POV: you're a worm who got invited to the elf-king's party 🥳
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Hello legend-lovers! How are you? How was your February? This month, I've been mainly teaching music in schools and setting up the Book Balladiers: composing for our first few customers and writing the February newsletter. My writing goal for the month was to finish the second draft of The Mistwaes Home, and I only have 3 chapters to go! But before I finish that, I need to write this email XD. (God gave me an extra day in February for this, and I still haven't started :').) I wanted to tell a beautiful romantic story for Valentine's Day, and it was harder to find one than I expected--especially one I haven't told already! Finally I remembered the Elf-Mound, a wonderful romance by Hans Christian Andersen. This is a favourite of mine, because I found it a few years ago, and wrote a song about it. The song is called The King of the Mountains, and I loved it so much that I wanted to record it somehow and share it with you. But I didn't have good equipment, and I was so scared of it not being ✨perfect✨ that I never recorded it, and never told you the legend. Well, here is a recording that is neither perfect nor using good equipment, but you can kind of (almost?) hear everything. I'm sorry that the vocals are really quiet... I was going to rerecord it but my guitar lead died 😭. I hope that despite its flaws, you can enjoy it <3. Maybe one day I'll buy a new lead and record a proper version for you with all the parts. Let's relocate (via our 🔥 magical teleporting Campfire 🔥) to the Elf-Mound, where the banquet hall is all a-bustle as they prepare for a wonderful feast! Rumour has it that the gnome king of the mountains is coming all the way from Norway... his sons are looking for wives, and no women are more wonderful than the elf-king's princesses. Unfortunately, the gnome princes are... not so wonderful... The old gnome is a true old honest Norwegian veteran, merry and straightforward. I know him from old days, when we drank brotherhood with one another. He was down here to fetch his wife; now she is dead, she was a daughter of the King of the Chalk-rocks of Möen. ... The lads, they say, are rather rude, forward lads; but perhaps they are belied, and they'll be right enough when they grow older.
--The Elf King
All the kings make the song slightly confusing, so here's a handy diagram:
(One last thing: there's this one line in this song that I really really need to change, but I don't know how to and it also makes me laugh/cringe every time. You'll know it when you hear it. Sorry in advance.)
Here are the lyrics! The king of the mountains is coming down today The king of Norwegian gnomes is coming tonight Hear the moonshine spun into their dresses The king wakes from the story, and, looking around Hear the golden crowns glitter with fine pencil dust Hear the moonshine spun into their dresses The elf king is watching his youngest daughter dance Hear the moonshine spun into their dresses (The last chord wasn't what I expected, which is why I made the face at the end 😂.) The story has a fun twist, doesn't it? The way the princes are, it's the most satisfying ending 😅. Here's the full legend, if you'd like more fun details and vivid imagination! The song references a number of small details and characters, but it's such a creative world that Andersen has built. (And writing the song from the point of view of the blind worm forced me to think hard about how I could describe the setting vividly.) Have you found any good romantic stories recently? (I reread The Princess Bride recently and the romance in it is 0.5/10 but everything else somehow makes up for it 😂.) What's your favourite romance? Have a wonderful March! <3 Debbie More like this from the archives:
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