Far Above Cayuga's Waters

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.

History

"Far Above Cayuga's Waters" as printed in Songs of Cornell in 1906

This song is 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 first line of 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, high schools, and camps 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, Syracuse University, the University of Missouri, the University of Georgia, the University of Alabama, Indiana University, Wofford College, Ripon College, Birmingham-Southern College, Emory University, Erskine College, Lehigh University, Lewis & Clark College, Moravian College, Xavier University, Acadia University, Salem College, Swarthmore College, 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. A rendition of the tune is also used to conclude all of the school's daily afternoon chime concerts (evening performances traditionally end with the "Evening Song"; the morning concert begins with the "Jennie McGraw Rag" but has no traditional finale).

Lyrics

The first two verses 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.

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.

Lift the chorus, speed it onward, loud her praises tell;

Hail to thee, our alma mater! Hail, all hail, Cornell!

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.

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!

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!

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 away!

As it is presented above in full form, the song has six verses and no refrains. However, in common practice, only the first two verses are sung, and they share the lines "Lift the chorus, speed it onward, loud her praises tell; / Hail to thee our Alma Mater! Hail, all hail, Cornell!". Due to this symmetry, whenever only the first two verses are printed or sung, it is customary to consider lines 1–2 and 5–6 as being verses 1 and 2, respectively, and lines 3–4 and 7–8 as being a single repeated refrain:

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

See also

• Cornell University
• List of Cornell Songs

External links

• Songs of Cornell at Google Books
• Cornell Songs - Read the more on Alma Mater history, download PDF sheet music, and listen to an mp3.
• Sounds of the Cornell Chimes - Cornell Chimes website includes mp3s of the three daily Cornell songs (Alma Mater, Evening Song, and Jenny McGraw Rag) available for free download
• The Borrowing of the Song
• Link to an article mentioning its use in a song about the fictitious "Plainfield Teacher's College"