''Westron Wynde'' is an early 16th-century
song
A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetitio ...
whose
tune was used as the basis (
cantus firmus
In music, a ''cantus firmus'' ("fixed melody") is a pre-existing melody forming the basis of a polyphonic composition.
The plural of this Latin term is , although the corrupt form ''canti firmi'' (resulting from the grammatically incorrect tr ...
) of Masses by English composers
John Taverner
John Taverner ( – 18 October 1545) was an English composer and organist, regarded as one of the most important English composers of his era. He is best-known for ''Missa Gloria tibi Trinitas'' and ''The Western Wynde Mass'', and ''Missa Coro ...
,
Christopher Tye
Christopher Tye (c.1505 – before 1573) was an English Renaissance composer and organist. Probably born in Cambridgeshire, he trained at the University of Cambridge and became the master of the choir at Ely Cathedral. He is noted as the music ...
and
John Sheppard. The tune first appears with words in a
partbook
A partbook is a format for printing or copying music in which each book contains the part for a single voice or instrument, especially popular during the Renaissance and Baroque. This format contrasts with the large choirbook, which included all ...
of around 1530, catalogued by the British Library as Royal Appendix MS 58.
Historians believe that the lyrics are a few hundred years older ('Middle English') and the words are a fragment of medieval poetry.
Lyrics
The lyrics of the original, as transcribed by Charles Frey:
: Westron wynde when wyll thow blow
: the smalle rayne downe can Rayne
: Cryst yf my love were in my Armys
: And I yn my bed Agayne.
Music
Recovering the original tune of ''Westron Wynde'' that was used in these Masses is not entirely straightforward. There is a version that uses the secular words, but with rather different notes:
![WesternWindOriginalSong](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/eb/WesternWindOriginalSong.PNG)
The version used by the three Mass composers can only be inferred by what they put into their Masses. In program notes (see below), Peter Phillips offers the following reconstruction:
![WesternWindReconstructedVersion](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/WesternWindReconstructedVersion.PNG)
But this is not always exactly what appears in the Masses; thus the
New Grove
''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language ''Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and theor ...
quotes the following sequence from Taverner's Mass:
![WesternWindFromTavernerMass](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/WesternWindFromTavernerMass.PNG)
For the words being sung here, see
Mass (music)
The Mass ( la, missa) is a form of sacred musical composition that sets the invariable portions of the Christian Eucharistic liturgy (principally that of the Catholic Church, the Anglican Communion, and Lutheranism), known as the Mass.
Most Mass ...
.
Reworkings and Recordings
''Westron Wynde'' was put to music by
Igor Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of the ...
as a movement (''Westron Wind'') of his
Cantata
A cantata (; ; literally "sung", past participle feminine singular of the Italian verb ''cantare'', "to sing") is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir.
The meaning of ...
(1952).
The American folk group
The Limeliters
The Limeliters are an American folk music group, formed in July 1959 by Lou Gottlieb (bass violin/bass), Alex Hassilev (banjo/baritone), and Glenn Yarbrough (guitar/tenor). The group was active from 1959 until 1965, and then after a hiatus of si ...
(
Louis Gottlieb
Louis Gottlieb (October 10, 1923 – July 11, 1996) credited as Lou Gottlieb, was an American bassist and comic spokesman for music trio The Limeliters. He held a PhD in musicology and was considered one of the so-called "new comedy" performers, ...
,
Alex Hassilev
Alex Hassilev (born July 11, 1932, Paris) is an American folk musician who was one of the founding members of the group the Limeliters. Educated at Harvard and the University of Chicago, he is an actor with a number of film and television appear ...
, and
Glenn Yarbrough
Glenn Robertson Yarbrough (January 12, 1930 – August 11, 2016) was an American folk singer and guitarist. He was the lead singer (tenor) with the Limeliters from 1959 to 1963 and also had a prolific solo career. Yarbrough had a restlessne ...
) recorded a version using a variation of the first tune above, with modern English stanzas interpolated. Both the variation and the interpolated stanzas were most likely written by the Limeliters themselves, one of whom (Gottlieb) was a musicologist and would have been familiar with the original song.
