Track Listing

1. Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8 (King James Version) Attributed to King Solomon (read by Geoffrey Palmer) / Music: Vivaldi - Concerto \x{2018}In Due Cori\x{2019} - 2nd movement (excerpt)
2. Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare (read by Joanna Lumley) / Music: Beethoven - Piano Sonata No.8 (excerpt)
3. Home Thoughts From Abroad by Robert Browning (read by Geoffrey Palmer) / Music: Dvorak - Symphony No.9 (excerpt)
4. Friendship by Elizabeth Jennings (read by Alison Steadman) / Music: Beethoven - Piano Concerto No.5 - 2nd Movement (excerpt)
5. A Red, Red Rose by Robert Burns (read by Brian Cox) / Music: Austin Ince & Frankie Hepburn - Colonel Robertson (excerpt)
6. I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud by William Wordsworth (read by Honor Blackman) / Music: Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1 - 2nd Movement (excerpt)
7. On The Balcony by D.H. Lawrence (read by Anthony Head) / Music: Grieg - Last Spring (excerpt)
8. Business Girls by John Betjeman (read by Joanna Lumley) / Music: Business Girls by John Betjeman / Music: Satie - Gymnopedie No.2 (excerpt)
9. To Autumn by John Keats (read by Ben Whishaw) / Music: Borodin - Symphony No.2 - 3rd Movement (excerpt)
10. Sonnets From The Portuguese by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (read by Lindsay Duncan) / Music: Mozart - Symphony No.50 - 3rd Movement (excerpt)
11. Mozart - Symphony No.50 - 3rd Movement (excerpt) (read by Martin Shaw) / Music: Verdi - La Forza Del Destino (excerpt)
12. Do Not Stand At My Grave And Weep by Mary Frye (read by Miriam Margolyes) / Music: Tchaikovosky - Variations on a Rocco Theme Op.33 (excerpt)
13. Diary Of A Church Mouse by John Betjeman (read by Martin Shaw) / Music: Bach - Sleepers Awake (excerpt)
14. Come Walk With Me by Emily Brontë (read by Samantha Morton) / Music: Dvorak - Waltz No.1 from Opus 54 (excerpt)
15. The Lady Of Shalott by Lord Alfred Tenyson (read by Brian Cox) / Music: Stephen Darrell Smith & Dan Smith - The Great Glen
16. One Flesh by Elizabeth Jennings (read by Honor Blackman) / Music: One Flesh by Elizabeth Jennings
17. He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven by W.B. Yeats (read by Lennie James) / Music: Mahler - Symphony No.3 - 6th Movement (excerpt)
18. Sonnet 116 by William Shakespeare (read by Lennie James) / Music: Mahler - Symphony No.3 - 6th Movement (excerpt)
19. Stop All The Clocks by W.H. Auden (read by Lindsay Duncan) / Music: Mahler - Symphony No.1 - 3rd Movement (excerpt)
20. Adlestrop by Edward Thomas (read by Geoffrey Palmer) / Music: Vaughan Williams - The Lark Ascending (excerpt)
21. When We Two Parted by Lord Byron (read by Brian Cox) / Music: Tchaikovosky - Symphony No.5 - 2nd Movement (excerpt)
22. Dulce Et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen (read by Ben Whishaw) / Music: Beethoven - Symphony No.7 - 2nd Movement (excerpt)
23. Silver by Walter de la Mare (read by Miriam Margolyes) / Music: Chopin - Nocturne in C sharp minor (excerpt)
24. She Walks In Beauty by Lord Byron (read by Martin Shaw) / Music: Grieg - Peer Gynt Suite No.2 - 4th Movement (excerpt)
25. Rock Me To Sleep by Elizabeth Akers Allen (read by Alison Steadman) / Music: Schubert - Rosamunde (excerpt)
26. Remember by Christina Rossetti (read by Anthony Head) / Music: Sor - Allegretto (excerpt)
27. Last Post by Carol Ann Duffy (read by Samantha Morton) / Music: Satie - Gymnopedie No.3 (excerpt)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #49 in Music
• Released on: 2009-11-16
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .22 pounds
• Running time: 49 minutes

CD Description
Words For You is a stunning collection of 27 of the greatest poems of all time, read by 12 of the best voices in British acting and set to the greatest classical music ever composed. Combining William Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnet 18’ read by Joanna Lumley with Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 8, Robert Browning’s ‘Home Thoughts, From Abroad’ using the voice of Geoffrey Palmer with Dvorak Symphony No. 9 and the heartbreaking WH Auden’s ‘Stop All The Clocks’ read by Lindsay Duncan with Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 [III], Words For You brings together the best of the best of the best. Alison Steadman, one of the Words For You artists said, “I loved being involved in Words For You, it’s a great idea and I’m sure will help promote poetry.”

The artists involved have waived their royalty so that a proportion of proceeds from sales can go to I CAN, a UK charity that helps children who have difficulties speaking and understanding. Virginia Beardshaw, Chief Executive of I CAN, said; “Words come easily to many of us. Actors, especially, thrive on their mastery of the spoken word. Sadly, for a large number of children, the ability to use words is a real challenge. It is a struggle for them to learn and make friends. I CAN helps these children so they don’t get left out and left behind.”

