We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Lorena (with The Rhetoricians)

from Songs our grandparents would have known by Ken Baake

/

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $1 USD  or more

     

  • Buy the Full Digital Album

about

This song written in 1856 by Rev. H.D.L Webster and J.P. Webster (not related) was immensely popular during the Civil War--particularly in the South. According to Irwin Silber, author of __Songs of the Civil War__, a lot of Southern parents named their baby girls after the heroine.

lyrics

Lorena

Oh, the years creep slowly by, Lorena,
The snow is on the ground again.
The sun's low down the sky, Lorena,
The frost gleams where the flow'rs have been.
But the heart beats on as warmly now,
As when the summer days were nigh.
.Oh, the sun can never dip so low.
A-down affection's cloudless sky.

A hundred months have passed, Lorena,
Since last I held that hand in mine,
And felt the pulse beat fast, Lorena,
Though mine beat faster far than thine.
A hundred months, 'twas flowery May,
When up the hilly slope we climbed,
To watch the dying of the day,
And hear the distant church bells chime.

We loved each other then, Lorena
,Far more than we ever dared to tell;
And what we might have been, Lorena,
Had but our loving prospered well
But then, 'tis past, the years are gone,
I'll not call up their shadowy forms;
I'll say to them, "Lost years, sleep on!
Sleep on! nor heed life's pelting storms.

"The story of that past, Lorena,
Alas! I care not to repeat,
The hopes that could not last, Lorena,
They lived, but only lived to cheat.
I would not cause e'en one regret
To rankle in your bosom now;
For "if we try we may forget,
"Were words of thine long years ago.

Yes, these were words of thine, Lorena,
They burn within my memory yet;
They touched some tender chords, Lorena,
Which thrill and tremble with regret.
'Twas not thy woman's heart that spoke;
Thy heart was always true to me:
A duty, stern and pressing, broke
The tie which linked my soul with thee.

It matters little now, Lorena,
The past is in the eternal past;
Our heads will soon lie low, Lorena,
Life's tide is ebbing out so fast.
There is a Future! O, thank God!
Of life this is so small a part!'
Tis dust to dust beneath the sod;
But there, up there, 'tis heart to heart.

credits

from Songs our grandparents would have known, released June 4, 2015
Ken guitar, vocal
Kristi Dunks, melodian
Charity Tran,Chris Andrews: ukulele

Engineer,producer: Amy DeVoge
Crossroads Recording Studio, Texas Tech.,

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Ken Baake image

Ken Baake Lubbock, Texas

Ken was born in Baltimore in 1955. He grew up hearing everyone from Johnny Mercer and Ray Charles to the Beatles on the family hi-fi, with a usual Saturday encore of Wagner's operas. Ken has degrees in English and economics and a background in journalism. He is currently an associate professor of English at Texas Tech, teaching classes in rhetoric. ... more

contact / help

Contact Ken Baake

Streaming and
Download help

Report this track or account

If you like Ken Baake, you may also like:

Bandcamp Daily  your guide to the world of Bandcamp

On Bandcamp Radio

Beans joins the show to discuss his album release, "ZWAARD".

listen now