Hey Guys! This isn’t a new song, but it’s a rerecorded version of the very first Tolkien song I put to music: I Sit Beside the FIre and Think from The Fellowship of the Ring, which is still one of my Tolkien favorite poems.

Also exciting news! I finally have got a bandcamp page, and I’ve uploaded this song to it as well as the version of ‘Farewell We Call’ from January, so you can download them for free! Link is here! http://adelemcallister.bandcamp.com/

I’m going to try to clean up the rest of the music similarly, but so far two tracks and COMPLETELY FREE!

But please, please listen and share if you enjoyed it, check out the bandcamp page and download the music! Thank you so much for listening and your support!

I Sit Beside the Fire and Think - J. R. R. Tolkien

“I sit beside the fire and think 
Of all that I have seen
Of meadow flowers and butterflies
In summers that have been

Of yellow leaves and gossamer
In autumns that there were
With morning mist and silver sun
And wind upon my hair

I sit beside the fire and think
Of how the world will be
When winter comes without a spring 
That I shall ever see

For still there are so many things
That I have never seen
In every wood in every spring
There is a different green

I sit beside the fire and think
Of people long ago
And people that will see a world
That I shall never know

But all the while I sit and think
Of times there were before
I listen for returning feet 
And voices at the door”


I Sit Beside The Fire And Think

Been awhile since I posted last though I have been writing a ton. Here's a small Tolkien piece in the meantime! 

Words are from J. R. R. Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring, music is my own. Thanks so much for listening!

O! Wanderers in the shadowed land 
despair not! For though dark they stand, 
all woods there be must end at last, 
and see the open sun go past: 
the setting sun, the rising sun,
the day's end, or the day begun. 
For east or west all woods must fail...

Old Forest Song

My own music set to text from J. R. R. Tolkien's poem from The Hobbit. Disclaimer: I do not own the text; this is a fanwork done purely for the love of the source. Thanks for listening!

The dwarves sing this while gathered around the fire at Beorn's home.

The wind was on the withered heath,
but in the forest stirred no leaf:
there shadows lay by night and day,
and dark things silent crept beneath.

The wind came down from mountains cold,
and like a tide it roared and rolled;
the branches groaned, the forest moaned,
and leaves were laid upon the mould.

The wind went on from West to East;
all movement in the forest ceased,
but shrill and harsh across the marsh
its whistling voices were released.

The grasses hissed, their tassles bent,
the reeds were rattling -- on it went
o'er shaken pool under the heavens cool
where racing clouds were torn and rent.

It passed the lonely Mountain bare
and swept above the dragon's lair:
there black and dark lay boulders stark
and flying smoke was in the air.

It left the world and took its flight
over the wide seas of the night,
The moon set sail upon the gale,
and stars were fanned to leaping light.

08/16/12

The Wind was on the withered heath

My own music set to text from J. R. R. Tolkien's poem from The Return of the King. Disclaimer: I do not own the text; this is a fanwork done purely for the love of the source. Thanks for listening!

Samwise sings this in Mordor as he rescues Frodo from the orcs in Cirith Ungol.

In western lands beneath the Sun
  the flowers may rise in Spring,
the trees may bud, the waters run,
  the merry finches sing.
Or there maybe 'tis cloudless night
  and swaying beeches bear
the Elven-stars as jewels white
  amid their branching hair.

Though here at journey's end I lie
  in darkness buried deep,
beyond all towers strong and high,
  beyond all mountains steep,
above all shadows rides the Sun
  and Stars forever dwell:
I will not say the Day is done,
  nor bid the Stars farewell.  

07/31/12

In Western lands beneath the sun

My own music set to text from J. R. R. Tolkien's poem from The Fellowship of the Ring. Disclaimer: I do not own the text; this is a fanwork done purely for the love of the source. Thanks for listening!

Gimli sings this song as the fellowship traveled through Moria. The background vocals double each other in different octaves- hope it gives it a sort of echoey cavernous feel... 

