Far potess'io vendetta (Cipriano de Rore)

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• (Posted 2020-04-19)  CPDL #58073:    (MIDI)    

Editor: Pothárn Imre (submitted 2020-04-19).   Score information: A4, 7 pages, 168 kB   Copyright: CPDL

Edition notes: Transcribed from 1552 Gardano print. Original key (chiavi naturali) and note values. Alto in transposed violin clef.

General Information

Title: Far potess'io vendetta
Composer: Cipriano de Rore
Lyricist: Francesco Petrarca

Number of voices: 5vv   Voicing: SATTB
Genre: Secular, Madrigal

Language: Italian
Instruments: A cappella

First published: 1542 in Il primo libro de madrigali a cinque voci, Edition 1, no. 16
    2nd published: 1544 in Il primo libro de madrigali a cinque voci, Edition 3, no. 14
Description: Two-part madrigal:
I. Far potess'io vendetta
II. Così gli afflitti

Original text and translations

Italian text

Far potess’io vendetta di colei
Che guardando et parlando mi distrugge,
Et per più doglia poi s’asconde et fugge,
Celando gli occhi a me sì dolci et rei.

Così gli afflitti et stanchi pensier mei
A poco a poco consumando sugge,
E ’n sul cor quasi fero leon rugge
La notte all’ hor quand’io posar dovrei.

L’alma, cui morte del suo albergo caccia,
Da me si parte, et di tal nodo sciolta
Vassene pur a lei che la minaccia.

Meravigliomi ben s’alcuna volta,
Mentre le parla, et piange, et poi l’abbraccia,
Non rompe ’l sonno suo, s’ella l’ascolta.

Petrarca, Canzoniere 256
 

English translation

Could I but take vengeance on her
who gazing and speaking destroys me
and then, for more pain, absconds and flees,
hiding from me her eyes so sweet and cruel!

Thus she saps my afflicted and tired thoughts,
consuming them little by little,
and above my heart like a fierce lion roars
at night, when I should be at rest.

My soul, which Death chases from its dwelling,
leaves me, and loosed from that knot
goes off straight to her who menaces it.

I marvel indeed if at some time,
while it speaks to her, and weeps, and then embraces her,
it does not break her sleep, if she is listening.