Editing Maiden's Prayer

{{Short description|Composition for piano by Tekla Bądarzewska-Baranowska}}
{{for|the cocktail sometimes known as the Maiden's Prayer|Between the Sheets (cocktail)}}
{{Infobox musical composition
| name              = Maiden's Prayer
| image             = Bądarzewska Gebet einer Jungfrau.jpg
| alt               = 
| caption           = Cover of the "Maiden's Prayer" by Thecla Badarzewska, 1900
| type              = Piano music
| composer          = [[Tekla Bądarzewska]]
| key               = [[E♭ major]], [[C minor]]
| catalogue         = Op. 4
| dedication        = 
| composed          = 
| duration          = 5:46 min.
| published         = 1856
| publisher         = 
| scoring           = 
| misc              = 
}}
{{Listen|type=music|filename=A Maiden's Prayer.mid|title="A Maiden's Prayer"|description=[[MIDI]] rendition, 3:05 minutes}}
"'''A Maiden's Prayer'''" (original Polish title: "{{Lang|pl|Modlitwa dziewicy|italic=no}}" [[Opus number|Op.]] 4, French: "{{Lang|fr|La prière d'une vierge|italic=no}}") is a composition of Polish composer [[Tekla Bądarzewska-Baranowska]] (1834–1861). It was published in 1856 in Warsaw, and then as a supplement to the ''[[Revue et gazette musicale de Paris]]'' in 1859. It is a short piano piece of medium difficulty for intermediate pianists. Some have liked it for its charming and romantic melody; others have described it as "sentimental salon tosh."{{who? |date=October 2023}} 

==In country music==
{{Infobox song
| name       = Maiden's Prayer
| cover      =
| alt        =
| type       = single
| artist     = [[Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys]]
| album      =
| B-side     = Takin' It Home  
| released   = May 1941
| recorded   = February 24 1941<ref>{{Citation|title=78 Record: Bob Wills And His Texas Playboys - Maiden's Prayer (1941)|url=http://www.45worlds.com/78rpm/record/06205|access-date=2021-07-20}}</ref>
| studio     = WBAP Studio, Blackstone Hotel, Fort Worth, Texas<ref>{{Cite book|last=Russell|first=Tony|title=Country Music Records: A Discography, 1921-1942|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2004|isbn=0195139895|location=New York|pages=965}}</ref>
| venue      =
| genre      = [[Western swing]]
| length     =
| label      = [[Okeh Records|Okeh]] 06205
| writer     = [[Bob Wills]]
| producer   =
| prev_title = [[Take Me Back To Tulsa]]
| prev_year  = 1941
| next_title = Twin Guitar Special
| next_year  = 1941
}}
The American musician [[Bob Wills]] heard "Maiden's Prayer" played on a fiddle while he was a barber in [[Roy, New Mexico]],<ref>McWhorter, ''Cowboy Fiddler'', pp. 59–60: "Bob said, 'He played "[[New Spanish Two Step|The Spanish Two-Step]]" and I locked the door where he couldn't get out and nobody else could get in, and I made him stay there until he taught me that and "Maiden's Prayer." Finally he nodded. I didn't know whether he needed to go to the bathroom or if I was doing it right, but I let him out.' That Mexican taught him those two tunes."</ref> and arranged the piece in the [[Western swing]] style. Wills first recorded it as an instrumental in 1935 ([[Vocalion]] 03924, released in 1938),<ref name=PFII>[http://countrydiscography.blogspot.com/2010/02/bob-wills-part-ii.html Praguefrank's Country Music Discographies: Bob Wills – part II] Retrieved 2 January 2012</ref><ref>[http://www.allmusic.com/song/maidens-prayer-t2711179 "Maiden's Prayer", Bob Wills with music sample], AllMusic. Retrieved 1 January 2012</ref> and it quickly became one of his signature tunes. Later, it became a [[standard (music)|standard]] recorded by many [[Country music|country]] artists, including [[Buck Owens]] on his number-one 1965 album ''[[I've Got a Tiger By the Tail (album)|I've Got a Tiger By the Tail]]''.<ref>[http://www.allmusic.com/album/ive-got-a-tiger-by-the-tail-r93471 "''I've Got a Tiger by the Tail'', Buck Owens review with chart and music sample], AllMusic. Retrieved 1 January 2012</ref> The tune is still a standard in the repertoire of Western swing bands.

