Richard Jose - Belle Brandon (1909 orchestra version - not Jose's 1903 piano version)
- el año pasado
Richard Jose
"Belle Brandon"
1909
Victor 16666
This is the orchestra version.
This is not to be confused with Jose's 1903 version that has piano accompaniment.
Lyrics are by T. Ellwood Garrett.
Music is by F. Woolcott.
'Neath a tree by the margin of a woodland,
Whose spreading leafy boughs sweep the ground,
With a path leading thither o'er the prairie,
Where silence hung her night garb around;
Where oft I have wandered in the evening,
When the summer winds were fragrant on the lea,
There I saw the little beauty, Belle Brandon,
And we met 'neath the old arbor tree.
Belle Brandon was a birdling of the mountain,
In freedom she sported on the lea,
And they said the life current of the red man
Tinged her veins, from a far distant sea.
And she loved her humble dwelling on the prairie,
And her guileless happy heart clung to me,
And I loved the little beauty, Belle Brandon,
And we both loved the old arbor tree.
On the trunk of an aged tree I carved them,
And our names on the sturdy oak remain,
But I now repair in sorrow to its shelter,
And murmur to the wild winds my pain.
And I sat there in solitude repining,
For the beauty dream night brought to me,
Death has wed the little beauty, Belle Brandon,
And she sleeps ’neath the old arbor tree.
Belle Brandon is called "a birdling of the mountain"--a way of saying the speaker's one-time (now deceased) girlfriend Belle Brandon was in tune with nature, enjoying the freedom of birds.
Richard Jose recorded for the Victor Talking Machine Company exclusively and was popular during that company's early Monarch-Deluxe and Grand Prize periods.
Richard Jose was the first countertenor to make records, including brown wax cylinders in 1892, such as "Poor Blind Boy."
Most of Jose's discs, including the earliest with Monarch and Deluxe labels (Victor used these words on early ten- and twelve-inch discs, respectively), identify him as "counter-tenor" though on some labels Jose is identified as "tenor." Jose was more often billed as a tenor than as a countertenor in minstrel shows.
A book titled "Silver Threads Among the Gold in the Life of Richard J. Jose" was self-published by Grace M. Wilkinson. Copyright date is February 8, 1945.
Only once does Wilkinson refer to Jose as a countertenor: "His popularity in vaudeville as a contra-tenor was very much like that of Caruso in Italian grand opera." Jose's range is noted: "Mr. Jose's compass was from D above middle C to E above high C."
He was born in England in a Cornish village, Lanner, on June 5, 1862. Various sources give later dates since Jose (and his wife) pretended that Jose was younger than he really was.
Wilkinson refers to a home built in Lanner by Captain James Francis and writes, "In this home, all of Captain Francis' children were born. His daughter, Elizabeth...was now being courted by a young Spanish miner, Richard Jose. His ancestors had come from Spain to work in the tin mines at Cornwall."
"Belle Brandon"
1909
Victor 16666
This is the orchestra version.
This is not to be confused with Jose's 1903 version that has piano accompaniment.
Lyrics are by T. Ellwood Garrett.
Music is by F. Woolcott.
'Neath a tree by the margin of a woodland,
Whose spreading leafy boughs sweep the ground,
With a path leading thither o'er the prairie,
Where silence hung her night garb around;
Where oft I have wandered in the evening,
When the summer winds were fragrant on the lea,
There I saw the little beauty, Belle Brandon,
And we met 'neath the old arbor tree.
Belle Brandon was a birdling of the mountain,
In freedom she sported on the lea,
And they said the life current of the red man
Tinged her veins, from a far distant sea.
And she loved her humble dwelling on the prairie,
And her guileless happy heart clung to me,
And I loved the little beauty, Belle Brandon,
And we both loved the old arbor tree.
On the trunk of an aged tree I carved them,
And our names on the sturdy oak remain,
But I now repair in sorrow to its shelter,
And murmur to the wild winds my pain.
And I sat there in solitude repining,
For the beauty dream night brought to me,
Death has wed the little beauty, Belle Brandon,
And she sleeps ’neath the old arbor tree.
Belle Brandon is called "a birdling of the mountain"--a way of saying the speaker's one-time (now deceased) girlfriend Belle Brandon was in tune with nature, enjoying the freedom of birds.
Richard Jose recorded for the Victor Talking Machine Company exclusively and was popular during that company's early Monarch-Deluxe and Grand Prize periods.
Richard Jose was the first countertenor to make records, including brown wax cylinders in 1892, such as "Poor Blind Boy."
Most of Jose's discs, including the earliest with Monarch and Deluxe labels (Victor used these words on early ten- and twelve-inch discs, respectively), identify him as "counter-tenor" though on some labels Jose is identified as "tenor." Jose was more often billed as a tenor than as a countertenor in minstrel shows.
A book titled "Silver Threads Among the Gold in the Life of Richard J. Jose" was self-published by Grace M. Wilkinson. Copyright date is February 8, 1945.
Only once does Wilkinson refer to Jose as a countertenor: "His popularity in vaudeville as a contra-tenor was very much like that of Caruso in Italian grand opera." Jose's range is noted: "Mr. Jose's compass was from D above middle C to E above high C."
He was born in England in a Cornish village, Lanner, on June 5, 1862. Various sources give later dates since Jose (and his wife) pretended that Jose was younger than he really was.
Wilkinson refers to a home built in Lanner by Captain James Francis and writes, "In this home, all of Captain Francis' children were born. His daughter, Elizabeth...was now being courted by a young Spanish miner, Richard Jose. His ancestors had come from Spain to work in the tin mines at Cornwall."