The Land of Lost Content is a song cycle for voice and piano composed in 1920–21 by John Ireland (1879–1962). It consists of settings of six poems by A. E. Housman from his 1896 collection A Shropshire Lad.[1][2]
A typical performance takes about 11 minutes. The songs are, with Roman numerals from A Shropshire Lad, and first lines where Housman did not title his poem:[3]
- XXIX "The Lent Lily" [4]
- XV "Ladslove" ("Look not in my eyes")
- XVII "Goal and Wicket" ("Twice a week the winter thorough")
- XXXIII "The Vain Desire" ("If truth in hearts that perish")
- XXII "The Encounter" ("The street sounds to the soldiers' tread")
- LVII "Epilogue" ("You smile upon your friend today")
The title of the cycle is taken from Housman's poem "Into my heart an air that kills", XL in A Shropshire Lad:
That is the land of lost content,
I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again.[5]— lines 5-8
References
edit- ^ John Ireland: The Land of Lost Content, cycle of 6 songs for voice & piano at AllMusic. Retrieved 26 April 2015.
- ^ The Land of Lost Content (John Ireland): Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
- ^ "The Land of Lost Content: Song Cycle by John (Nicholson) Ireland (1879–1962)". recmusic.org.
- ^ The Lent Lily (Ireland, John): Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
- ^ Housman, A. E. (1906). A Shropshire Lad. New York: John Lane Company. p. 57.
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