Richard John Samuel Stevens
(1757 - 1837)

Sigh no more, ladies
(A.T.T.T.B. (or S.S.A.T.B.))
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Stevens originally composed this glee for men's voices. At the request of one Miss Thurlows, he subsequently adapted it for a mixed choir, by transposing it up a fifth and revising some of the dispositions. Both versions are available here.

When the latter version was published it was reviewed in The Analytical Review in the following terms: "The harmony of this composition is so good as to exhibit the perfect theorist; also in its melody it displays a tolerable imagination; and is calculated to please both the learned and unlearned hearer".
Lyrics: William Shakespeare

Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more,
Men were deceivers ever;
One foot in sea, and one on shore,
To one thing constant never.
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny,
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into Hey nonny, nonny.

Sing no more ditties, sing no more
Of dumps so dull and heavy;
The fraud of men was ever so,
Since Summer first was leafy.
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny,
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into Hey nonny, nonny.