Neidhart von Reuental
(b.c. 1190? - d. after 1236)

"Sing, my golden cock, I'll give thee grain!"
(at her voice I rejoice)
spoke the pretty maid for whom I sigh.
Thus a dunce's hopes are raised in vain
season through.
Were it true,
no one's spirit then would be as high,
no one else's heart would beat so light.
Will her careless gaiety
ever free
me from all the sorrows of my plight?

Listen! Hear the dancing at the inn!
Every man
go who can,
there the women wait, a merry throng
Soon we'll see the ridewanz begin.
Tarradiddle
goes the fiddle,
lusty peasant youths break forth in song.
Each in turn sings out his verse with pride,
shakes the room with lungs of brass.
Noblegrass
dances with a maid on either side.

Move out all the chairs and clear the floor;
take the tables
to the stables
and we'll dance till feet and ankles hurt.
Open up the windows and the door;
let the breeze
cool their knees,
blowing through each village wench's skirt.
When the leaders stop to rest a little,
then we'll all, great and small,
short and tall,
step a courtly dance once to the fiddle.

Gozbreht, Willebolt, Gumpreht, and Eppe,
Willebrand
(hired hand),
Werenbolt, and also youngster Tutze,
Megenbolt (the farmer's son), and Reppe,
Irenwart,
Sigehart,
Giselher and Frideger and Utze-
he's the stupid oaf from Holingare.
He goes courting every day,
so they say,
but the girls don't like him anymore.

Never has a bumpkin looked so grand,
nor so flighty;
God Almighty,
how he struts in line before the rest!
More than two hands wide the leather band
of his sword,
like a lord
in his new and gaily colored vest,
scraps of every shape and hue are there,
fancy shirt, embroidered pants,
see him prance
in a garb no other fool would wear.

His attire is rustic as can be,
it's absurd.
So I've heard,
he's been wooing Engel's daughter, Pearl.
All such hopes are futile, I foresee.
She's a prize
of shape and size
to win the admiration of an earl.
Good advice I?ll given him: let him try
someone else; for all his pain
what he'll gain
he can take to Mayence in his eye.

Performers: Augsburg Early Music Ensemble

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