Texts and Translations

Musica est dei donum optimi

Music is the best gift from God

Absalon, Fili Mi

Absalom, my son, 

Who will let me die instead of you, 

My son Absalom. 

Let me not live longer, 

But descend into hell weeping. 

Mille Regretz

A thousand regrets at deserting you

and leaving behind your loving face,

I feel so much sadness and such painful distress,

that it seems to me my days will soon dwindle away.

El Grillo

The cricket is a good singer

Who can hold long notes

After drinking, the cricket sings

But he doesn't do like the other birds

Once they've sung a little bit

They go somewhere else

The cricket instead stands firm

When it's very hot out

He sings only for the love of it

Super Flumina Babylonis

By the waters of Babylon, 

There we sat and wept:

When we remember Zion. 

Carmina Chromatico

These songs which you hear, 

Sung with chromatic progressions, 

Are those in which the 12 Sibyls once

With confident voice

Sang the secrets of our salvation. 

La Nuict Froide et Sombre

The cold and somber night, As sweet as honey, Which covers with a dark shadow The Earth and the skies, Makes sleep roll down from the sky Into people's eyes. Then the glowing1 day, Used to toil, Exposes its glow, And with a varied color Weaves and composes This great Universe.

Matona, mia Cara

My lovely lady, hear my song

sung under your window, to win you as companion.

Don don don etc…

Please hear the good things I sing

I wish you well like the Greek did the chicken.

(reference to a story well known at the time)

Don don don

When I go hunting, I hunt with the falcon

and I'll bring you a woodcock, as fat as foie gras

Don don don

I cannot tell you many elegant things,

I know nothing of Petrach, (an italian scholar)

nor the Fountain of Helicon (its magic water was thought to be a muse to poets)

Don don don

If you wish me well, I won't be lazy

I will f*** all night long bucking like a bronco

Don don don

Lamento d’Arianna

Mvt. One

Let me die.

And who do you think

can comfort me

in thus harsh fate,

in thus great suffering?

Let me die.

Mvt. Two

Oh Theseus, oh my Theseus,

yes, I still call you mine

for mine you are,

although you flee, cruel one,

far from my eyes.

Turn back, my Theseus,

turn back, Theseus, o God,

turn back to see again the one,

who for you has left her fatherland and kingdom,

and who, staying on these shores,

a prey to cruel and pitiless beasts,

will leave her bones denuded.

Oh Theseus, oh my Theseus,

if you knew, oh God,

if you only knew

how much poor Arianna

is frightened,

perhaps, overcome with remorse,

you would return your prow shorewards again.

But with the serene winds

you sail on happily, while I remain here weeping.

Athens prepares to greet you

with joyful and superb feasts and I remain,

a prey to wild beasts on these solitary shores.

You will be happily embraced by

your old parents and I will not see you again,

oh mother, oh my father.

Mvt. Three

Where is the faith you

swore me so much?

Is this how you place me

on my ancestors' throne?

Are these the crowns

with which you adorn my hair?

Are these the sceptres,

the diamonds and the gold?

To leave me abandoned

for the beast to tear up and devour?

Ah Theseus, ah my Theseus,

would you let me die,

weeping in vain, crying for aid

the wretched Arianna,

who trusted you and gave you glory and life?

Mvt. Four

Ah, that you do not even reply!

Ah, that your ears are deaf to my laments!

Oh clouds, oh storms, oh winds,

submerge him in those waves.

Fly, whales and orcs,

and fill up the profound gulfs

with these unworldly limbs!

What am I saying? Ah, what am I raving about?

Wretched that I am, what am I asking?

Oh Theseus, oh my Theseus,

that is, that is not I,

that it is not I who hurled these curses,

my anguish spoke,

the pain spoke,

it was my tongue but not my heart.

Triptych of Knowledge

Mvt. One

Those who are in love with practice without knowledge are like the

sailor who gets into a ship without rudder or compass and who

never can be certain whither he is going. Practice must always be

founded on sound theory, and to this, perspective is the guide and

the gateway; and without this nothing can be done well in the

matter of drawing.

Mvt. Two

All our knowledge has its origin in our perceptions.

Mvt. Three

The greatest good of all is knowledge.

Obstacle cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to firm resolve.

The acquisition of any knowledge is always useful to the intellect,

because it will be able to banish useless things and retain those that are good. For nothing can be loved or hated unless it is first known.

Leonardo Dreams of his Flying Machine

I.

Tormented by visions of flight and falling

More wondrous and terrible each than the last

Master Leonardo imagines an engine

To carry a man up into the sun…

And as he’s dreaming the heavens call him

“Leonardo. Leonardo, vieni á volare”. (“Leonardo. Leonardo, come fly”.)

L’uomo colle sua congiegniate e grandi ale

Facciendo forza contro alla resistente aria

(A man with wings large enough and duly connected

Might learn to overcome the resistance of the air.)

II. 

As the candles burn low he paces and writes

Releasing purchased pigeons one by one

Into the golden Tuscan sunrise…

And as he dreams, again the calling

The very air itself gives voice:

“Leonardo. Leonardo, vieni á volare”. (“Leonardo. Leonardo, come fly”.)

Vicina all’elemento del fuoco…

(Close to the sphere of elemental fire…)

Scratching quill on crumpled paper

Rete, canna, filo, carta

(Net, cane, thread, paper.)

Images of wing and frame and fabric fastened tightly

…sulla suprema sottile aria

(…in the highest and rarest atmosphere.)

III.

Master Leonardo Da Vinci Dreams of his Flying Machine…

As the midnight watchtower tolls

Over rooftop, street and dome

The triumph of a human being ascending

In the dreaming of a mortal man

Leonardo steels himself

Takes one last breath

And leaps…