[Begin Theme Music]
Welcome to Harmonia…I’m Angela Mariani.
Recently, I had the pleasure of visiting with members of the Baltimore Consort, who came to Lubbock, Texas to present their Shakespeare program “The Food of Love.” Joining me were Mary Anne Ballard, Mark Cudek, Larry Lipkis, Ronn McFarlane, and Danielle Svonavec—their 6th member Mindy Rosenfeld joined them for the concert the next day. I believe it was the first live interview I’ve done with guests since the beginning of the pandemic, and we had a great time talking about their current projects, including the songs and tunes from Shakespeare that are featured on their recent CD “The Food of Love,” and the release of their upcoming Christmas CD, “A Glorious Light,” on the 30-year anniversary of their FIRST Christmas CD “Bright Day Star.”
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MUSIC TRACK
Food of Love
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2019
T. 1: Tiers livre de danseries; Les Bouffons [02.56]
T.4: O Mistress Mine (actual 2:05)
Music from Shakespeare’s time, from the Baltimore Consort’s CD, Food of Love.
This hour on Harmonia, we’re featuring my recent visit with the Baltimore Consort, who joined me in the studio of radio station KTTZ at Texas Tech University.
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Angie: It’s such a wonderful feeling to be sitting here in a studio, with musicians, not on Zoom, not from a distance, but to actually be able to interview people live, it’s just a wonderful feeling. And the occasion is the performance of The Baltimore Consort at the First United Methodist Church’s Vespers series that is here is Lubbock Texas – and I am also here in Lubbock Texas, so we have this opportunity to talk, and I’m delighted to have you all here today. The program you’re doing here is the Shakespeare program…I’d love to hear about that.
Larry [I think]: This is a program that Mark and I put together 8 years ago or so? The Shakespeare repertory is really at the core of what the Baltimore Consort, you know, how the group started, playing music from Shakespeare’s time, and we did it faithfully for all these 30 years and then thought let’s put together a program, a CD, exploring the repertory, going a little deeper into it…the way the group works is that various people take on projects,and Mark and I split this one, so we’ve got some of our old favorites, and some new things that made it a little theatrical in some places, so… we’ve been touring with it, and then we made a recording. So it’s one of our favorite programs.”
Larry: “The first piece is a really fun one, it’s just called “Kemp’s Jig,” which is a tune in honor of Will Kemp in Shakespeare’s troupe, and he was the clown “Touchstone” in As You Like It, and he was famous for the 9-day wonder where he danced a jig from London to Norwich, which is about 100 miles, so if you start in Lubbock and head northwest, you might end up in Clovis, which is just about—I looked it up! [laughter] so I think I’m on safe ground here, it’s about 100 miles - so if you want to try that … stay off the interstate!”
Ronn: There’s a woodcut of Will Kemp, and someone playing pipe and tabor, and Will Kemp always gets the credit, but the musician, who had to go along the whole way, playing the pipe and tabor, what credit do they get?
Larry: Nothing! Isn’t that typical! [Laughter]
MUSIC TRACK
Food of Love
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2019
T.2: Kemp’s Jig [1:15]
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Angie: “I think sometimes people don’t realize how much music is there in the Shakespeare plays.
We read through and we see this lyric piece, and maybe dom’t realize that yes, there was actually music, and it was probably played on stage at the time, too.
Larry: Absolutely. And there are lots of directions throughout the plays as you know of just something as simple as “music here,” or “Music for dancing,” or “Musicians enter, a processional” or some sort of thing, and you have to kind of, in cases like that, find music that fits. There are also lots of places in the plays where the song text is embedded into the play, which happens in As You Like it, Twelfth Night, Othello …
Danielle: The Tempest
Angie: And that is a question, sometimes the music is not known, and sometimes it is known, right? So you have to – well, I would say a little detective work, but a little bit of creative composing, or different ways to go about it.
Larry: And there’s some places where Shakespeare writes a comic scence in a place where there’s…had just been tragedy. And that’s something that a lot of stage directors don’t feel that’s appropriate, it would confurse the audience. And Juliet’s feigned death, everyone’s like “Oh my gosh, she’s dead” – there’s this really wonderful comic scene with some music in it, but it’s not often done, because it doesn’t seem right for a lot of directors, but we include music from that scene. It’s well worth it, actually.”
MaryAnne: “Yeah, we have a comic scene in the concert we’re doing tomorrow, which is the reason why we’re. . .borrowing a shovel from you (laughter)
Angie: That’s right, I have to locate the shovel . . .
Larry: It has to be a Renaissance era shovel, if you can . .
Angie: I’m not sure about that…[laughter]
Larry: As close as you can get!
MUSIC TRACK
Food of Love
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2019
T.18: Gravedigger’s song/Tarleton’s Rise [2:37]
The Gravedigger’s song & Tarleton’s Rise, from the Baltimore Consort’s CD “The Food of Love.” The Baltimore Consort are my guests this hour on Harmonia.
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Mark: “We’re doing two songs from “Tempest” that are by Robert Johnson . . .and those are without question, he was a collaborator; Shakespeare was in the same company for awhile, so those are songs that the versions we’re doing, we know were used. And that’s Full Fathom Five and Where the bee sucks. And then other songs, like the Willow Song, Farewell Dear Love, we’re just using the earliest surviving versions of them.”
