Swansong
(pronounced swon-sawng)
(1) The last act or manifestation of someone or
something; farewell appearance.
(2) According to legend, the first and last song
a dying swan was said to sing.
1831: A compound word, swan + song and a calque
from the original German Schwanenlied
(that construct being Schwan + Lied).
Swan dated from before 900 and was from the Middle English & Old English swan, from the Proto-Germanic swanaz (swan, literally “the singing
bird”), from the primitive Indo-European swonhz-
& swenhz- (to sing, make
sound”). It was cognate with the West
Frisian swan, the Low German Swaan, the Dutch zwaan, the German Schwan,
the Norwegian svane and the Swedish svan.
It was related also to the Old English ġeswin (melody, song) & swinsian
(to make melody), the Latin sonus
(sound), the Old Norse svanr, the
Middle Low German swōn and the
Russian звон (zvon) (ringing) &
звук (zvuk) (sound). Song was from the Middle English & Old English
song & sang (noise, song, singing, chanting; poetry; a poem to be sung or
recited, psalm, lay), from the Proto-Germanic sangwaz (singing, song), from the primitive Indo-European songwh-o- (singing, song) from sengwh- (to sing). It was
cognate with the Scots sang & song (singing, song), the Saterland
Frisian Song, the West
Frisian sang, the Dutch zang, the Low German sang, the German Sang (singing, song), the Swedish sång (song), the Norwegian Bokmål sang, the Norwegian Nynorsk
(song), the Icelandic söngur and the
Ancient Greek ὀμφή (omphḗ) (voice, oracle).
It was related to the Gothic saggws
and the Old High German sang. Swansong (used also a swan song & swan-song) is a noun; the noun plural is swansongs.
The English swansong (which has always existed
also as swan song and swan-song) was a calque of the German Schwanenlied (Schwan (swan) + Lied
(song)) (also as Schwanengesang), the
term alluding to the old belief that swans normally are mute but burst into
beautiful song moments before they die.
Although the idea is much older, swansong appeared first in English
translation in 1831 but did not pass into common use until after 1890 which is
perhaps surprising giver Chaucer mentions the singing of swans as early as the
late fourteenth century. To date, Lindsay Lohan's last single release was Back to Me (2020), released on the Casablanca label. She has hinted it may be included on a yet to be released third album but this far, musically, it's her swansong.
The romantic roadster's swansong
Ferrari's Dino 246 F1 on the Monza banking, Italian Grand Prix, September 1960.
The
swansong for the front-engined open wheel racing cars which had since the early
twentieth century dominated top-flight motorsport came in the 1960s. In 1959, both the driver’s and constructor’s
championships were claimed using rear-engined machines and as the new decade
began, it was obvious to all in the once unpredictable behaviour of the layout
had been mastered (at least on race tracks in the hands of expert drivers) and
the opening eight rounds of the season did nothing to change that view,
rear-engined cars winning the lot.
Ferrari, still running the front-engined Dino 246 F1, were not happy and
that meant most of Italy was similarly grumpy something which induced the
organizers of the Italian Grand Prix to stage their event under conditions designed
to suit the Scuderia’s last remain advantage: straight-line speed. Accordingly, it was announced the event would
be held using the combined road and oval course at the Monza Autodrome, making
what was already the championship’s highest speed circuit faster still. With both titles already decided, the leading
teams opted to boycott the event, attracted by neither the prospect of their delicate
machines being subjected to the notorious roughness of the concrete banking nor
the prospect of a high-speed accident following mechanical damage. As planned, Scuderia Ferrari enjoyed a 1-2-3
result, delighting the Italian crowd. It
was the last World Championship grand prix won by a front-engined car.
The rebodied 246 F1, Lady Wigram Trophy weekend, RNZAF (Royal New Zealand Air Force) Wigram Air Base, Christchurch, New Zealand, 1964.
The
winning Dino 246 F1 therefore became a machine of some historical significance
but even though Enzo Ferrari (1898-1988) may have suspected the success would
not again be repeated, he was not sentimental about yesterday’s car, happy
usually to sell anything obsolete to gain funds so he might build something with
which to win tomorrow. The Monza winner
was thus sold to a private racer in New Zealand who, with a similar pragmatism,
removed the 2.5 litre V6 in favour of the greater power and torque offered by a
3 litre V12 Testa Rossa engine in sports car trim. In that form, he campaigned the hybrid
Ferrari for two quite successful years but found no buyers when he tried to
sell it, most agreeing with Il Commendatore that, big engine and all, it was
just another, uncompetitive relic with the engine in the wrong place. Thinking laterally, the owner took a very
modern approach, having a coachbuilder fabricate in sixteen gauge aluminium a
body strikingly similar to the factory’s own 250 GTOs, creating a very fast road
car and one of the few on the road with the underpinnings of the machine which
won an Italian Grand Prix. The rules
were rather more relaxed in those days. In
that form it was run until 1967 when it was sold, along with its original body,
to an English collector who restored it to it with its V6 engine to the configuration
in which it ran at Monza in 1960. It’s
still seen as an entry in historic events on the European calendar.
Ran
just before crashed, nicely patinaed, one headlamp
believed matching numbers and in original condition: 1954 Ferrari 500 Mondial, as sold (left & centre) and in period (right).
