We'll to the Woods No More (John Ireland)

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We'll to the Woods No More is a song cycle for voice and piano composed in 1928 by John Ireland. It consists of settings of two poems by A. E. Housman (1859{{ndash}}1936) and a concluding piece for solo piano named after a third.{{cite web

|url=http://www.johnirelandtrust.org/ttoy.htm

|website=The John Ireland Trust

|title=List of works – T to Y

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A performance takes about 8 minutes. The poems are:{{cite web

|url=http://www.lieder.net/lieder/assemble_texts.html?SongCycleId=2685

|website=recmusic.org

|title= We'll to the woods no more: Song Cycle by John (Nicholson) Ireland (1879{{ndash}}1962)

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  1. "We'll to the Woods No More" (Last Poems (1922), unnumbered preface)
  2. "In Boyhood" ("When I would muse in boyhood"; Last Poems, No. XXXII)
  3. "Spring Will Not Wait" ("'Tis time, I think, by Wenlock town"; A Shropshire Lad (1896), No. XXXIX)

John France has written, "The mood of this cycle is typically a deep sense of the fragility of life, love and friendship that so influenced both men."{{cite web

|url=http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2007/Sept07/Ireland_SRCD2261.htm

|website=musicweb-international.com

|title=John Ireland (1879{{ndash}}1972): The Songs

|last=France

|first=John

|accessdate=29 April 2015 }} Rob Barnett has written of the piano piece "Spring Will Not Wait" that, "It is in Ireland’s typically elusive, wanderingly ambivalent tonal palette."{{cite web

|url=http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2007/Aug07/Ireland_songs_SRCD2261.htm

|website=musicweb-international.com

|title=John Ireland (1879{{ndash}}1972): The Songs

|last=Barnett

|first=Rob

|accessdate=29 April 2015 }}

References

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Category:Song cycles by John Ireland

Category:1928 compositions

Category:Musical settings of poems by A. E. Housman

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