Lament for Boromir
Lament for Boromir
A recent Counting Stars article collected several music versions of “Lament for Boromir,” the poem by J.R.R. Tolkien from The Two Towers that was sung by Aragorn and Legolas to pay homage to Boromir.
The article mentions a version by Brocelïande from their 1996 album The Starlit Jewel: Songs of J. R. R. Tolkien. Here is a description from a Coreopsis Journal of Myth & Theatre review of the album:
Brocelïande is a band that plays Medieval and Renaissance music from Europe, and Celtic music from the British Isles. They are interested in music of days past, and also in playing traditional music during each season of the year. The artists on the album are Margaret Davis, Kristoph Klover, Karl Franzen, and Kris Yenney, with guest musicians Ernest Kinsolving, Deirdre McCarthy, Beth Milne, Aodh Og O Tuama, and Cat Taylor. The words were written by J.R.R. Tolkien, in his books The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. The music is by Marion Zimmer Bradley, Kristoph Klover, and Margaret Davis.
You can listen to Brocelïande’s beautiful version of “Lament for Boromir” here:
I also really like this version of “Lament for Boromir” by Clamavi De Profundis that was mentioned in the article:
As a member of a family who loves to sing and make music together, I appreciate this description of Clamavi De Profundis:
We are a family that loves to sing together and record inspiring and uplifting music. Our music is influenced by classical and fantasy literature as well as cinematic, traditional, religious, and classical music. Being a family, we have the unique advantage of similar sounding voices that blend well together. We also have a very broad vocal range potential of over five octaves with a particular focus on singing in the deeper registers. This all enables us to create well blended recordings with a lot of musical depth.
The Clamavi De Profundis YouTube channel has a playlist of J.R.R. Tolkien music as well as original Dwarven songs.
Lastly, not mentioned in the article is this moving version of “Lament for Boromir” by Karliene:
Karliene’s YouTube channel features her “singing, writing, and producing nerdy music for nerdy lovers of history, movies, games, and TV shows” and is well worth checking out.
More Fight Dice
Sheppard Express published an article last week about the D&D-inspired band Fight Dice. I previously covered this Milwaukee band when they announced their debut album Total Party Kill, but this article provides more detail on their gaming background. Here is a an excerpt about their origin story:
Like all journeys, it starts with an origin. About four years ago singer Jay Gilkay (Evel), bassist Todd Bell (Braid, Hey Mercedes), drummer Dan Didier (The Promise Ring, Maritime), guitarists Brett Schwandt (Evel, Ceilishrine) and Eric Arsnow (Tigernite, Devils Teeth) began playing D&D virtually during the pandemic to pass the time.
Like many D&D groups, they home brew campaigns and create house rules:
Creating their own stories provided hours of pure joy. Oftentimes, Gilkay and Schwandt took on the role of Dungeon Masters, who organize gameplay and create worlds for players to journey in a campaign. They used campaigns either from a manual or something “home brewed” that they created. Each player took satisfaction in taking the characters that they made and using their powers or abilities to complete certain tasks. Players combated mythical creatures and sought to survive the game’s many twists and turns.
For Bell, who played D&D since middle school but had trouble in recent years finding interested friends, the group has been very fulfilling. Playing D&D was one of the things that kept his calendar rolling. “It was one of those things that just kept us socially connected and engaged,” says Bell. “We create our own rules and make it as fun as we can because D&D has a lot of flexibility depending on who you’re playing with and where you want to go with it. We are doing it just to have fun, make jokes, create some laughs, kill time and be social.”
The article also discusses the different ways playing D&D influences their songwriting:
About half of the album features narrative songs detailing real life scenarios and situations they’ve experienced, while the other is more of a manual detailing different parts of the game such as certain spells (“Magic Pact”) and monsters (“Owlbear”).
“We’re a little bit all over the place but keep it in the realm of Dungeons and Dragons and making sure that the content is relatable to people who play the game, but also accessible to people who don’t play the game and will just vibe and enjoy the music,” says Gilkay.
One of the things I love about Fight Dice is their unique post-punk sound, which separates them from many other RPG-influenced bands who more commonly focus on metal and/or prog rock elements. I am anxiously awaiting their vinyl version, which I recently ordered. You can listen to the full album and order a digital version from the Fight Dice Bandcamp page.