The world was young, the mountains green, 
No stain yet on the Moon was seen, 
No words were laid on stream or stone, 
When Durin woke and walked alone. 
He named the nameless hills and dells; 
He drank from yet untasted wells; 
He stooped and looked in Mirrormere, 
And saw a crown of stars appear, 
As gems upon a silver thread, 
Above the shadow of his head.

The world was fair, the mountains tall, 
In Elder Days before the fall 
Of mighty kings in Nargothrond 
And Gondolin, who now beyond 
The Western Seas have passed away: 
The world was fair in Durin's Day.

A king he was on carven throne 
In many-pillared halls of stone 
With golden roof and silver floor, 
And runes of power upon the door. 
The light of sun and star and moon 
In shining lamps of crystal hewn 
Undimmed by cloud or shade of night 
There shone for ever fair and bright.

There hammer on the anvil smote, 
There chisel clove, and graver wrote; 
There forged was blade, and bound was hilt; 
The delver mined, the mason built. 
There beryl, pearl, and opal pale, 
And metal wrought like fishes' mail, 
Buckler and corslet, axe and sword, 
And shining spears were laid in hoard.

Unwearied then were Durin's folk; 
Beneath the mountains music woke: 
The harpers harped, the minstrels sang, 
And at the gates the trumpets rang.

The world is grey, the mountains old, 
The forge's fire is ashen-cold; 
No harp is wrung, no hammer falls: 
The darkness dwells in Durin's halls; 
The shadow lies upon his tomb 
In Moria, in Khazad-dum. 
But still the sunken stars appear 
In dark and windless Mirrormere; 
There lies his crown in water deep, 
Till Durin wakes again from sleep

09/22/12

The World was young, the mountains green

My own music set to text from J. R. R. Tolkien's poem from The Fellowship of the Ring. Disclaimer: I do not own the text; this is a fanwork done purely for the love of the source. Thanks for listening!

This is Galadriel's lament in Lothlorien. My apologies in advance for mangling the Quenya- I don't speak it and have nearly no idea what I'm doing.

Ai! laurië lantar lassi súrinen,
yéni únótimë ve rámar aldaron!
Yéni ve lintë yuldar avánier
mi oromardi lisse-miruvóreva
Andúnë pella, Vardo tellumar
nu luini yassen tintilar i eleni
ómaryo airetári-lírinen.

Sí man i yulma nin enquantuva?

An sí Tintallë Varda Oiolossëo
ve fanyar máryat Elentári ortanë,
ar ilyë tier undulávë lumbulë;
ar sindanóriello caita mornië
i falmalinnar imbë met, ar hísië
untúpa Calaciryo miri oialë.
Sí vanwa ná, Rómello vanwa, Valimar!

Namárië! Nai hiruvalyë Valimar.
Nai elyë hiruva. Namárië!

——-

Ah! like gold fall the leaves in the wind, 
long years numberless as the wings of trees! 
The years have passed like swift draughts 
of the sweet mead in lofty halls beyond the West, 
beneath the blue vaults of Varda
wherein the stars tremble in the song of her voice, holy and queenly. 

Who now shall refill the cup for me? 

For now the Kindler, Varda, the Queen of the Stars, 
from Mount Everwhite has uplifted her hands like clouds, 
and all paths are drowned deep in shadow; 
and out of a grey country darkness lies on the foaming waves between us,
and mist covers the jewels of Calacirya for ever. 
Now lost, lost to those from the East is Valimar!

Farewell! Maybe thou shalt find Valimar. 
Maybe even thou shalt find it. Farewell!

12/13/12

Namárië

My own music set to text from J. R. R. Tolkien's poem from The Two Towers. Disclaimer: I do not own the text; this is a fanwork done purely for the love of the source. Thanks for listening!

Aragorn sings this for Legolas and Gimli in Rohan

“Where now are the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the hand on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow.
Who shall gather the smoke of the deadwood burning,
Or behold the flowing years from the Sea returning?”

