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The Swimmer (poem)
"The Swimmer" is a poem by the Australian poet Adam Lindsay Gordon. The poem is from his last volume of poems ''Bush Ballads and Galloping Rhymes'' published in 1870, when he was living at Melbourne. In ''The Poems of Adam Lindsay Gordon'', it is grouped among "Poems Swinburnian in Form and Pessimism, but full of the Personality of Gordon." The poem was set to music by Sir Edward Elgar as the fifth and last song in his song-cycle ''Sea Pictures''. Lyrics Square brackets indicate text omitted in Elgar's song. ''Italics'' indicate text repeated in the song. "The Swimmer" With short, sharp, violent lights made vivid, To southward far as the sight can roam ; Only the swirl of the surges livid, The seas that climb and the surfs that comb. Only the crag and the cliff to nor'ward, ndthe rocks receding, and reefs flung forward, ndwaifs wrecked seaward and wasted shoreward On shallows sheeted with flaming foam. A grim, grey coast and a seaboard ghastly, And shores tr ...
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Adam Lindsay Gordon
Adam Lindsay Gordon (19 October 1833 – 24 June 1870) was a British-Australian poet, horseman, police officer and politician. He was the first Australian poet to gain considerable recognition overseas, and according to his contemporary, writer Marcus Clarke, Gordon's work represented "the beginnings of a national school of Australian poetry". Early life Though commonly cited as having been born in Fayal in the Azores, where Captain Gordon had brought his wife for the sake of her health, Gordon's birthplace was the small English village of Charlton Kings near Cheltenham, where he was baptised. He was the son of Captain Adam Durnford Gordon and Harriet Gordon, his first cousin, both of whom were descended from Adam Gordon of Auchindoun, of the ballad " Edom o Gordon". Captain Gordon had retired from the Bengal cavalry and taught Hindustani. His mother's family had owned slaves in the British West Indies until the abolition of slavery in the 1830s, and had received signif ...
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Bush Ballads And Galloping Rhymes
''Bush Ballads and Galloping Rhymes'' (1870) is the second poetry collection by Australian poet Adam Lindsay Gordon. It was also the last collection to be published during the poet's lifetime appearing only the day before the author's suicide. The original collection included only 16 poems, though later editions expanded on this list. Most of the poems were published in the Australian newspapers ''Colonial Monthly'' and ''The Australasian''. Contents * " A Dedication" * " The Sick Stockrider" * "The Swimmer" * "From the Wreck" * "No Name" * "Wolf and Hound" * "De Te" * "How We Beat the Favourite" * "From The Road to Avernus" * "Doubtful Dreams" * "The Rhyme of Joyous Garde" * " Thora's Song" * "The Three Friends" * "A Song of Autumn" * "The Romance of Britomarte" * "Laudamus" Critical reception On its original publication a reviewer in ''The Argus'', aware of the poet's recent death, wrote: "Mr. Gordon was a man of cultivated and refined mind, and of more than average litera ...
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Melbourne
Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/ Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a metropolitan area known as Greater Melbourne, comprising an urban agglomeration of 31 local municipalities, although the name is also used specifically for the local municipality of City of Melbourne based around its central business area. The metropolis occupies much of the northern and eastern coastlines of Port Phillip Bay and spreads into the Mornington Peninsula, part of West Gippsland, as well as the hinterlands towards the Yarra Valley, the Dandenong and Macedon Ranges. It has a population over 5 million (19% of the population of Australia, as per 2021 census), mostly residing to the east side of the city centre, and its inhabitants are commonly referred to as "Melburnians". The area of Melbourne has been home to Abori ...
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Algernon Charles Swinburne
Algernon Charles Swinburne (5 April 1837 – 10 April 1909) was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. He wrote several novels and collections of poetry such as '' Poems and Ballads'', and contributed to the famous Eleventh Edition of the ''Encyclopædia Britannica''. Swinburne wrote about many taboo topics, such as lesbianism, sado-masochism, and anti-theism. His poems have many common motifs, such as the ocean, time, and death. Several historical people are featured in his poems, such as Sappho ("Sapphics"), Anactoria ("Anactoria"), and Catullus ("To Catullus"). Biography Swinburne was born at 7 Chester Street, Grosvenor Place, London, on 5 April 1837. He was the eldest of six children born to Captain (later Admiral) Charles Henry Swinburne (1797–1877) and Lady Jane Henrietta, daughter of the 3rd Earl of Ashburnham, a wealthy Northumbrian family. He grew up at East Dene in Bonchurch on the Isle of Wight. The Swinburnes also had a London home at Whiteha ...
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Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the ''Enigma Variations'', the ''Pomp and Circumstance Marches'', concertos for violin and cello, and two symphonies. He also composed choral works, including ''The Dream of Gerontius'', chamber music and songs. He was appointed Master of the King's Musick in 1924. Although Elgar is often regarded as a typically English composer, most of his musical influences were not from England but from continental Europe. He felt himself to be an outsider, not only musically, but socially. In musical circles dominated by academics, he was a self-taught composer; in Protestant Britain, his Roman Catholicism was regarded with suspicion in some quarters; and in the class-conscious society of Victorian and Edwardian Britain, he was acu ...
