Thursday, December 15, 2016

Carpe Diem #1097 Serenade in D major by Ethel Smyth


Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Today at 10 PM (CET) the Carpe Diem Winter Retreat and our first Tanka Kukai will close for submissions, so if you want to submit for the Winter Retreat or the Tanka Kukai than don't forget to do that before 10 PM (CET).

Welcome at a new episode of Carpe Diem Haiku Kai, a daily haiku meme. Today we are going on with the discovery of beautiful classical music of all times and from all over the world to inspire us. Today I have another nice compositon by a female composer of whom I never had heard. Today I love to inspire you with Serenade in D major by Ethel Mary Smyth (1858-1944).

Ethel Smyth (1858-1944)
Let me first tell you a little bit more about Ethyl Smyth before I share the composition for today's episode.

Dame Ethel Mary Smyth, DBE (1858 – 1944) was an English composer and a member of the women's suffrage movement. Smyth was born in Sidcup, Kent, which is now in the London Borough of Bexley, as the fourth of a family of eight children. Her father, John Hall Smyth, who was a Major-General in the Royal Artillery, was very much opposed to her making a career in music.
Undeterred, Smyth was determined to become a composer, studied with a private tutor, and then attended the Leipzig Conservatory, where she met many composers of the day. Her compositions include songs, works for piano, chamber music, orchestral and concertante works, choral works, and operas.
She lived at Frimhurst, near Frimley Green for many years, but from 1913 onwards, she began gradually to lose her hearing and managed to complete only four more major works before deafness brought her composing career to an end. However, she found a new interest in literature and, between 1919 and 1940, she published ten highly successful, mostly autobiographical, books.
In recognition of her work as a composer and writer, Smyth was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in 1922, becoming the first female composer to be awarded a damehood.  Smyth received honorary doctorates in music from the Universities of Durham and Oxford. She died in Woking in 1944 at the age of 86. (video by Unsung Masterworks)

early Sunrise
while the sun climbs to the blue sky
birds awaken

© Chèvrefeuille

What a nice piece of music, I had to listen a few times to come up with the above haiku. I think it fits the music, notwithstanding the fact that a serenade is mostly in the evening and not in the early morning.

This episode is open for your submissions tonight at 7.00 PM (CET) and will remain open until December 20th at noon (CET). I will try to publish our new episode, Symphony No. 1 by Georges Onslow, later on. For now .... have fun!

1 comment:

  1. A nice piece of music - I can heat the birds too, like your morning haIku that fits so well.

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