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So you'll be an Austrian nobleman
Commissioning a symphony in C
Which defies all earthly descriptions
You'll be commissioning a symphony in C
With money you squeeze from the peasants
To your nephew you can give it as a present
This magnificent symphony in C
You'll be commissioning a symphony in C
Completely filling the palace concert hall
It's warm and golden like an oven that's wide open
It has a melody both happy and sad
Built on victorious known triads
You enter the room with great caution
Though no-one in the hall is even watching
They are transfixed, they are forgetting just to breathe
They are so taken by your symphony in C
You are sitting there thinking your thoughts
They are not about what is but what is not
You are sitting there breathing in your breath
You are seldom breathing life but mostly death
So you'll be an Austrian nobleman
Commissioning a symphony in C
Which defies all earthly descriptions
You'll be commissioning a symphony in C
Commissioning a symphony in C
Which defies all earthly descriptions
You'll be commissioning a symphony in C
With money you squeeze from the peasants
To your nephew you can give it as a present
This magnificent symphony in C
You'll be commissioning a symphony in C
Completely filling the palace concert hall
It's warm and golden like an oven that's wide open
It has a melody both happy and sad
Built on victorious known triads
You enter the room with great caution
Though no-one in the hall is even watching
They are transfixed, they are forgetting just to breathe
They are so taken by your symphony in C
You are sitting there thinking your thoughts
They are not about what is but what is not
You are sitting there breathing in your breath
You are seldom breathing life but mostly death
So you'll be an Austrian nobleman
Commissioning a symphony in C
Which defies all earthly descriptions
You'll be commissioning a symphony in C
Lyrics submitted by shut, edited by EvanDood, adameyer, Gideonator, brownale9000
Commissioning a Symphony in C Lyrics as written by John M Mccrea
Lyrics © Wixen Music Publishing
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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I'd like to point out that the commissioner of a symphony is not necessarily the composer (and most likely is not, back in the day of Austrian composers such as Mozart). This song may be relating the exploitation of artists by record companies to something like that that could possibly have happened back in the Victorian era...? Also, I'm not sure if, in the third verse, the lyrics are "Victoria's young triads." I would likely think it is victorious young triads, also I can't figure out why someone would call a triad "young." But I guess they could be referring to the early, simpler forms of harmonization....well, anyway
"Victorious" perhaps because this song is about Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, the opening four notes of which were used as an identifier on the BBC during World War II because they sound like the Morse code for V (as in V for Victory).
He calls them young triads because they're brand new and fresh. Nobody has ever heard anything like this symphony. yet, the commissioner can only think about what he doesn't have.