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"Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman" redirects here. For the variations for piano by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, see Variations on "Ah vous dirai-je, Maman".
"Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star"
Roud #7666
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.png
Music by Traditional
Lyrics by Jane Taylor
Published 1806
Written England
Language English
Form Nursery Rhyme

"Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" is one of the most popular English nursery rhymes. The lyrics are from an early nineteenth-century English poem, "The Star" by Jane Taylor. The poem, which is in couplet form, was first published in 1806 in Rhymes for the Nursery, a collection of poems by Taylor and her sister Ann. It is often sung to the tune of the French melody "Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman" (oldest known publication 1761).[1] The English lyrics have five stanzas, although only the first is widely known. Mozart wrote twelve variations on ‘Ah! Vous dirai-je, Maman’. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 7666.

Contents

Lyrics

The English lyrics were first published as a poem with the title "The Star" by sisters Ann and Jane Taylor (1793–1824) in Rhymes for the Nursery in London in 1806.[2] The poem was probably written by Jane.[3] There are five stanzas. The repetition of the first two lines at the end of each verse is not in the original, but is needed to fit the usual melody. Below is the whole text with only the first phrase with the repetition of the first two lines added:

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Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky!

Repeat:
 *Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!*

When the blazing sun is gone,
When he nothing shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.
(*repeat)

Then the traveller in the dark,
Thanks you for your tiny spark,
He could not see which way to go,
If you did not twinkle so.
(*repeat)

In the dark blue sky you keep,
And often through my curtains peep,
For you never shut your eye,
Till the sun is in the sky.
(*repeat)

As your bright and tiny spark,
Lights the traveller in the dark,—
Though I know not what you are,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star.
(*repeat)[2][3][4]

Appearances of the melody

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Many songs in various languages have been based on the "Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman" melody. In English, "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" shares its melody with the "Alphabet Song" from 1834, and "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep".

The German Christmas carol "Morgen kommt der Weihnachtsmann", with words by Hoffmann von Fallersleben, also uses the melody, as does the Hungarian Christmas carol "Hull a pelyhes fehér hó", and the Dutch "Altijd is Kortjakje ziek".

Several classical compositions have been inspired by the tune:

First appearances of the melody and the original French text version

The original French rhyme Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman, was far from a children's rhyme. Apparently it originated in the first half of the 18th century. As there was no published version of the text before 1774, several slightly differing versions of what could have been the "original" version exist:

In these versions a girl confides a secret to her mother: that she has been seduced by "Silvandre". Only in one version cited above did the girl apparently make a narrow escape ("Je m'échappai par bonheur"[5]), in the other versions the girl appears to have been "beaten" by L'Amour ("Love").

As for the history of the melody and the non-nursery rhyme version(s) of the French text:[6][7]

  • 1761: first publication of the music (without lyrics) of Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman in "Les Amusements d'une Heure et Demy" by Mr. Bouin (Paris), p. 1.
  • Around 1765, the words and music appear in a manuscript entitled "Recueil de Chansons" under the title "Le Faux Pas", p. 43.
  • 1774: earliest known printed publication of the lyrics together with the music in volume two of "Recueil de Romances" by M.D.L. (De Lusse) published in Brussels, under the title "La Confidence – Naive" (p. 75).
  • Around 1780 (Paris): the words and music appear in sheet music under the title "Les Amours de Silvandre".
  • 1785: First publication of Mozart's Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman variations.

As for the composition date of Mozart's Variations, for a time the variations were thought to have been composed in 1778, while Mozart stayed in Paris from April to September in that year, the assumption being that the melody of a French song could only have been picked up by Mozart while residing in France. For this presumed composition date, in the chronological catalogue of Mozart's compositions the composition was renumbered from K. 265 to K. 300e.[7] Later analysis of Mozart's manuscript of the composition by Wolfgang Plath rather indicated 1781-1782 as the probable composition date.[8]

French "nursery rhyme" version

Origin unknown.

French lyrics English translation

Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman,
Ce qui cause mon tourment.
Papa veut que je raisonne,
Comme une grande personne.  
Moi, je dis que les bonbons
Valent mieux que la raison.

Ah! I shall tell you, mum,
That which causes my torment.
Papa wants me to reason
Like an adult.
I say that sweets
Are better than reason.

The French "nursery rhyme" version also appears with slight variations:

French lyrics English translation
A variation

Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman,
ce qui cause mon tourment.
Papa veut que je demande
de la soupe et de la viande...
Moi, je dis que les bonbons
valent mieux que les mignons.[9]

Ah! I would tell you, Mother,
what causes my torment.
father wants me to ask
for soup and for meat
I say that candy
is better than lovers.[9]
Another variation

Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman,
ce qui cause mon tourment
Papa veut que je retienne
des verbes la longue antienne[10]...  
Moi, je dis que les bonbons
valent mieux que les leçons.