Wills wrote lyrics for "Maiden's Prayer" and recorded it again in 1941 ([[Okeh]] 06205) with vocals by [[Tommy Duncan]].<ref>[http://www.allmusic.com/song/a-maidens-prayer-t931306 "A Maiden's Prayer", Bob Wills with music sample], Allmusic. Retrieved 1 January 2012</ref> His lyrics reflect the title, and the song, as written by Wills, opens with:
<poem style="margin-left: 2em;">Twilight falls, evening shadows find,
There 'neath the stars, a maiden so fair divine.
The moon on high seemed to see her there.
In her eyes is a light, shining ever so bright,
She whispered a silent prayer.</poem>

"Maiden's Prayer" was released in May 1941, and quickly hit number 1 on June 28, 1941, in [[Billboard (magazine)|The Billboard]]'s "[[Country music|Hillbilly]] and Foreign Record Hits Of the Month".<ref>{{cite magazine|date=28 June 1941|title=Hillbilly Recordings – Month Ending June 28, 1941|url=http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/40s/1941/BB-1941-06-28.pdf|magazine=The Billboard|location=Cincinnati, Ohio|page=94|access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref> 

Relatively few country singers have [[Cover version|covered]] "Maiden's Prayer" with vocals, but they include [[Ray Price (musician)|Ray Price]] on his [[tribute album]] ''San Antonio Rose'' (1962)<ref>[http://www.allmusic.com/album/san-antonio-rose-r109544 ''San Antonio Rose'' Ray Price review with music sample], Allmusic. Retrieved 1 January 2012</ref> and [[Willie Nelson]] on his album ''[[Red Headed Stranger]]'' (on the 2000 CD reissue but not the 1975 LP).<ref>[http://www.allmusic.com/album/red-headed-stranger-r93336 ''Red Headed Stranger'' Willie Nelson review with chart and music sample], Allmusic. Retrieved 1 January 2012</ref> Both singers used the lyrics written by Wills with minor variations, e.g. the maiden is an Indian in Price's version. Also the [[Everly Brothers]] recorded a rendition of the song in 1973.<ref>[[The Everly Brothers]], The Masters, Eagle Records, 1997</ref>

Wills recorded the song a third time on the 1963 album ''Bob Wills Sings and Plays''.<ref name=PFII /> When he was inducted into the [[Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame]] in 1970, "Maiden's Prayer" was one of the works cited.{{citation needed|date=February 2021}}

==In popular media==

The "Maiden's Prayer" is quoted in the 1930 opera ''[[Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny]]'' by [[Kurt Weill]] and [[Bertolt Brecht]]. It appears midway through act 1, played on an out-of-tune piano at a honky-tonk frequented by prostitutes and their clients. Jakob Schmidt, one of the denizens of Mahagonny, refers to the song as "ewige Kunst" ("eternal art").{{citation needed|date=February 2021}}

"Maiden's Prayer" is heard off-stage in act 4 of ''[[Three Sisters (play)|Three Sisters]]'' by [[Anton Chekhov]].{{citation needed|date=February 2021}} "Maiden's Prayer" appears as an insert piano song in the anime series ''[[List of Strawberry Panic episodes|Strawberry Panic]]''.{{citation needed|date=February 2021}} "Maiden's Prayer" is played by [[Waste management in Taiwan|garbage trucks in Taiwan]]. As residents have to take out their own trash, the garbage truck signals everyone to do so with the melody of this piece, along with [[Beethoven]]'s ''[[Für Elise]]''.<ref>[http://www.culture.tw/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=938&Itemid=156 "'A Maiden's Prayer': A call to dump all our garbage"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110811100809/http://www.culture.tw/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=938&Itemid=156 |date=2011-08-11 }} by Leo Maliksi (7 October 2008)</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.mnn.com/lifestyle/recycling/blogs/in-taiwan-trash-disposal-is-a-classical-affair|title=In Taiwan, trash disposal is a classical affair|work=MNN – Mother Nature Network|access-date=2018-10-03|archive-date=2018-10-03|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181003061800/https://www.mnn.com/lifestyle/recycling/blogs/in-taiwan-trash-disposal-is-a-classical-affair|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>[https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB1032902617408392553 "Taiwan Enlists Garbage Trucks To Teach the English Language"] by Jason Dean, ''[[The Wall Street Journal]]'', September 25, 2002 {{subscription required}}</ref><ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/08/world/asia/taiwan-waste-management-beethoven.html "When You Hear Beethoven, It’s Time to Take Out the Trash (and Mingle)"] by Amy Qin and Amy Chang Chien, ''[[The New York Times]]'', February 8, 2022</ref>

