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The Worlds of Gilbert and Sullivan

This haunting tune is sung by Lady Rosie Pippin during the first act of the show. The song (lament?) (it's almost an aria!) starts in sombre mood in the mournful strains of E minor. In bar 49 it lifts determinedly to the optimistic bright key of E major - with occasional lapses into the minor.

Poor Rosie is in quite an emotional state, and the dramatic music matches her mood. Her cry from the heart must have been a high point in the show. Come on mezzos show us your paces! The rest of us may just sit back and thrill to this MusicSmiles arrangement of the combination of musical talents from Sullivan and German . . .

O Setting Sun
(Four bars intro)

O Setting Sun . .,
You bid the world goodbye!
Your course is nearly run,
And soon the day will die!
Night . . ., with gentle sigh,
With gentle sigh,
Will spread her pall . ,
Will spread her pall . .!

(Four bars interlude)

Hope was my sun . . ,
That cross'd a summer sky!
My day is nearly done
The night already nigh:
Love's . . . a laugh - a sigh . ,
A laugh - a sigh - 
And that is all . ,
And that is all . . .

(Eight bars interlude and change key & tempo)

Not so, not so,
My doubting heart . . !
Altho' the sun depart - 
Altho' the sun depart - 
And leave the earth in sor . .row;
Not so, not so . .
My doubting heart - 
Despair, despair . . . is but tonight . .
Is there to be no light . . no light . . .
Upon the morrow . .?
Not so . . . 
My doubting heart,
Not so . .not so . . .
Ah . . . my doubting heart . . . .
My doubt . . . ing heart,
Not so . .
Not so . . . . ..

Now we're being lured to the Heights of Glantaun! . . .

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