The Hours can refer to:
The Hours is a stipple engraving by a master of the technique, Francesco Bartolozzi (1725-1815), published on April 4, 1788, from the print shop of Thomas Macklin, at No. 39 Fleet Street, London. The print is based upon a painting by Maria Cosway (1760-1838). The dancing hours, or nymphs of Greek mythology, were a pictorial representation of the poem "Ode on the Spring" by British poet Thomas Gray (1716-1771). The poem begins:
"Lo! where the rosy-bosomed Hours,
Fair Venus' train, appear,
Disclose the long-expecting flowers,
And wake the purple year!
The Attic warbler pours her throat,
Responsive to the cuckoo's note,
The untaught harmony of spring:
While, whisp'ring pleasure as they fly,
Cool Zephyrs thro' the clear blue sky
Their gathered fragrance fling."
Maria Cosway sent a copy of the engraving to Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825), a highly influential French painter, who stated, "on ne peut pas faire une poesie plus ingenieuse et plus naturelle." ("One couldn't make poetry more ingenious and more natural.")
The Hours is the original soundtrack album, on the Elektra/Nonesuch label, of the 2002 film The Hours, starring Nicole Kidman, Meryl Streep and Julianne Moore. The original score was composed by Philip Glass.
Not all of the music in the film was composed specifically for it: earlier music by Glass, including a theme from his opera Satyagraha, was also featured and credited separately at the end of the film.
The album won the BAFTA Award for Best Film Music. It was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Score, the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score and the Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media (lost to the score of the film The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers).
Michael Riesman and Nico Muhly arranged the soundtrack for piano solo. This score was published in 2003 as a 64-paged book containing most of the tracks (excluding "For Your Own Benefit", "Vanessa and the Changelings" and "The Kiss").
I was born in the valley of bricks
Where the river runs high above the rooftops
I was waiting for the cars coming home late at night
From the Dutch mountains
I was standing in the valley of rock
Up to my belly in an early fog
I was looking for the road to a green painted house
In the Dutch mountains
In the Dutch mountains
Mountains
I met a woman in the valley of stone
She was painting roses on the walls of her home
And the moon is a coin with the head of the queen
Of the Dutch mountains
Mountains
I lost a button of my shirt today
It fell on the ground
And it was rolling away
Like a trail leading me back
To the Dutch mountains
To the Dutch mountains
Mountains
I met a miller on the back of a cow
He was looking for the wind but he didn't know how
I said: Follow the cloud that looks like a sheep
In the Dutch mountains
In the Dutch mountains
In the Dutch mountains
Mountains
Mountains
Buildings