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‘Et in Arcadia Ego’, literally ‘And I too in Arcadia’, is a Latin phrase first coined in 16th-century Italy, and is featured in much art and literature.
Most famously the title of 17th-century paintings of ‘idyllic Arcadian life’ by Poussin and Guercino, its meaning is ambiguous. Some read it as ‘even in Paradise I, Death can be found’, others as ‘Though still on Earth, I am in Paradise’.
Both the cynical and content readings of this phrase are represented in contrasting ‘cells’ in the score, and the ambiguity of the title also explored through the music’s aleatoric features. The concept of freedom, one of the main Arcadian ideals, is also explored through the piece, with some strict, standard western notation within a free time period, juxtaposed with other freer graphic notation but within strict time codes. The stricter elements of both these sections are broken down at the end of the piece where freely interpretable material is played within a free timeframe.
Some of the graphic figures and shapes in the score are in fact traced from shapes found in the Poussin and Guercino artworks and are also all freer ‘variations’ on the stricter western-notated cells found towards the start of the piece, marking a progression towards freedom and a breakdown of rigidity throughout the piece.
The text is a collection of lines taken from a poem also of the same title by Felicia Hemans. The poem, referring to the works of Poussin and Guercino, explores this ideology of Arcadian happiness. The text however is broken up in the piece, exploring a more disjunct and darker theme than the original poem.
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And I Too in Arcadia!
Felicia Hemans, 1824
They have wandered in their glee
With the butterfly and bee,
They have climbed o'er heathery swells,
They have wound thro' forest dells,
Mountain moss hath felt their tread,
Woodland streams their way have led;
Flowers in deepest Oread nooks,
Nurslings of the loneliest brooks,
Unto them have yielded up
Fragrant Bell and starry Cup;
Chaplets are on every brow,
What hath staid the wanderers now?
Lo! a grey and rustic tomb
Bowered amidst the rich wood gloom
Whence those words their stricken bosoms melt— "I too, shepherds! in Arcadia dwelt!"
There is many a summer sound
That pale sepulchre around;
Thro' the shade young birds are glancing Insect wings on sun-streaks dancing, Glimpses of blue festal skies
Pouring in when soft winds rise;
Violets o'er the turf below
Shedding out their warmest glow;
Yet a spirit not its own,
O'er the greenwood now is thrown! Something of an under note
Through its music seems to float, Something of a stillness grey
Creeps across the laughing day, Something from those old words felt— "I too, shepherds, in Arcadia dwelt."
Was some gentle kindred maid
In that grave with dirges laid?
Some fair creature, with the tone
Of whose voice a joy is gone,
Leaving melody and mirth
Poorer on this altered Earth?
Is it thus? that so they stand,
Dropping flowers from every hand;
Flowers, and Lyres, and gathered store
Of red wild-fruit, prized no more?
No, from that bright band of morn
Not one link hath yet been torn;
'Tis the Shadow of the Tomb,
Falling thus o'er Summer's bloom,
O'er the flush of Love and Life,
Passing with a sudden strife:
'Tis the low, prophetic breath
Rising from the house of death,
Which thus whispers, those glad hearts to melt— "I too, shepherds, in Arcadia dwelt."
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Please get in touch at j.22.fitzgerald@gmail.com if you interested in viewing a score for this or any other of the music on my SoundCloud.
- Genre
- Contemporary Classical