Kerry's Wednesday Challenge ~ Songs

Continuing with my theme of poetry inspired by musical genre, I have come across a collection of songs which became popular during the Romantic Era of the 19th Century.

The Liberty Leading the People ~ Eugene Delacroix (1830)
Wikipaintings.org (Fair Use)

The word romanticism was first used to describe new ideas in painting and literature, towards the end of the 18th century. This word was later taken up by musicians, to describe the changes in musical style, which took place soon after the turn of the century. Unlike Classical composers, Romantic composers aimed for a store powerful expression of emotion, often revealing their innermost thoughts and feelings. Romantic music is not just about the emotion of love, it can also be about hate or death (positive or negative feelings). Many Romantic composers took an interest in art and literature:

• Far off lands
• The distant past
• Dreams
• Night and moonlight
• Rivers, lakes and forests
• Nature and the seasons
• The joy and pain of love
• Fairy tales, myths, legends
• The supernatural
• Magic

The Hay Wain ~ John Constable (1821)
Wikipaintings.org

Romance: a song with a simple vocal line and a simple accompaniment; especially popular in late 18th-19th-century France and Italy.
The term Romance in music, has a centuries-long history. Applied to narrative ballads in Spain, it came to be used by the 18th century for simple lyrical pieces not only for voice, but also for instruments alone. The Oxford Dictionary of Music states that "generally it implies a specially personal or tender quality".  The following link will take you to a performance of Brahms' Romance op.118 no.5 in F.

Chanson: French for song; in particular, a style of 14th- to 16th-century French song for voice or voices, often with instrumental accompaniment.
A chanson is in general any lyric-driven French song, usually polyphonic and secular. The earliest chansons were the epic poems performed by a professional class of jongleus or ménestrels. These usually recounted the famous deeds of past heroes, legendary and semi-historical. The Song of Roland is the most famous of these, but in general the chansons de geste are studied as literature since very little of their music survives. However, it is a style which remained popular in the Romantic Era, and is still used today.
La Chanson de l'alouette is performed by Denise Duval.

Lied(er): German for song(s); in particular, a style of 19th-century German song distinguished by the setting of texts from the literary tradition and by the elaboration of the instrumental accompaniment.
This is typically 19th-century German art song characterized by the setting of a poetic text in either strophic or through-composed style and the treatment of the piano and voice in equal artistic partnership.
Lay of the Imprisoned Huntsman is the last in a series of five Schubert songs derived from Sir Walter Scott's "The Lady of the Lake".

Our challenge today is to draw from the same themes that inspired the artists of the 1800s, and to write a new poem, either narrative or lyrical, with musical qualities in its composition. Rhyme and meter are a definite option, but a strong rhythm may be achieved through the use of alliteration, assonance or repetition, as well as with the inclusion of a refrain.