(recorded 12/14/2012, written 08/24/12)

Where now the horse and the rider?

My own music set to text from J. R. R. Tolkien's poem from The Hobbit. Disclaimer: I do not own the text; this is a fanwork done purely for the love of the source. Thanks for listening!

One of the more childish poems from The Hobbit and despite the parts, still one of the more simple settings, but it was fun. 

The dragon is withered,
His bones are now crumbled;
His armour is shivered,
His splendour is humbled!
Though sword shall be rusted,
And throne and crown perish
With strength that men trusted
And wealth that they cherish,
Here grass is still growing,
And leaves are yet swinging,
The white water flowing,
And elves are yet singing
     Come! Tra-la-la-lally!
     Come back to the valley!

The stars are far brighter
Than gems without measure,
The moon is far whiter
Than silver in treasure:
The fire is more shining
On hearth in the gloaming
Than gold won by mining,
So why go a-roaming?
     O! Tra-la-la-lally 
     Come back to the Valley.

O! Where are you going,
So late in returning?
The river is flowing,
The stars are all burning!
O! Whither so laden,
So sad and so dreary?
Here elf and elf-maiden
Now welcome the weary
     With Tra-la-la-lally
     Come back to the Valley,
          Tra-la-la-lally
          Fa-la-la-lally
               Fa-la!

The Dragon is Withered

My own music set to text from J. R. R. Tolkien's poem from The Fellowship of the Ring. Disclaimer: I do not own the text; this is a fanwork done purely for the love of the source. Thanks for listening!

I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold, and leaves of gold there grew:
Of wind I sang, a wind there came and in the branches blew.
Beyond the Sun, beyond the Moon, the foam was on the Sea,
And by the strand of Ilmarin there grew a golden Tree.
Beneath the stars of Ever-eve in Eldamar it shone,
In Eldamar beside the walls of Elven Tirion.
There long the golden leaves have grown upon the branching years,
While here beyond the Sundering Seas now fall the Elven-tears.
O Lórien! The Winter comes, the bare and leafless Day;
The leaves are falling in the stream, the River flows away.
O Lórien! Too long I have dwelt upon this Hither Shore
And in a fading crown have twined the golden elanor.
But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?

(02/19/2012)

I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold

Super, super rough copy of Kortirion Among the Trees by J. R. R. Tolkien. But it's finally finished! With all the words and the awkward number of lines and rhyme scheme constantly changing and sheer length, this was not a friendly poem to set, ha. Also, sorry for the stopping and starting- this wasn't done in one take so there's a few awkward transitions. If you sit through the whole thing (12 minutes, oh god, why),  you get a prize, which is my gratitude and probably bragging rights as well.

I

O fading town upon an inland hill,
Old shadows linger in thine ancient gate,
Thy robe is grey, thine old heart now is still;
Thy towers silent in the mist await
Their crumbling end, while through the storeyed elms
The Gliding Water leaves these inland realms,
And slips between long meadows to the Sea,
Still bearing downward over murmurous falls
One day and then another to the Sea;
And slowly thither many years have gone,
Since first the Elves here built Kortirion.

O climbing town upon thy windy hill
With winding streets, and alleys shady-walled
Where now untamed the peacocks pace in drill
Majestic, sapphirine, and emerald;
Amid the girdle of the sleeping land,
Where silver falls the rain and gleaming stand
The whispering host of old deep-rooted trees
That cast long shadows in many a bygone noon,
And murmured many centuries in the breeze;
Thou art the city of the Land of Elms,
Alalminore in the Faery Realms.

Sing of thy trees, Kortirion, again:
The beech on hill, the willow in the fen,
Within thine aged courts that muse
In sombre splendour all the day;
Until the twinkle of the early stars
Comes glinting through their sable bars,
And the white moon climbing up the sky
Looks down upon the ghosts of trees that die
Slowly and silently from day to day.
O Lonely Isle, here was thy citadel,
Ere bannered summer from his fortress fell.
Then full of music were thine elms:
Green was their armour, green their helms,
The Lords and Kings of all thy trees.
Sing, then, of elms, renowned Kortirion,
That under summer crowds their full sail on,
And shrouded stand like masts of verdurous ships,
A fleet of galleons that proudly slips
Across long sunlit seas.

