J. R. R. Tolkien was a scholar of English literature, a philologist and medievalist interested in language and poetry from the Middle Ages, especially that of Anglo-Saxon England and Northern Europe.

The book contains one of the longest samples of the constructed language Quenya, in the shape of the song "Namárië", as well as the Sindarin prayer "A Elbereth Gilthoniel", with grammatical explanations.

[4][5] In addition, Tolkien contributed decorations in the form of elvish script for the top and bottom of every page of sheet music, and tailpieces for the spaces at the ends of the poems.

The third edition, published in 1993, added music for "Lúthien Tinúviel" from The Silmarillion, which had earlier appeared in The Songs of Donald Swann: Volume I.

On 10 June 1995, the song cycle was performed in Rotterdam under the auspices of the Dutch Tolkien Society, by the baritone Jan Krediet together with the chamber choir EnSuite and Alexandra Swemer on the piano.

These included A Elbereth Gilthoniel and O Orofarnë, Lassemista, Carnimírië; he replaced the latter with Namárië for the first edition as he felt it was too similar to Henry Purcell's "Dido's Lament".

"I Sit Beside the Fire" portrays a traveller, Bilbo, reflecting on his journeys; it ends with a quotation of the melody of "The Road Goes Ever On", a poem that recurs (adapted to each context) in The Lord of the Rings.

[10] The educationist Estelle Jorgensen states that she was "struck by Swann's simple, folklike, and tonal strophic settings, harking back to an earlier time before atonal music, which seems appropriate to the rustic character of the hobbits and others he portrays.

In her view, the setting of "In the willow-meads of Tasarinan" captures Treebeard's strength and resilience, but not the quality of chanting that Tolkien mentions, nor the fact that the Ents had been influenced by elvish music.

She notes that in Middle-earth, singing was natural and a pleasure, as it was in times before amplified popular music changed the style of the human voice.