Ruminative, he started pounding the triplets of Fats Domino's "Every Night About This Time," and sang a few of its sad verses, then shut down the band entirely.
When the partridge is trapped ("how sad!") several verses later, we are offered a moral: "Take note here and consider life's vanity, of which there's plenty in this world".
If we take the word blue to mean "sad" or "down," then the opening verse in fact sets out an all-consuming depression incurred by the oppressive suffocation of modern existence.
She turns quiet verses into sadder-but-wiser reflections or clipped preacher's syncopations.
The verses confess to feeling scared and sad; the choruses promise consolation if she perseveres.
In addition to prolific variations on standard themes of love, God and death, his music immortalized verses about fish, flowers, streams, pigeons, colors, sad journeys and famously, his own love for music itself.
According to Ibn Sad, the opposition in Mecca started when Muhammad delivered verses that condemned idol worship and the Meccan forefathers who engaged in polytheism.
The saxophonist Roy Nathanson recited a few thoughts about the passage of time and then sidled into the first verse: "The breakup we had/Left me lonely and sad," he spoke-sang, tweaking the lyrics just slightly.
In the second verse, Knowles continues to dismiss her former lover as she sings, "So sad, you're hurt / boo hoo... ......, over a tinkling piano riff and bass drums.
The highest emotion hits late, in the wordless windups of his greatest songs — from "Sad-Eyed Lady" to "Not Dark Yet" — when the band plays through the verse one more time and language sinks into silence.
