Aldhelm of Sherborne, Religious Rapper

Dorset County Museum

Aldhelm, Bishop of Sherborne, Saint, musician, rapper and poet.

Here's his rhythmic rap, a hundred rhyming couplets in Latin, about a tempest "rocking the church":

"standing in two ranks singing together, we’re celebrating the melody of matins and the psalm-singing of the Office: behold! suddenly with a blast [of wind] the columns were rocking out of their foundations"

Carmen rhythmicum

Text  and commentary (pdf)

Aldhelm's lost works (from Wikipedia):

"According to William of Malmesbury, Aldhelm also wrote poetry in Old English, and set his own compositions to music, but none of his songs, which were still popular in the time of Alfred, have come down to us. Finding his people slow to come to church, he is said to have stood at the end of a bridge singing songs in the vernacular, thus collecting a crowd to listen to exhortations on sacred subjects".

At least we do have some Old English poetry by Widsith

Modern English version by Douglas B Killings

And, for fun, a little blues:

Wandering Widsith’s Original Homesick Anglo-Saxon Blues

They call me Wandering Widsith, Widsith is my name,

They call me Wandering Widsith, Widsith’s an Anglian name,

They way they mistreat me people, is a low down crying shame.

I used to be a singer, singing praises for my pay,

I used to be a singer, singing praises for my pay,

Now I’m out of work, and I’ve got no place to stay.

I’ve wandered over Europe, with my harp and my word-hoard,

I’ve wandered over Europe,  looking for a worthy lord,

But times are getting hard now, they can’t afford my bed and board.

It was sometime in six hundred, came to this new Angle-Land,

It was sometime in six hundred, came to this new-fangled land,

But it’s such a songless island, going back to join a minstrel band.