Sea Drift

Im Meerestreiben

DCW 70
RT II/3
DCE 9b

Composer: Frederick Delius
Author: Walt Whitman
Translator: Jelka Delius
Dedicatee: Max Schillings

One of several works setting poems from Whitman's Leaves of Grass, this work sets 'Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking', lines 23-129, from the section of the volume itself titled 'Sea-Drift'. Threlfall's 1977 catalogue gives the German title In Meerestreiben precedence, yet acknowledges Delius's own assertion that he composed the work in English, and Heseltine's view that Jelka's translation was necessary to secure performance and publication in Germany (RT, 60-61).

Is related to:

The Magic Fountain

Composition: Between 1903 and 1904.

Instrumentation:

Orchestra: 3 fl., 3 ob., cor.ingl., 3 cl., cl.b., 3 fg., cfg., 6 cor., 3 tr., 3 trb., tb., timp., gr.c., 2 arp., str.

Choir SSAATTBB: S., A., T., B.

Soloist: Bar.

Musical incipit for this work

Sources

Sketch material

[Classification: notated music, manuscript, partly autograph, sketch]

This manuscript contains various fragmentary sketches in pencil and ink, including one sketch of the start of the work in piano score, not in Delius's hand. For full details see RT.1986, 177.

GB-Lbl (British Library, London) MS Mus. 1745/2/9. Link to external resource

British Library source record

Sketch

[Classification: notated music, manuscript, autograph, short score, sketch]

Sketch of a passage of the closing section in short score.

GB-Lbl (British Library, London) MS Mus. 1745/2/11/4. Link to external resource

British Library source record

Published score

[Classification: notated music, print, score, first edition, complete]

Verlag Harmonie, Berlin 1906.

First edition, in full score, with English text and German words provided by Jelka Rosen. A vocal score by Siegfried Fall was issued the same year, and the work was transferred to Universal Edition in 1921 and to Boosey & Hawkes in 1939.

Delius's copy

Delius's copy contains numerous corrections and annotations to notes, dynamics and orchestration.

Delius Trust, London.

Collected Edition

[Classification: notated music, print, score, later edition, complete]

Editor: Thomas Beecham

Boosey & Hawkes, London 1951.

Re-engraved for the 'Complete Works' and edited by Beecham, this edition became vol. 9b of the Collected Edition, published in a revised edition in 1988.

Performances

Last changed 2020-10-26T14:17:11+00:00

24 May 1906	Essen (Allgemeine Deutsche Musikverein; conductor: Georg Witte; performer: Josef Loritz (baritone)).
1-2 March 1907	Basel (conductor: Hermann Suter).
7 October 1908	Sheffield (Queen's Hall Orchestra; Sheffield Festival Chorus; conductor: Henry Wood; performer: Frederick Austin (baritone)).