Ah! I shall tell you, Mother,
what causes my torment.
father wants me to remember
This catalogue of verbs conjugations[10]
I say that candy
is better than lessons.

The lyrics from "The Star" were first published with the tune in The Singing Master: First Class Tune Book in 1838.[3]

Other text versions

The song is a popular target for parodies. "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat," is a parody of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" recited by the Mad Hatter during the mad tea-party, in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It reads:

Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!
How I wonder what you're at!
Up above the world you fly,
Like a tea tray in the sky.
Twinkle, twinkle—[3]

The Mad Hatter is interrupted in his recitation. "The Bat" was the nickname of Professor Bartholomew Price, one of the Dons at Oxford, a former teacher of Carroll's and well known to the Liddell family. It is one of the few parodies in the Alice books of which the original is still widely known.

A Latin translation appeared in Mary Mapes Dodge's When life is young (1894):

Mica, mica, parva stella,
Miror quaenam sis tam bella.
Super terra in caelo,
Alba gemma splendido.
Mica, mica, parva stella,
Miror quaenam sis tam bella.

The Elegants released a single adapted from this song called Little Star, which made #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1958.

A version using synonyms from Roget's Thesaurus exists.[11] An anonymous astronomy parody, quoted in Violent Universe by Nigel Calder (BBC, 1969), refers to pulsars and quasars. A different version of this parody attributed to George Gamow and Nigel Calder was published in Galaxies in the Universe: An Introduction by Linda Sparke and John Gallagher (Cambridge University Press, 2000 - ISBN 0-521-59740-4).

The Girl Scouts of the USA placed a full page ad in the March 19th 2006 New York Times containing a version of the rhyme that was "resung by science" as part of their "Girls Go Tech" campaign.

Vashti Bunyan, an English singer-songwriter, composed "Lily Pond" based on this tune. It can be found on her 1970 album Just Another Diamond Day. American singer Elizabeth Mitchell covers the song on her 2006 album You Are My Little Bird.

Covers, remixes, samples and uses

  • A version of the song appears in a scene from the 1950 Clark Gable movie Key to the City.
  • Variations sung a cappella with jazz harmonies and stylings comprise the first track on The Swingle Singers 1965 album Swinging Mozart (France) / Anyone for Mozart (U.S.)
  • American recording artist Jewel did a cover of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in her 2009 release Lullaby.
  • A version is sung in the introduction of the Visceral Games game, Dead Space, interrupted at times with audio cues, accompanied by scenes of the game's enemies ("necromorphs") repeatedly killing the main character.
  • Before the Visceral Games, the rhyme had been previously used in the Dead Space animated movie Dead Space: Downfall as well. The rhyme plays on the final scene of the movie, when Alissa Vincent, as the security officer of USG Ishimura (and supposedly the only survivor on the ship), takes on a desperate move by venting out all of the necromorphs on the bridge, as well as herself. The rhyme echoes while her lifeless body is hovering in the open space.
  • An excerpt of the poem is quoted by a ghostly apparition that appears to Col. Samantha Carter (Amanda Tapping) in the Stargate: SG1 Season 7 episode "Grace".

Notes

  1. ^ "The melody was first known as 'Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman,' the music of which appeared (without words) in 1761 in 'Les Amusements d'une Heure et Demy' by Mr. Bouin (Paris), p. 1." [1]
  2. ^ a b I. Opie and P. Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd edn., 1997), pp. 397-8.
  3. ^ a b c d M. Cryer, Love Me Tender: The Stories Behind the World's Best-loved Songs (Frances Lincoln, 2009), pp. 83-5.
  4. ^ The Star, Representative Poetry Online (RPO), University of Toronto, 2005
  5. ^ See http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Thierry_klein/ahvousdi.htm
  6. ^ The chronology is based on an account by Bob Kosovsky, librarian at the Music Division of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, 2001
  7. ^ a b (in German:) Neue Mozart-Ausgabe, IX/26: Variationen für Klavier, Kritischer Bericht (Fischer, 1962), p. 58-59
  8. ^ Based on booklet notes by Robin Golding, 1991 for Daniel Barenboims Mozart: The Complete Piano Sonatas and Variations, EMI Classics 8 CD box No. 5 73915 2
  9. ^ a b literally, mignons = "darlings;" objects of affection
  10. ^ a b An antienne is literally an antiphon, a short liturgical text chanted or sung alternately by two choirs preceding or following a psalm or canticle.
  11. ^ G. Hughes, A history of English words (Wiley-Blackwell, 2000), p. 40.

External links








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