II

Thou art the inmost province of the fading isle,
Where linger yet the Lonely Companies;
Still, undespairing, here they slowly file
Along thy paths with solemn harmonies:
The holy people of an elder day,
Immortal Elves, that singing fair and fey
Of vanished things that were, and could be yet,
Pass like a wind amoung the rustling trees,
A wave of bowing grass, and we forget
Their tender voices like wind-shaken bells
Of flowers, their gleaming hair like golden asphodels.

Once Spring was here with joy, and all was fair
Amoung the trees; but Summer drowsing by the stream
Heard trembling in her heart the secret player
Pipe, out beyond the tangle of her forest dream,
The long-drawn tune that elvish voices made
Forseeing Winter through the leafy glade;
The late flowers nodding on the ruined walls
Then stooping heard afar that haunting flute
Beyond the sunny aisles and tree-propped halls;
Fro thin and clear and cold the note,
As strand of silver glass remote.

Then all thy trees, Kortirion, were bent,
And shook with sudden whispering lament:
For passing were the days, and doomed the nights
When flitting ghost-moths danced as satellites
Round tapers in the moveless air;
And doomed already were the radiant dawns,
The fingered sunlight drawn across the lawns;
The odour and the slumbrous noise of meads,
Where all the sorrel, flowers, and plumed weeds
Go down before the scyther’s share.
When cool October robed her dewy furze
In netted sheen of gold-shot gossamers,
Then the wide-umbraged elms began to fail;
Their mourning multitude of leaves grew pale,
Seeing afar the icy spears
Of Winter marching blue behind the sun
Of bright All-Hallows. Then their hour was done,
And wanly borne on wings of amber pale
They beat the wide airs of the fading vale,
And flew like birds across the misty meres.

III

This is the season dearest to the heart,
And time most fitting to the ancient town,
With waning musics sweet that slow depart
Winding with echoed sadness faintly down
The paths of stranded mist. O gentle time,
When the late mornings are begemmed with rime,
And early shadows fold the distant woods!
The Elves go silent by, their shining hair
They cloak in twilight under secret hoods
Of grey, and filmy purple, and long bands
Of frosted starlight sewn by silver hands.

And oft they dance beneath the roofless sky,
When naked elms entwine in branching lace
The Seven Stars, and through the boughs the eye
Stares golden-beaming in the round moon’s face.
O holy Elves and fair immortal Folk,
You sing then ancient songs that once awoke
Under primeval stars before the Dawn;
You whirl then dancing with the eddying wind,
As once you danced upon the shimmering lawn
In Elvenhome, before we were, before
You crossed wide seas unto this mortal shore.

Now are thy trees, old grey Kortirion,
Through pallid mists seen rising tall and wan,
Like vessels floating vague, and drifting far
Down opal seas beyond the shadowy bar
Of cloudy ports forlorn;
Leaving behind for ever havens loud,
Wherein their crews a while held feasting proud
And lordly ease, they now like windy ghosts
Are wafted by slow airs to windy coasts,
And glimmering sadly down the tide are borne.
Bare are thy trees become, Kortirion;
The rotted raiment from their bones is gone.
The seven candles of the Silver Wain,
Like lighted tapers in a darkened fane,
Now flare above the fallen year.
Though court and street now cold and empty lie,
And Elves dance seldom neath the barren sky,
Yet under the white moon there is a sound
Of buried music still beneath the ground.
When winter comes, I would meet winter here.

