Gay Florimel of noble birth (Thomas Arne)
Music files
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- (Posted 2023-10-17) CPDL #76417:
- Editor: Christopher Shaw (submitted 2023-10-17). Score information: A4, 2 pages, 535 kB Copyright: CC BY SA
- Edition notes: Please click on the link for preview/playback/PDF download. This edition includes the original orchestral accompaniment.
- (Posted 2023-10-17) CPDL #76418:
- Editor: Christopher Shaw (submitted 2023-10-17). Score information: A4, 2 pages, 124 kB Copyright: CC BY SA
- Edition notes: Please click on the link for preview/playback/PDF download. This edition includes a keyboard reduction of the orchestral accompaniment
General Information
Title: Gay Florimel of noble birth
Composer: Thomas Arne
Lyricist: Christopher Smart
Number of voices: 1v Voicing: solo high
Genre: Secular, Aria
Language: English
Instruments: Basso continuo, violin
First published: 1748
Description: A song written for performance at Vauxhall; the text "written by a gentleman of Cambridge (viz. Christopher Smart), on a young lady, who was so closely watch'd by an aunt, her guardian, that he could never get an opportunity to address her". Published in Lyric Harmony, second volume.
External websites:
Original text and translations
English text
Gay Florimel of noble birth,
The most engaging thing on earth,
To please a blithe gallant
Has much of wit and much of mirth,
And much of tongue to set it forth;
But then she has an aunt.
How oft, alas! In vain I've tried
To tempt her from her guardian's side,
And trap her on love's hook.
She's like a little wanton lamb
That frisks about the careful dam,
But shuns the shepherd's crook.
Like wretched Dives, I am plac'd
To see the joys I ne'er must taste,
Of all my hopes bereav'n;
Her aunt's the dreadful gulf betwixt,
By all the pow'rs of malice fix'd,
To cheat me of my heav'n.