The [[Rodgers and Hart]] standard "[[It Never Entered My Mind]]" refers to this song in the penultimate line.{{citation needed|date=February 2021}}

In the 1955 Italian ''[[Scandal in Sorrento]]'' film, Antonio and Violante play the tune together on a piano at the very end of the movie

In Nobuhiko Obayashi's 1977 horror movie ''[[House (1977 film)|House]]'', the character Melody plays the opening section of "A Maiden's Prayer" on the piano a few times.{{citation needed|date=February 2021}}

In 1993, the North Korean [[Wangjaesan Light Music Band|Wangjaesan Dance Troupe]]'s VHS tape featured this song in electronic arrangement.{{citation needed|date=February 2021}}

In the 2013 television serial ''[[The Tunnel (TV series)|The Tunnel]]'', Anglo-French actor and singer [[Charlotte Gainsbourg]] performs a voice-over to the tune of the ''Maiden's Prayer'', singing a mixture of French and English:
<poem style="margin-left: 2em;">{{Lang|fr|Venez dans mes bras}}, closer to me, dear.
{{Lang|fr|Donnez-vous à moi;}} set aside all fear.
{{Lang|fr|Restons enlacés pour l'éternité,}}
Yes, you shall be mine till the end of time.{{citation needed|date=February 2021}}</poem>

The piece remains especially popular in Asia. In Japan, the melody of Bądarzewska's ''Maiden Prayer'' is played when the platform door of [[Shinkansen]] bullet trains closes.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j02oprxvRzY |title=Shinkansen platform door closing sound "Badarzewska−La prière d'une" |website=youtube.com |access-date=25 November 2023}}</ref> In Taiwan, the Maiden's Prayer is one of two songs that are typically played on garbage trucks, the other being Beethoven's [[Für Elise]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8G45uCa0Ic |title=Kaohsiung (高雄) Taiwan garbage truck song |website=youtube.com |access-date=15 April 2024}}</ref>

==In literature==

The ''Maiden's Prayer'' was used in a macabre context in [[Mary Wilkins Freeman]]'s [[ghost story]] ''The Wind in the Rose-Bush'' (published 1903), where the main character, roused from sleep by the sound of the melody being played in a seemingly empty house, rushed downstairs to see who was at the piano, only to find that there was no one there.<ref>[https://americanliterature.com/author/mary-e-wilkins-freeman/short-story/the-wind-in-the-rose-bush "The Wind in the Rose-Bush" by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman]</ref>

==Interpretations==
''A Maiden's Prayer Op. 4'' by Bądarzewska is featured on [[Lang Lang]]'s 2019 album ''Piano Book'' released by [[Deutsche Grammophon]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkLHdmcMU0I |title=Lang Lang - Badarzewska-Baranowska: The Maiden's Prayer, Op. 4 (Track by Track) |website=youtube.com |date=5 April 2019 |access-date=25 November 2023}}</ref>

==Criticism==
The pianist and academic [[Arthur Loesser]] was among the critics of the piece and described it as "this dowdy product of ineptitude."{{cq |date=October 2023}}

==References==
{{reflist|colwidth=30em}}

==Bibliography==
*McWhorter, Frankie. ''Cowboy Fiddler in Bob Wills' Band''. University of North Texas Press, 1997. {{ISBN|1-57441-025-3}}
*Mishler, Craig. ''The Crooked Stovepipe: Athapaskan Fiddle Music and Square Dancing in Northeast Alaska and Northwest Canada''. University of Illinois Press, 1993. {{ISBN|0-252-01996-2}}

==External links==
*{{IMSLP|work=La prière d'une vierge, Op.4 (Bądarzewska-Baranowska, Tekla)|cname="La prière d'une vierge"}}

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[[Category:Western swing songs]]
[[Category:Songs written by Bob Wills]]
[[Category:1856 compositions]]
[[Category:1938 songs]]
[[Category:1941 singles]]
[[Category:Compositions in E-flat major]]