Hard Times Come Again No More

I’m excited to be heading to Andrews University today to conduct the MSVMA District 6 Men’s Invitational choir for the day.

I chose Alice Parker’s setting of Stephen Foster’s “Hard Times Come Again No More” to be a part of her 90th birthday celebration, and am moved to find how potent the words feel today.

Let us pause in life’s pleasures and count its many tears,
While we all sup sorrow with the poor;
There’s a song that will linger forever in our ears;
Oh! Hard times come again no more.

Chorus
‘Tis the song, the sigh of the weary,
Hard Times, hard times, come again no more
Many days you have lingered around my cabin door;
Oh! Hard times come again no more.

While we seek mirth and beauty and music light and gay,
There are frail forms fainting at the door;
Though their voices are silent, their pleading looks will say
Oh! Hard times come again no more.
[Chorus]

There’s a pale drooping maiden who toils her life away,
With a worn heart whose better days are o’er:
Though her voice would be merry, ’tis sighing all the day,
Oh! Hard times come again no more.
[Chorus]

‘Tis a sigh that is wafted across the troubled wave,
‘Tis a wail that is heard upon the shore
‘Tis a dirge that is murmured around the lowly grave
Oh! Hard times come again no more.
[Chorus]

I think we would all appreciate it if these hard times would cease lingering around our world.