Far Above Cayuga's Waters

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View of Cayuga Lake.
View of Cayuga Lake.

"Far Above Cayuga's Waters" is Cornell University's alma mater. The lyrics were composed circa 1870 by roommates Archibald Croswell Weeks, 1872, and Wilmot Moses Smith, 1874, and set to the tune of "Annie Lisle", a popular 1857 ballad by H. S. Thompson about a heroine dying of tuberculosis.

Contents

[edit] History

This song is the one of the better known alma maters in the United States. It is the only alma mater song included in Ronald Herder's "500 Best-Loved Song Lyrics." In a novel, Betty Smith called it "the saddest and oldest of all college songs." Edward Abbey, in One Life at a Time, Please, mentions a campfire sing in which he contributed "the only Ivy League song that occurred to me: 'Far Above Cayuga's Waters.'"

The tune has been adopted since by dozens of universities, colleges, and high schools worldwide. For example, Professor George Penny of the University of Kansas wrote his school's alma mater by changing a few words from Cornell's song ("Far above the golden valley..."). Other colleges and universities that have borrowed the song include the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, the College of William and Mary, the Colorado State University, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Missouri, the University of Georgia, the University of Alabama, Indiana University, Wofford College, Birmingham-Southern College, Emory University, Erskine College, Lehigh University, Lewis & Clark College, Moravian College, Xavier University, Acadia University, Vanderbilt University, the American University of Beirut, and even the fictional Plainfield Teacher's College.

The song traditionally concludes campus performances by the Cornell University Chorus and Cornell University Glee Club. It is also heard between the second and third periods of men's ice hockey games, halftime or the end of the third quarter of football games, and half time of other Cornell athletic contests attended by the Cornell Big Red Marching Band or the Cornell Big Red Pep Band.

Students of Ithaca College on the other side of Cayuga Lake, like to point out that the song's lyrics are not as magnificent or accurate as one might think -- Cornell's campus is actually at a much lower elevation (in feet above sea level) than the campus of Ithaca College. The school bookstore has, at times in the past, sold t-shirts to this effect, with the motto: "Farther Above Cayuga's Waters."

[edit] Lyrics

The first two verses and the chorus are the best known and are usually the only verses sung. These verses and the rest of the song are as follows:

Far Above Cayuga's Waters
With its waves of blue,
Stands our noble Alma Mater
Glorious to view.
Refrain:
Lift the chorus, speed it onward,
Loud her praises tell.
Hail to thee, our Alma Mater,
Hail, all hail, Cornell!
Far Above the busy humming
Of the bustling town;
Reared against the arch of Heaven,
Looks she proudly down.
Refrain
Sentry-like o'er lake and valley towers her regal form,
Watch and ward forever keeping, braving time and storm.
So through clouds of doubt and darkness gleams her beacon light,
Fault and error clear revealing, blazing forth the right.
Refrain
To the glory of her founder rise her stately walls.
May her sons pay equal tribute whene'er duty calls.
When the moments, swiftly fleeting, ages roll between,
Many yet unborn shall hail her: Alma Mater, Queen!
Refrain
In the music of the waters as they glide along,
In the murmur of the breezes with their whispered song,
In the tuneful chorus blending with each pealing bell,
One refrain seems oft repeated: Hail, all hail, Cornell!
Refrain
Here, by flood and foaming torrent, gorge and rocky dell,
Pledge we faith and homage ever to our loved Cornell.
May time ne'er efface the memory of her natal day,
And her name and fame be honored far and wide alway!
Refrain

[edit] Parodies

As expected in a song that has become part of popular culture, it is the subject of parodies. Allan Sherman's "No One's Perfect," about choral clinkers, put these words to the tune:
"Far above the other singers
In the treble clef
A soprano sings in E Flat
But... the key is F."[citation needed]

Fans of other Ivy League institutions have been known to sing doctored versions of the lyrics when playing Cornell in athletic contests. The most popular version goes as such:

Far above Cayuga's waters/
What's that awful smell/
Some will say that it's the lake/
But no -- it's just Cornell.

A variant of the above is:

Far above Cayuga's waters/
There's an awful smell/
Some say it's Cayuga's waters/
Some say it's Cornell."

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  • Abbey, Edward (1988): One Life at a Time, Please. Owl Books, ISBN 0-8050-0603-6
  • Herder, Ronald (1998), 500 Best-Loved Song Lyrics. Courier Dover Publications, ISBN 0-486-29725-X'
  • Smith, Betty: Joy in the Morning

[edit] External links

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