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Flowers for You

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Spring is here, bringing us warmer weather and the joy of beautiful, newly blooming flowers. At this time of year, Washington DC’s famous Cherry Blossoms along the Tidal Basin highlight how flowers can enhance any landscape.

Photograph from The Washington Monument rises above the cherry blossoms along the Tidal Basin. Photo: Carol Highsmith. Prints and Photographs Division. https://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2020/03/free-to-use-and-reuse-cherry-blossoms/
The Washington Monument rises above the cherry blossoms along the Tidal Basin. Photo: Carol Highsmith. Prints and Photographs Division.

Flowers are associated with meanings. Roses are flowers of love; daffodils symbolize rebirth and new beginnings; daisies represent innocence and purity; carnations symbolize pride and beauty; magnolia flowers and lilies are associated with nobility, perseverance, and love of nature.

Print from c.1885 of woman holding red roses; she is wearing a big hat with yellow roses.
Roses. Print, 1905, Library of Congress

 

Colors add to the symbolism of flowers: Red is associated with passion, pride, and strength, while white in a flower represents innocence, purity and honesty. A red rose is for lovers on Valentine’s Day; a white rose will remember a beloved who departed. A colorful bouquet of tulips will brightly announce the arrival of spring. Other flowers are considered as extremely precious. The saffron crocus is known to be one of the most expensive flowers in the world.

Tulips. Print from circa 1885, Library of Congress. https://lccn.loc.gov/2003664055
Tulips. Print from circa 1885, Library of Congress.

 

Let me offer you a musical bouquet of flowers, which you can enjoy by checking them out on BARD or in physical forms by reaching out to the NLS Music Section. To borrow hard copies of braille music or talking books on digital cartridge, please call us at 1-800-424-8567 (choose option 2), or e-mail us at [email protected]. If you are new to BARD, or if you need some assistance, you may like to consult this link: Braille and Audio Reading Download (BARD) and BARD Access.

 

Braille Scores

Flower Duet by Léo Délibes from the opera Lakmé. Arranged for flute duet or flute and oboe. (BRM36468)

Flower Duet by Léo Délibes from the opera Lakmé. Arranged for violin. (BRM36690)

Flower Song by Charles Gounod. For voice and piano. (BRM01263)

Flower Song by George Bizet. For tenor and piano. (BRM06532)

Flower Songs, op. 47 no. 5 by Benjamin Britten. For mixed chorus. (BRM27120)

Honeysuckle Rose, in volume 3 of The Real Book of Jazz, compiled and arranged by Jack Long. (BRM36832)

I Touched the Flower by César Cui. Words by Vasily Nemirovich-Danchenko. For voice and piano, with Russian text. (BRM36609)

The Last Rose of Summer by Dudley Buck. For organ solo (BRM29130)

The Last Rose of Summer from Martha by Friedrich von Flotow; in Deanna Durbin’s Album of Favorite Songs and Arias. For medium voice and piano. (BRM22015)

Lotus Flower (or “Die Lotosblume”) by Robert Schumann. For high voice in F with piano. (BRM00640)

A Spirit Flower by Louis Campbell-Tipton. For medium voice and piano. (BRM27103)

Thou Art Like Unto a Flower (“Du bist wie eine Blume”) by Arthur Rubinstein. For medium voice and piano. (BRM20056)

Variations for Flute and Piano on “Trockne Blumen” from Die schöne Müllerin, by Franz Schubert, D 802. (BRM36465)

When the White Lilacs Bloom Again by Fritz Rotter and Franz Doelle. For piano. (BRM33823)

Woodland Sketches, opus 51, by Edward MacDowell, they include “To a Water Lily and “To a Wild Rose.” (BRM32185)

Large Print Scores

Flower Song by Gustav Lange. (LPM00041)

Woodland Sketches, opus 51, by Edward MacDowell, they include “To a Water Lily” and “To a Wild Rose.” (LPM00089)

Digital Talking Books

Blackberry Blossom for banjo taught by Bill Brown. (DBM03220)

The Lily of the Valley for guitar taught by Bill Brown. (DBM02202)

Wildwood Flower for guitar taught by Bill Brown. (DBM02107) 

Other Digital Talking Books

Garden Flower Folklore by Laura C. Martin. A botanical reference guide to more than one hundred flowers and their history. (DB29669)

Plants. A Very Short Introduction by Timothy Walker. (DB86539)

The Plant Messiah. Adventures in Search of the World’s Rarest Species, by Carlos Magdalena. (DB90798)

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