The 27 poems featured on Words For You have been recorded by Joanna Lumley, Lindsay Duncan, Geoffrey Palmer, Honor Blackman, Brian Cox, Alison Steadman, Martin Shaw, Miriam Margolyes, Lennie James, Samantha Morton, Anthony Head and Ben Whishaw.

Customer Reviews

'A thing of beauty is a joy forever ...'
OK, so you won't be hearing the opening line from Endymion here, but you will hear some of the most famous lines in English-language poetry in this 'celebration of the greatest poems and classical music, read by the finest voices of our time.' Including:

'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? ...'
'Oh, to be in England/ Now that April's there, ...'
'Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, ...'
'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. ...'
'If you can keep your head when all around you/ Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, ...'

As it has been released this week, it is now possible to listen to this CD before reviewing it.

The actors involved in this recording have waived their royalties in favour of I CAN, the children's communication charity.

To many poetry lovers the sound of the poem is as essential to the meaning as the words on the page, and a collection of this kind, read by some of our best-loved actors is most welcome. Though some of us will be happy just to let these wonderful words and music wash over us, others may want to reflect and ponder the poet's words. If you are like me, you will also want the printed words in front of you (though they are not included in the accompanying booklet).

There is no explanation of how these poems were selected, though as can be seen, they include the familiar as well as a few perhaps lesser-known gems. The latter include Rock Me To Sleep, accompanied by a heavenly excerpt from Schubert's Rosamunde, and Emily Bronte's Come Walk With Me; and it's good to see included two poems from the sadly-missed Elizabeth Jennings. Many of the poems have appeared repeatedly in popular anthologies in recent years; for example, two-thirds of them were included in the BBC book (and audio collection) The Nation's Favourite Poems published in 1996.

The background music has been carefully selected for each particular poem, though perhaps it works better on some than others. There is an issue here. In some poetry collections where music has been included the results have not always been appreciated, and indeed, considered by some to be too intrusive, even distracting. Well, clearly that is a matter of personal choice. In this case the music is mostly well in the background.

The opening poem will be familiar not just from its origins, but also as Pete Seeger's 1960s popular folk song Turn! Turn! Turn! Kipling's portentous If remains a great favourite, though I had to smile at both the choice of reader in Martin Shaw, and the music by Verdi. Still, I do prefer this better-paced version to the one I have read by John Nettles.

To Autumn is read over a piece by Borodin by Ben Whishaw, who plays a fragile Keats in Jane Campion's new film Bright Star. Brian Cox impresses with his readings of Burns and The Lady Of Shalott (and I'm pleased to say we get the full version). The excerpts from Greig work well behind DH Lawrence's On The Balcony, and hauntingly with Byron's She Walks In Beauty. Similarly, Mahler's sweeping strings lift Yeats's He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven, and Shakespeare's Sonnet 116, yet is appropriately sombre behind Auden's Stop All The Clocks (or Funeral Blues). An elegant Nocturne excerpt from Chopin accompanies Silver, and Vaughan Williams's The Lark Ascending is most suitable for another perennial (though poignant) favourite Adlestrop, written hardly 18 months before Edward Thomas died in the trenches.

A plaintive cello piece backs this version of Do Not Stand At My Grave And Weep, read movingly by one of our best-known character actors, Miriam Margolyes. This poem has become a popular favourite in recent years, At one time believed to have been written by a serviceman killed in Northern Ireland, it has been attributed to a Baltimore housewife Mary Elizabeth Frye, written in the Thirties over the grief of a friend unable to return to Nazi Germany. An excerpt from Beethoven's 7th Symphony is played behind the angry Dulce Et Decorum Est ('The old Lie: ...') sounding both dramatic and poignant. Wilfred Owen's lines resonate in the words of The Last Post, the magnificent poem written by the new laureate, the wonderful Carol Ann Duffy, to mark the funerals earlier this year of the last veterans of the Great War. 'If poetry could truly tell it backwards,/ then it would.' Ah, if only.

Well, there's no Housman, Eliot, Larkin or Hughes, to name but a few; nor Anon, another favourite of mine. But what we do have is a veritable treasure of words, music and voice to entertain, reassure, comfort and challenge as we look to the long winter nights ahead - and beyond.

As the late Clifford T. Ward once sang: 'I like the words they use, and I like the way they use them, ...'

a taster on breakfast
Heard three poems from the CD on Breakfast TV. The music in the background enhanced my enjoyment and brought tears to my eyes. Shall certainly order the CD and can't wait to listen to it all the way through!

Excellent idea
Heard Geoffery Palmer reciting part of one on the "one show" what a moving experience and I am sure the rest of the compilation will be of a similar standard a very good way to promote poetry and make it more accessible to all as well as being an excellent way to raise funds for a worthwhile cause - should be in everyones christmas stocking!