Sam Kemp ([log in to unmask]) wrote:

>While vaguely on the subject of titles of pieces of music, I have
>a silly question: which came first, swansong or Schwannengesang? Or
>put differently, was the posthumous collection of Schubert lieder that
>is subject of the final release in the Hyperion cycle so named by its
>publisher because it was seen as Schubert's "swansong", or is "swansong"
>as a phrase derived from the name of this last edition?

The term swansong comes from an old myth/legend that the otherwise songless
swan sings just before it dies.  The legend was certainly know to Plato,
Aristotle and others.

Coleridge wrote:

   Swans sing before they die; 'twere no bad thing
   Did certain persons die before they sing.

Deryk Barker
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