The British guitarist
John Renbourn
John Renbourn (8 August 1944 – 26 March 2015) was an English guitarist and songwriter. He was best known for his collaboration with guitarist Bert Jansch as well as his work with the folk group Pentangle, although he maintained a solo care ...
recorded his own arrangement of the tune for two guitars on his 1970 album ''The Lady and the Unicorn''. The song has been recorded by
Maddy Prior
Madelaine Edith Prior MBE (born 14 August 1947) is an English folk singer, best known as the lead vocalist of Steeleye Span. She was born in Blackpool and moved to St Albans in her teens. Her father, Allan Prior, was co-creator of the police dr ...
and
Tim Hart
Tim Hart (9 January 1948 – 24 December 2009) was an English folk singer and multi-instrumentalist, best known as a founding member of British folk rock band Steeleye Span.
Early years
Tim Hart was born in Lincoln, England, but moved to St ...
on the album ''Summer Solstice'' and by
Barbara Dickson
Barbara Ruth Dickson (born 27 September 1947) is a Scottish singer and actress whose hits include 'I Know Him So Well', 'Answer Me' and 'January February'. Dickson has placed fifteen albums on the UK Albums Chart from 1977 to date, and had a n ...
on ''Full Circle''.
The British band
Current 93
Current 93 are an English experimental music group, working since the early 1980s in folk-based musical forms. The band was founded in 1982 by David Tibet, who has been Current 93's only constant member.
Background
Tibet has been the only const ...
recorded an extended and modified version of the song sometime between 1982 and 1995, adding various new lines. This version, however, was not released until 2010.
Susan McKeown and The Chanting House perform poet Robert Burns's version of the song entitled "Westlin Winds" on the 1995 album "Bones."
British composer Roger Jackson used the text and added a new verse in an entirely new setting in 2014.
:"Eye of Heaven, pray gently smile,
:And though the cold wind blow,
:Soft, may you warm and mind my love
:That I do love her so"
New Zealand composer
Douglas Lilburn
Douglas Gordon Lilburn (2 November 19156 June 2001) was a New Zealand composer.
Early life
Lilburn was born in Whanganui and spent his early years on the family sheep farm in the upper Turakina River valley at Drysdale. He attended Waitaki Bo ...
wrote a string quartet in 1939 entitled ''Phantasy'' based on a reworking of ''Westron Wynde''. He undoubtedly modelled the work on his teacher
Ralph Vaughan Williams
Ralph Vaughan Williams, (; 12 October 1872– 26 August 1958) was an English composer. His works include operas, ballets, chamber music, secular and religious vocal pieces and orchestral compositions including nine symphonies, written over ...
'
Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis
''Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis'', also known as the ''Tallis Fantasia'', is a one-movement work for string orchestra by Ralph Vaughan Williams. The theme is by the 16th-century English composer Thomas Tallis. The Fantasia was first perf ...
(Lilburn was studying with Vaughan Williams at the time).
Versions
Both simplified and distorted versions of this poem have been printed over the past many years. These include both tampered and accurately modernized versions. For example William Chappell inserted 'O' at the start of the poem and replaced the word 'Cryst' with 'Oh' in his 1859 version. The latter was probably done to make it a safe reading for women and children in the 19th century context. He also included 'doth' between 'down' and 'rayne' based on his probable interpretation that the wind did blow the rain away. Some modernization of spellings was done by other editors to make the poem accessible for modern reading.
In popular culture
The poem is used by:
*
Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style—which he termed the iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century fic ...
in his novel ''
A Farewell to Arms
''A Farewell to Arms'' is a novel by American writer Ernest Hemingway, set during the Italian campaign of World War I. First published in 1929, it is a first-person account of an American, Frederic Henry, serving as a lieutenant () in the am ...
'' (1929).
*
Virginia Woolf
Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device.
Woolf was born i ...
in her novel ''
The Waves
''The Waves'' is a 1931 novel by English novelist Virginia Woolf. It is critically regarded as her most experimental work, consisting of ambiguous and cryptic soliloquies spoken mainly by six characters; Bernard, Susan, Rhoda, Neville, Jinny an ...
'' (1931).
