Everything about Sydney Carter totally explained
Sydney Bertram Carter (
6 May 1915–
13 March 2004) was an
English poet,
songwriter,
folk musician and
Quaker, born in
Camden Town,
London. He is best known for the song
Lord of the Dance (1963), set to the tune of the
American Shaker song
Simple Gifts.Other notable songs include
One More Step along the road I go... and
When I needed a neighbour
He studied at
Christ's Hospital school in
Horsham,
West Sussex and
Balliol College, Oxford, graduating in
history in 1936. A committed pacifist, Carter joined the
Friends' Ambulance Unit on the outbreak of
World War II and served in
Egypt,
Palestine and
Greece.
He worked as a lyricist for
Donald Swann's reviews and musicals in the 1950s and in
1962, produced an album
Putting Out The Dustbin with
Sheila Hancock, with the song
Last Cigarette on failing to give up smoking that became a minor hit.
Partly inspired by
Jesus, and partly by a statue of
Shiva as
Nataraja, Sydney wrote the lyrics "
Lord Of The Dance" in 1963, as an adaptation of
Joseph Brackett's "Simple Gifts", and a tribute to Shaker music. He later stated, "I didn't think the churches would like it at all. I thought many people would find it pretty far flown, probably heretical and anyway dubiously Christian. But in fact people did sing it and, unknown to me, it touched a chord… Anyway, it's the sort of Christianity I believe in."
» "I see Christ as the incarnation of the piper who is calling us. He dances that shape and pattern which is at the heart of our reality. By Christ I mean not only Jesus; in other times and places, other planets, there may be other Lords of the Dance. But Jesus is the one I know of first and best. I sing of the dancing pattern in the life and words of Jesus.
Whether Jesus ever leaped in Galilee to the rhythm of a pipe or drum I don't know. We are told that David danced (and as an act of worship too), so it isn't impossible. The fact that many Christians have regarded dancing as a bit ungodly (in a church, at any rate) doesn't mean that Jesus did. The Shakers didn't...
:
Green Print for Song (1974)
In
1964, he married his second wife Leela Nair, with whom he'd a son Michael, who became a neurosurgeon.
He continued to work with Donald Swann writing six songs for the 1964 Donald Swann EP,
Songs Of Faith And Doubt.
In the 1960s, he also worked as a
critic for
Gramophone magazine.
In
1965, Carter wrote the six-song EP album
Lord Of The Dance with
Martin Carthy on guitar, the Johnny Scott Trio and the Mike Sammes singers. He also worked with
Nadia Cattouse and
Jeremy Taylor.
In
1972,Carter presented a series of concerts in
Australia.
Franciscus Henri who accompanied him has recorded an anthology of Carter's songs and poems. *
Nothing Fixed or Final (2005)
Bibliography
- The Rock Of Doubt (1978)
- Dance In The Dark (1980)
Further Information
Get more info on 'Sydney Carter'.
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