Look you don’t have to take requests I know, but I really want you to blog through every track on “Good Old Boys.” Well you can skip “Naked Man.” That one seems disposable.
You probably won't be surprised to hear that I'm interested in your objections to Attridge.
In these contexts, I think of Thomas Campion, who was A) England's best music-&-words songwriter before the twentieth century, & B) a champion of English nonrhyming wannabe-quantitative meter. Was his treatise an attempt to curry favor with Sydney & heroes of his kidney? Or just an "I despise what I'm good at" reaction, like so many self-condemned sell-outs (e.g., "https://www.blueridgejournal.com/poems/dm-pete.htm")? I still wonder.
Alongside "I Think It's Going to Rain Today", "Simon Smith" is my favorite Newman composition. For me "sincere"'s forced accent lands squarely on the tightrope spirit of the song: simultaneously, undecidably naïve & show-biz professional.
In response, his fellow poet Samuel Daniel (who supplied some lyrics to his musician brother, John Danyel) wrote "A Defence of Ryme", "for that this detractor (whose commendable Rymes, albeit now himselfe an enemy to ryme, have given heretofore to the world the best notice of his worth) is a man of faire parts, and good reputation, and therefore the reproach forcibly cast from such a hand may throw downe more at once than the labors of many shall in long time build up againe, specially upon the slippery foundation of opinion, and the worlds inconstancy, which knowes not well what it would have".
Look you don’t have to take requests I know, but I really want you to blog through every track on “Good Old Boys.” Well you can skip “Naked Man.” That one seems disposable.
You probably won't be surprised to hear that I'm interested in your objections to Attridge.
In these contexts, I think of Thomas Campion, who was A) England's best music-&-words songwriter before the twentieth century, & B) a champion of English nonrhyming wannabe-quantitative meter. Was his treatise an attempt to curry favor with Sydney & heroes of his kidney? Or just an "I despise what I'm good at" reaction, like so many self-condemned sell-outs (e.g., "https://www.blueridgejournal.com/poems/dm-pete.htm")? I still wonder.
Alongside "I Think It's Going to Rain Today", "Simon Smith" is my favorite Newman composition. For me "sincere"'s forced accent lands squarely on the tightrope spirit of the song: simultaneously, undecidably naïve & show-biz professional.
Campion is great: no question.
I care not for these ladies,
That must be wooed and prayed;
Give me kind Amaryllis,
The wanton country maid.
Nature art disdaineth;
Her beauty is her own.
Metrically gorgeous. It helps that all the vowels in Ἀμαρυλλίς are short.
I haven't read his Treatise: isn't it about counterpoint, rather than musical prosody?
Campion's peculiar poetics tract is a different treatise, "Observations in the Art of English Poesie":
https://archive.org/details/worksofdrthomasc00camp/page/224/mode/2up
In response, his fellow poet Samuel Daniel (who supplied some lyrics to his musician brother, John Danyel) wrote "A Defence of Ryme", "for that this detractor (whose commendable Rymes, albeit now himselfe an enemy to ryme, have given heretofore to the world the best notice of his worth) is a man of faire parts, and good reputation, and therefore the reproach forcibly cast from such a hand may throw downe more at once than the labors of many shall in long time build up againe, specially upon the slippery foundation of opinion, and the worlds inconstancy, which knowes not well what it would have".
https://web.archive.org/web/20090426091220/https://luminarium.org/renascence-editions/ryme.html
Ah, that's fascinating: didn't know about that.
Thank you!!!