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Hard Times

  • (Stephen Foster)

    Chorus:
    'Tis the song, the sigh of the weary
    Hard times, hard times, come again no more
    Many days you have lingered around my cabin door
    Oh hard times, come again no more

    Let us pause in life's pleasures and count its many tears
    For we all sup sorrow with the poor
    There's a song that will linger forever in our ears
    Oh hard times, come again no more

    While we seek youth and beauty and music bright and gay
    There are frail forms fainting at the door
    Though their voices are silent their pleading looks will say
    Oh hard times, come again no more

    Not used:
    There's a pale drooping maiden who toils her life away
    With a worn heart whose better days are o'er
    Though her voice would be merry, 'tis sighing all the day
    Oh hard times, come again no more

    'Tis a sigh that is wafted across the troubled wave
    'Tis a wail that is heard upon the shore
    'Tis a dirge that is murmured around the lowly grave
    Oh hard times, come again no more

    As sung by De Dannan

Susannes Folksong-Notizen

  • [1946:] Stephen Foster achieved a truly American expression. Born and bred in Pittsburgh, he was not influenced by the foreign music that enslaved the composers who lived in the more cosmopolitan seaboard cities. The voices Stephen heard were those of the minstrel shows, the singing and dancing of Negroes on the wharves of the Ohio River, and the sentimental songs of mid-century that were carried through the country by the "singing family" troupes, and were sung by demure young ladies who played the accompaniments on square pianos covered with brocade and lace. ('A Treasury of Stephen Foster', Random House)

  • [2000:] The "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" of 1854, this song expressed the nation's struggles through a major financial depression. (American Experience - Stephen Foster)

  • Books: John Tasker Howard: Stephen Foster, America's troubadour. Tudor, New York 1939;
    Ken Emerson: Doo-dah! Stephen Foster and the rise of American popular culture. Simon & Schuster, New York c1997.

  • See also
    http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=2933
    http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=6187
    http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=19434

Quelle: USA

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