*
Wilbur Daniel Steele
Wilbur Daniel Steele (17 March 1886, Greensboro, North Carolina – 26 May 1970, Stamford, Connecticut) was a U.S. author and playwright. He has been called "America's recognised master of the popular short story" between World War I and the Gr ...
in his short story ''How Beautiful with Shoes''.
*
Madeleine L'Engle
Madeleine L'Engle DStJ (; November 29, 1918 – September 6, 2007) was an American writer of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and young adult fiction, including ''A Wrinkle in Time'' and its sequels: ''A Wind in the Door'', ''A Swiftly Tilting Plan ...
in her novel ''
The Small Rain
''The Small Rain'' is a semi-autobiographical novel by Madeleine L'Engle, about the many difficulties in the life of talented pianist Katherine Forrester between the ages of 10 and 19. Published in 1945 by the Vanguard Press, it was the first of L ...
'' (1945).
*
Thomas Pynchon
Thomas Ruggles Pynchon Jr. ( , ; born May 8, 1937) is an American novelist noted for his dense and complex novels. His fiction and non-fiction writings encompass a vast array of subject matter, genres and themes, including history, music, scie ...
for the title of his first published story, ''
The Small Rain
''The Small Rain'' is a semi-autobiographical novel by Madeleine L'Engle, about the many difficulties in the life of talented pianist Katherine Forrester between the ages of 10 and 19. Published in 1945 by the Vanguard Press, it was the first of L ...
'' (1959).
*
Walter Tevis
Walter Stone Tevis (February 28, 1928 – August 9, 1984) was an American novelist and short story writer. Three of his six novels were adapted into major films: ''The Hustler'', ''The Color of Money'' and ''The Man Who Fell to Earth''. A fourth, ...
in his novel
''Mockingbird'' (1980).
*
Marta Randall
Marta Randall (born 1948 in Mexico City) is an American science fiction writer.
In addition to writing numerous science fiction novels and short fiction, Marta Randall has edited the ''New Dimensions'' science fiction anthology series, and '' The ...
in her book ''Dangerous Games'' (1980).
*The character Thierry (
Judge Reinhold
Edward Ernest "Judge" Reinhold Jr. (born May 21, 1957) is an American actor who has starred in several Hollywood movies, such as ''Ruthless People'', ''Fast Times at Ridgemont High'', ''Stripes'' and ''Gremlins'', and co-starred in all of the fil ...
) in the 1991 thriller ''
Zandalee
''Zandalee'' is a 1991 American erotic thriller/romantic tragedy directed by Sam Pillsbury and starring Nicolas Cage, Judge Reinhold, Erika Anderson, Viveca Lindfors, Aaron Neville, Joe Pantoliano and Steve Buscemi. The screenplay by Mari Kornhau ...
''.
*The character Mary Boleyn (
Scarlett Johansson
Scarlett Ingrid Johansson (; born November 22, 1984) is an American actress. The world's highest-paid actress in 2018 and 2019, she has featured multiple times on the ''Forbes'' Celebrity 100 list. ''Time'' magazine named her one of the 100 ...
) in the 2008 film ''
The Other Boleyn Girl
''The Other Boleyn Girl'' (2001) is a historical novel written by British author Philippa Gregory, loosely based on the life of 16th-century aristocrat Mary Boleyn (the sister of Anne Boleyn) of whom little is known. Inspired by Mary's life s ...
''.
*
Barbelle (Web Series) ficticious band from the web series of the same name in the song ''
Clear Cut'' (2017).
References
Bibliography
*Peter Phillips's reconstruction is taken from his program notes for his recording ''Western Wind Masses: Taverner, Tye Sheppard'', released 1993 on compact disc by
Gimell Records
The Tallis Scholars is a British professional early music vocal ensemble normally consisting of two singers per part, with a core group of ten singers. They specialise in performing ''a cappella'' sacred vocal music.
History
The group was formed ...
, 454 927-2.
*The remaining musical examples above are adapted from versions given in the online version (2004) of the ''
New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language ''Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and theo ...
''.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Western Wynde, The
British songs
Anonymous musical compositions
Renaissance chansons
16th-century songs