I would not seek the desert, or red palaces
Where reigns the sun, nor sail to magic isles,
Nor climb the hoary mountains’ stony terraces;
And tolling faintly over windy miles
To my heart calls no distant bell that rings
In crowded cities of the Earthly Kings.
For here is heartsease still, and deep content,
Though sadness haunt the Land of withered Elms
(Alalminore in the Faery Realms);
And making music still in sweet lament
The Elves here holy and immortal dwell,
And on the stones and trees there lies a spell.

Kortirion Among the Trees I, II, III

I’ve been getting a handful of people asking after this song, so I thought I'd attempt it: here goes! Sorry for the blips in the recording towards the end. Music is mine- poetry is Tolkien’s.

"The leaves were long, the grass was green,
The hemlock-umbels tall and fair,
And in the glade a light was seen
Of stars in shadow shimmering.
Tinuviel was dancing there
To music of a pipe unseen,
And light of stars was in her hair,
And in her raiment glimmering.

There Beren came from mountains cold.
And lost he wandered under leaves,
And where the Elven-river rolled
He walked alone and sorrowing.
He peered between the hemlock-leaves
And saw in wonder flowers of gold
Upon her mantle and her sleeves,
And her hair like shadow following.

Enchantment healed his weary feet
That over hills were doomed to roam;
And forth he hastened, strong and fleet,
And grasped at moonbeams glistening.
Through woven woods in Elvenhome
She lightly fled on dancing feet,
And left him lonely still to roam
In the silent forest listening.

He heard there oft the flying sound
Of feet as light as linden-leaves,
Or music welling underground,
In hidden hollows quavering.
Now withered lay the hemlock-sheaves,
And one by one with sighing sound
Whispering fell the beachen leaves
In wintry woodland wavering.

He sought her ever, wandering far
Where leaves of years were thickly strewn,
By light of moon and ray of star
In frosty heavens shivering.
Her mantle glinted in the moon,
As on a hill-top high and far
She danced, and at her feet was strewn
A mist of silver quivering.

When winter passed, she came again,
And her song released the sudden spring,
Like rising lark, and falling rain,
And melting water bubbling.
He saw the elven-flowers spring
About her feet, and healed again
He longed by her to dance and sing
Upon the grass untroubling.

Again she fled, but swift he came,
Tinuviel! Tinuviel!
He called her by her elvish name;
And there she halted listening.
One moment stood she, and a spell
His voice laid on her: Beren came,
And doom fell on Tinuviel
That in his arms lay glistening.

As Beren looked into her eyes
Within the shadows of her hair,
The trembling starlight of the skies
He saw there mirrored shimmering.
Tinuviel the elven-fair,
Immortal maiden elven-wise,
About him cast her shadowy hair
And arms like silver glimmering.

Long was the way that fate them bore,
O'er stony mountains cold and grey,
Through halls of iron and darkling door,
And woods of nightshade morrowless.
The Sundering Seas between them lay,
And yet at last they met once more,
And long ago they passed away
In the forest singing sorrowless."

(04/17/2013)

The Lay of Luthien

I'm a singer-songwriter with a passion for folk music and high fantasy, currently living in Washington DC.  A vocalist, guitarist, and (hesitant) violinist, I combine finger-picked guitar, intricate vocal harmonies, and folk-inspired melodies to create my music. 

If you love Lord of the Rings, please check out ‘Roads Go Ever, Ever On’, my collection of J. R. R. Tolkien’s poems set to original music. I also have a fair number of Age of Sail poems floating around as well (pun intended), as well as other poetry settings.

In addition to writing and setting songs, I’ve also acted in and composed/arranged/performed music for several theatrical productions including Twelfth Night (Bare Bodkin, Tufts University), Richard III (Tufts University), The Unnatural Tragedy (British American Drama Academy), and The Legend of Jim Cullen (Heartwood Regional Theatre Company).

Hope you’ll take a listen and enjoy!

Also, if you would like tabs, feel free to message me to request them and I'll post them here: https://drive.google.com/?authuser=0#folders/0B8YEQFEX6ZybdGpmZ2pwTUVyczA

I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold

Adele McAllister

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