To
Enzo Ferrari for whom old race cars were usually just assets to be sold, it
would in 1960 have amused him had anyone suggested decades later, people would
pay millions of dollars for old, battered Ferraris, some of which never came
close to winning anything. Improbable as
it would have sounded, he might have conceded such things could one day happen if
the vehicles had four wheels and were drivable but the state of the 1954
Ferrari 500 Mondial which in August 2023 sold at auction for US$1.875 million would
have been beyond comprehension. The second
Mondial built and one of 13 examples with Pininfarina spider coachwork, it was one
of the rare “customer” race cars which used two litre, four cylinder engines and
was campaigned extensively in Italy and the US where, sometime between
1963-1965 (the stories vary) it crashed and was incinerated, apparently while
fitted with a Chevrolet V8, the swap a common practice at the time.
Some assembly required.
The
provenance is solid if not illustrious.
It was raced by a one-time Scuderia Ferrari team driver and its many
appearances includes starts in the Mille Miglia, Targa Florio, and Imola Grand
Prix. Although the original engine is
long gone, the sale included a comparable 3.0-liter Tipo 119 Lampredi four while
the transmission is original and thus “matching numbers”. Belying the Italian corporations' (usually undeserved)
reputation for chaotic record keeping, the supplied documentation was an
impressive wad, including the precious factory build sheets and homologation
papers. In the hands of experts, such a
thing can be restored although without the original engine, it hard to predict
if it will realise the same value as the US$4.15 million a similar Mondial (Chassis number 0448 MD and all "matching numbers") in
restored condition achieved in 2019.
The Offenhauser-powered Watson Special, winner of the 1964 Indianapolis 500.
In
the US, the swansong of the front-engined roadsters at the Indianapolis 500
came a little later, the last victory coming in 1964. As in so many things however, the end came
quickly and the next year a solitary roadster completed the full race distance,
finishing a creditable fifth. The last roadster
to appear in the event in 1968 qualified on the second to last row of the grid
and completed only nine lap of the 200 laps, retiring with a collapsed piston. That run was at the time little noted but it’s
now remembered as the swansong of the front-engined roadsters in top flight
racing.
Richard Strauss, Vier Letzte Lieder (Four Last Songs)
Richard Strauss (1864-1949), was the last great
German composer in the Romantic tradition and Vier Letzte
Lieder (Four Last Songs) was his swansong, the last set of work he
wrote. Inspired by the poetry of Nobel
Laureate Hermann Hesse (1877-1962) and Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff (1788-1857), all four are pieces of exquisite beauty but Strauss
didn’t live to hear them performed, the premiere delivered posthumously in London
in 1950, sung by Kirsten
Flagstad (1895–1962), accompanied by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
under Wilhelm
Furtwängler (1886–1954).
Many notable sopranos have sung the songs but the
definitive performance remains the 1965 recording by Elisabeth Schwarzkopf (1915-2006) with the Radio-Symphonieorchester Berlin
under György Széll
(1897–1970). (CD: EMI Classics Cat: 0724356696020[9]).
Four Last Songs Since their collaboration, the need again to record the songs vanished; it's simply not possible to improve on Schwarzkoph's achievement in 1965. Re-mastered versions from the original master-tapes have been released and they're of interest to audiophiles but add nothing to the atmospherics so well captured in the Berlin sessions.
Spring
(Hermann Hesse)
Wandering in darkness
under your high
vaulting branches, I
have dreamed so long
of your green leaves
and breezy blue sky,
the vibrant
fragrances–and the bird song!
Now, as you open your
robe of winter night,
your brilliance
staggers every sense.
The world sparkles in
the light
of a Miracle, your
recurring presence.
I feel the healing
touch
of softer days, warm
and tender.
My limbs
tremble–happily, too much–
as I stand inside your
splendor.
September (Hermann
Hesse)
The garden mourns.
The flowers fill with
cold rain.
Summer shivers
in the chill of its
dying domain.
Yet summer smiles,
enraptured
by the garden’s dreamy
aphasia
as gold, drop by drop,
falls
from the tall acacia.
With a final glance at
the roses–
too weak to care, it
longs for peace–
then, with darkness
wherever it gazes,
summer slips into
sleep.
When I Go
to Sleep (Hermann Hesse)
Now that day has
exhausted me
I give myself over, a
tired child,
to the night and to my
old friends, the stars–
my watchful guardians,
quiet and mild.
Hands–let everything
go.
Head–stop thinking.
I am content to follow
where my senses are
sinking.
Into the darkness, I
swim out free:
Soul, released from
all your defenses,
enter the magic,
sidereal circle
where the gathering of
souls commences.
At Sunset
(Joseph Karl Benedikt Freiherr von Eichendorff)
We have passed through
sorrow and joy,
walking hand in hand.
Now we need not seek
the way:
we have settled in a
peaceful land.
The dark comes early
to our valley,
and the night mist
rises.
Two dreamy larks sally
forth–our souls’
disguises.
We let their soaring
flight delight
us, then, overcome by
sleep
at close of day, we
must alight
before we fly too far,
or dive too deep.
The great peace here
is wide and still
and rich with glowing
sunsets:
If this is death,
having had our fill
of getting lost, we
find beauty, –No regrets.
