Go, Lovely Rose!

SATB a cappella

Duration 2:30

Text by Edmund Waller

Notes

The wonderful conductor and good friend of mine , David Weiller, programs a setting of “Go, Lovely Rose!” every single year. I cannot disagree with him that it is a wonderful text, and there are many wonderful settings of it from Halsey Stevens to Eric Whitacre. Nonetheless, I was inspired by David to set it myself.

Text

Go, lovely rose!
Tell her that wastes her time and me,
That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Tell her that’s young,
And shuns to have her graces spied,
That hadst thou sprung
In deserts, where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.

Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired;
Bid her come forth,
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.

Then die! that she
The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee;
How small a part of time they share
That are so wondrous sweet and fair!