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Henry Purcell

The Fairy Queen, Z. 629 (Suckling/McCreesh Edition)

The Fairy-Queen (1692; Purcell catalogue number Z.629) is a semi-opera by Henry Purcell; a "Restoration spectacular". The libretto is an anonymous adaptation of William Shakespeare's comedy A Midsummer Night's Dream. First performed in 1692, The Fairy-Queen was composed three years before Purcell's death at the age of 36. Following his death, the score was lost and only rediscovered early in the twentieth century.

Purcell did not set any of Shakespeare's text to music; instead he composed music for short masques in every act but the first. The play itself was also slightly modernised in keeping with seventeenth-century dramatic conventions, but in the main the spoken text is as Shakespeare wrote it. The masques are related to the play metaphorically, rather than literally. Many critics have stated that they bear no relationship to the play. Recent scholarship has shown that the opera, which ends with a masque featuring Hymen, the God of Marriage, was composed for the fifteenth wedding anniversary of King William III and Queen Mary II.

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Movements

Act I

  1. First Act Tune - Jig
  2. Prelude & Song - Come, Let Us Leave the Town
  3. Scene of the Drunken Poet

Act II

  1. Chorus - Now Join Your Warbling Voices All
  2. Dance for the Followers of Night
  3. Prelude & Song - Come All Ye Songsters
  4. Prelude & Song - One Charming Night
  5. Prelude & Song - See, Even Night Herself is Here
  6. Second Act Tune - Air
  7. Song & Chorus - Hush, No More
  8. Song - I Am Come to Lock All Fast
  9. Song - May the God of Wit Inspire
  10. Song, Chorus & Dance - Sing While We Trip It
  11. Symphony in Imitation of Birds
  12. Symphony in Imitation of an Echo

Act III

  1. Dance for the Fairies
  2. Dance for the Green Men
  3. Dance for the Haymakers
  4. Prelude & Dialogue - Now the Maids and the Men are Making of Hay
  5. Prelude & Song - When I Have Often Heard Young Maids Complaining
  6. Prelude, Song & Chorus - If Love's a Sweet Passion
  7. Song & Chorus - A Thousand, Thousand Ways
  8. Song - Ye Gentle Spirits of the Air
  9. Symphony While the Swans Come Forward
  10. Third Act Tune - Hornpipe

Act IV

  1. Chorus - Hail! Great Parent of Us All
  2. Chorus - Hail! Great Parent of Us All (2)
  3. Fourth Act Tune - Air
  4. Prelude & Song - Here's the Summer
  5. Prelude & Song - See My Many Colour'd Fields
  6. Prelude & Song - Thus the Ever Grateful Spring
  7. Prelude & Song - When a Cruel Long Winter
  8. Song & Chorus - Now the Night is Chas'd Away
  9. Song - Let the Fifes and the Clarions
  10. Song - Next, Winter Comes Slowly
  11. Symphony - Prelude / Canzona / Largo / Allegro / Adagio / Allegro
  12. Symphony for the Entry of Phoebus

Act V

  1. Dance for Chinese Man & Woman - Chaconne
  2. Dance for the Monkeys
  3. Entry Dance
  4. Prelude & Song - Thrice Happy Lovers
  5. Prelude as Hymen Enters
  6. Prelude, Song & Chorus - Thus Happy and Free
  7. Song & Chorus - Hark the Echoing Air a Triumph Sings
  8. Song & Chorus - Sure the Dull God of Marriage / Hymen Appear
  9. Song & Chorus - They Shall Be As Happy As They're Fair
  10. Song - Hark How All Things with One Sound Rejoice
  11. Song - See, I Obey / Turn Then Thine Eyes / My Torch, Indeed
  12. Song - Thus the Gloomy World
  13. Song - Yes, Daphne
  14. Symphony
  1. Interlude: The Plaint - O Let Me Weep
  2. Air
  3. Hornpipe
  4. Overture
  5. Prelude
  6. Rondeau

Recommended recordings

Elsewhere

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