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Sea Pictures
''Sea Pictures, Op. 37'' is a song cycle by Sir Edward Elgar consisting of five songs written by various poets. It was set for contralto and orchestra, though a distinct version for piano was often performed by Elgar. Many mezzo-sopranos have sung the piece. The songs are: * " Sea Slumber Song" by Roden Noel (approximately 4 minutes) * " In Haven (Capri)" by Caroline Alice Elgar, the composer's wife (under 2 minutes) * "Sabbath Morning at Sea" by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (approximately 4 minutes) * "Where Corals Lie" by Richard Garnett (approximately 3 minutes) * " The Swimmer" by Adam Lindsay Gordon (approximately 5 minutes) Much of the vocal line of the first song, "Sea Slumber Song", is heard again in other parts of the cycle; most notably, the second stanza is heard again almost in its entirety as part of the finale. History Elgar composed the piece on his 1894 Broadwood Square piano while residing at Birchwood Lodge, Great Storridge in Herefordshire. The songs wer ...
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Shallop
Shallop is a name used for several types of boats and small ships (French ''chaloupe'') used for coastal navigation from the seventeenth century. Originally smaller boats based on the chalupa, the watercraft named this ranged from small boats a little larger than a banks dory to gunboats. The shallops used by English explorers were about long and equipped with oars and a mast with one or two sails. These larger English shallops could take over a dozen people and usually had a shallow draft of about . The larger vessels of this design could carry a substantial load and be armed with cannon. Captain John Smith used shallops to explore Chesapeake Bay in the summer of 1608. The boats were disassembled and stowed aboard the '' Susan Constant'', being reassembled when the colonists arrived in North America. The Danes armed large boats called shallops for use as gunboats, particularly in the Gunboat War (1807–1814) between Denmark–Norway and the British Navy during the Napoleonic ...
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Where Corals Lie
"Where Corals Lie" is a poem by Richard Garnett which was set to music by Sir Edward Elgar as the fourth song in his song-cycle ''Sea Pictures''. The poem was first published in ''Io in Egypt and other poems'' in 1859 and subsequently anthologized in ''Sea Music'' in 1888. Lyrics (Italicised text indicates lines repeated in the song, but not in the original poem.) The deeps have music soft and low When winds awake the airy spry, It lures me, lures me on to go And see the land where corals lie. ''The land, the land, where corals lie.'' By mount and mead, by lawn and rill, When night is deep, and moon is high, That music seeks and finds me still, And tells me where the corals lie. ''And tells me where the corals lie.'' Yes, press my eyelids close, 'tis well, ''Yes, press my eyelids close, 'tis well'', But far the rapid fancies fly To rolling worlds of wave and shell, And all the land where corals lie. Thy lips are like a sunset glow, Thy smile is like a morning sky, Yet leave ...
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Sea Slumber Song
"Sea Slumber Song" is a 19th-century poem by Roden Noel set to music by Sir Edward Elgar as the first song in his song-cycle ''Sea Pictures'' (1899). Lyrics The poem here is as sung in ''Sea Pictures''. ''Italicised'' text indicates lines repeated in the song but not in the original poem. Elgar's setting The sea's lullaby ("I, the Mother mild") is evoked by bass drum and tam-tam and strings repeating a phrase that reappears later in the song cycle. At "Isles in elfin light" the music changes key to C major before returning to the oceanic theme. Beales, Brendan ''Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Concert Programme'' for performance at the Royal Albert Hall The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London. One of the UK's most treasured and distinctive buildings, it is held in trust for the nation and managed by a registered charity which receives no govern ... 6 April 2008 References Further reading * — Del Mar's notes on ...
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Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) is a British symphony orchestra based in London, that performs and produces primarily classic works. The RPO was established by Thomas Beecham in 1946. In its early days, the orchestra secured profitable recording contracts and important engagements including the Glyndebourne Festival Opera and the concerts of the Royal Philharmonic Society. After Beecham's death in 1961, the RPO's fortunes declined steeply. The RPO battled for survival until the mid-1960s, when its future was secured after a report by the Arts Council of Great Britain recommended that it should receive public subsidy. A further crisis arose in the same era when it seemed that the orchestra's right to call itself "Royal" could be withdrawn. In 2004, the RPO acquired its first permanent London base, at Cadogan Hall in Chelsea. The RPO also gives concerts at the Royal Festival Hall, the Royal Albert Hall and venues around the UK and other countries. The current musi ...
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Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London. One of the UK's most treasured and distinctive buildings, it is held in trust for the nation and managed by a registered charity which receives no government funding. It can seat 5,272. Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres have appeared on its stage. It is the venue for the BBC Proms concerts, which have been held there every summer since 1941. It is host to more than 390 shows in the main auditorium annually, including classical, rock and pop concerts, ballet, opera, film screenings with live orchestral accompaniment, sports, awards ceremonies, school and community events, and charity performances and banquets. A further 400 events are held each year in the non-auditorium spaces. Over its 151 year history the hall has hosted people from various fields, including meetings by Suffragettes, speeches from Winston Church ...
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Australian Poems
Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Australians, indigenous peoples of Australia as identified and defined within Australian law * Australia (continent) ** Indigenous Australians * Australian English, the dialect of the English language spoken in Australia * Australian Aboriginal languages * ''The Australian'', a newspaper * Australiana, things of Australian origins Other uses * Australian (horse), a racehorse * Australian, British Columbia, an unincorporated community in Canada See also * The Australian (other) * Australia (other) * * * Austrian (other) Austrian may refer to: * Austrians, someone from Austria or of Austrian descent ** Someone who is considered an Austrian citizen, see Austrian nationality law * Austrian German dialect * Someth ...
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