If music be the food of love | If music be the food of love

by Henry Heveningham, Colonel (1651 - 1700)

If music be the food of love

Language: English

Our translations: CAT FRE GER ITA

If music be the food of love,
Sing on till I am fill'd with joy;
For then my list'ning soul you move
To pleasures that can never cloy.
Your eyes, your mien, your tongue declare
That you are music ev'rywhere.

Pleasures invade both eye and ear,
So fierce the transports are, they wound,
And all my senses feasted are,
Tho' yet the treat is only sound,
Sure I must perish by your charms,
Unless you save me in your arms.

Note: the first line quotes Orsino's lines in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night

Text Authorship:

by Henry Heveningham, Colonel (1651 - 1700) [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

by (Edward) Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976), "If music be the food of love", 1947 [ voice and piano ], a realization of the Purcell song. Confirmed with a CD booklet [sung text checked 1 time]
by (Edward) Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976), "If music be the food of love", 1948 [ voice and piano ], a realization of the first version of Purcell's song. Confirmed with a CD booklet [sung text checked 1 time]
by Cecil Armstrong Gibbs (1889 - 1960), "If music be the food of love", 1933, published 1933 [ voice and piano ], from Old wine in new bottles: four Restoration songs, no. 3 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Henry Purcell (1658/9 - 1695), "If music be the food of love", Z. 379, published 1692, published in Gentleman's Journal or Monthly Miscellany, June 1692 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Michael Tippett (1905 - 1998), "If music be the food of love", note: this is a realization of a Purcell song. [sung text checked 1 time]
by Wim Zwaag (b. 1960), "If music be the food of love ", 2003 [ soprano and cello ], from Music for a while, no. 3 [sung text not yet checked]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 12
Word count: 80

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