tears, unending tears

The only surviving manuscript of tears, unending tears for solo voice and piano, is a fair copy. On the cover page Reddy called it ‘Song on a Ground Bass in the Baroque style’. It is undated but may have been written in 1983, the same year as his setting of Shakespeare’s tell me where is fancy bred, which is not dissimilar in style. The scoring of tears is unspecified. It is written on two staves – melody and bass – and although the bass is not figured, all the ornaments are indicated. The words are by Reddy, and obviously inspired by John Dowland’s famous ayre of 1600, ‘Flow my tears’, in turn derived from Dowland’s instrumental ‘Lachrimae pavane’. The reason for Reddy writing the piece, or details of any performance of it, are not known.