DDW challenge; euphonious - pleasing to the ear

Having been in a number of bands I’ve got to know a lot of musicians. They all have one characteristic in common; when they listen to music - recorded or live - they always focus on their own instrument, often to the exclusion of everything else.

Here’s me and a friend discussing a Bruce Springsteen song:

me; “that is such great song”
him (guitarist): “I never listen to the words”

And so it is with me; I was a singer so I always home in on the voice. In all genres of music, there are singers with wonderful voices, but who cannot put a song across - and singers with awful voices who can make magic with words. And there are those singers who not only have the voice but can also move us with the story - even if it’s in a language we don’t understand. Lucia Popp was one such euphonious singer from the classical world.

She had a silky smooth voice, not one of those heavy, wobbly, cartoon-like vibratos. Imagine honey being gently drip-fed into your ear - so light and delicate - as if the bees were tip-toeing around the hive when they made it.

This is a recording of Richard Strauss’s Four Last Songs. A bit grim, on the face of it - the clue is in the word Last. It’s often seen as the composer's own requiem - a self-conscious farewell to existence. So not ideal for a spin class at the gym.

The one that always gets me is song 4: Im Abentrot, (Sunset/Twilight). The final phrase just seems to drift off gently into the Cosmos. I always imagined that when I finally shuffle of this mortal coil (Shakespeare Challenge?) I’d be listening to this - but then I realised of course that I wouldn’t actually be able to hear it …

We have through sorrow and joy

gone hand in hand;

From our wanderings,
let's now rest
in this quiet land.