MUSIC TRACK
Food of Love
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2019
T.23: Where the bee sucks [:55]
T.24: Full Fathom Five [1:48]
The Baltimore Consort, from the CD “The Food of Love: Songs, Dances and Fancies for Shakespeare.” We heard Where the Bee Sucks and Full Fathom Five, both from Shakespeare’s play The Tempest.” I’m chatting with the Baltimore Consort this hour on Harmonia.
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Ronn: “Do you want to say something about Robin Goodfellow?”
Danielle: Oh, that’s a comic scene--Robin Goodfellow talking about himself and some of his full moon hijnks—I think it’s a bit unexpected for an early music audience, at the end of a concert, to see something that’s semi-staged, and a bit ridiculous…and we really ham it up.
Mark: Robin Goodfellow is another name for Puck – it’s a Midsummer Night’s Dream scene.
Larry: [he] likes to make mischief and make merry, and sometimes we turn Danielle loose, or she turns herself loose, and knocks things off the stage, and grabs programs out of the hands of the audience members . . .
Ronn: Even the audience is not safe!
Larry: NO one’s safe for that one!
Danielle: No, I’ve only sung this one once since Covid—and I used to grab things from audience members, and Puck can be sensitive too [Laughter!] to the way we’re coming back from COVID, so
Larry: He’s not known to be sensitive . . .
Danielle: No, Puck will be sensitive. Puck’s all about public health. [Laughter]
Angie: The restraint.
Mark: He knows all about the Plague! {Laughter, “That’s right!” agreement]
MUSIC TRACK
Food of Love
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2019
T.28: The Merry Adventures of Robin Goodfellow [actual 3:57]
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
MaryAnne: “We’re a Renaissance group that does popular music of Renaissance times, and that means of course . . . ballads. Broadside ballads. I’ve always been fascinated by them. One of the broadsides that we have in this show is the famous Carman’s Whistle. Most people know it as something that Elizabethan composers did variations on, you know, the tune – but, in fact, it has a rather naughty text.
Angie: There may be some of my listeners who don’t remember that you were, I believe, the first early music ensemble to have a parental warning . . . on the CD.
MaryAnne: That’s right . . . [murmuring] Yes, and it really helped sell the CDs. [Laugher] Yeah, it’s called a parental advisory, and I still have a roll of the stickers at home…and it was called the Art of the Bawdy song.
MUSIC TRACK
Food of Love
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2019
T.13: The Carman’s Whistle [actual 5:22]
The Carman’s Whistle, performed by the Baltimore Consort, from the CD “The Food of Love.”
Theme Music Bed: Ensemble Alcatraz, Danse Royale, Elektra Nonesuch 79240-2 / B000005J0B, T.12: La Prime Estampie Royal
[Theme music begins]
Early music can mean a lot of things. What does it mean to you? Let us know your thoughts and ideas. Contact us at harmonia early music dot org, where you’ll also find playlists and an archive of past shows.
You’re listening to Harmonia . . . I’m Angela Mariani.
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:59 Midpoint Break Music Bed:
Adew Dundee
Baltimore Consort
Dorian 2003
T. 6 The Scotch cuckold (excerpt of 3:03)
(fades out at :59)
I’m visiting this hour with several members of the Baltimore Consort: Mary Anne Ballard, Larry Lipkis, Ronn McFarlane, Danielle Svonavec, and Mark Cudek. One of the Baltimore Consort’s recent projects was based on the life of Mary Queen of Scots.
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Mark: Well, it’s a program that we do in collaboration with Robert Aubrey Davis, who does narrations, and he’s an Emmy-winning actor as well as the host of the radio program, and he’s very dramatic and does just a terrific job on stage – fun to work with.
Angie: And I think a lot of my listeners will also recognize RAD from Millennium of Music” “Sure,” “Right”.
Mark: Mary became Queen of Scotland when she was only a few days old; her father James the Fifth died when she was an infant; her mother was Catholic, and sent her off to France, so she grew up in the French court, was reputed to be a wonderful dancer, played the lute well, and was a very fine poet. SO we start the program with just giving the audience a feeling of Old Scotland, and then move to France and do chansons, and then there are readings of her poetry and poems by the very famous poet Pierre Ronsard about Mary, that Robert reads, and then we do some of the songs on Ronsard’s texts. That’s kind of the first half, and then the second half we move and change moods, and do some very dark music from Scotland where she comes back, and being Catholic, coming back to Scotland which is ruled by a bunch of nobles who are not really crazy to have her back, so it was not a pleasant time…
MUSIC TRACK
Adew Dundee
Baltimore Consort
Dorian 2003
T.2: Adew Dundee
The title track from the Baltimore Consort’s CD “Adew Dundee.” I’m visiting this hour with the Baltimore Consort, and Mark Cudek is telling us about their recent project that explores the life of Mary Queen of Scots, with narrative by Robert Aubry Davis.
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Mark: The program is punctuated with French music that is subtitled “Escosse,” Scottish composers that wanted to flatter her and wrote dances that they thought sounded kind of Scottish, and then Scottish music that was based on preexisting French chansons. So there’s a beautiful chanson, Je suis desheritee, that we do in the first half, and then we do the Scottish setting, the text of the Our Father, of this same chanson on the second half. And then we move into England for William Byrds “In Angel’s wede,” beautiful, beautiful consort song on her execution, basically, and then end up back in Scotland to end the program.
MUSIC TRACK
Adew Dundee
Baltimore Consort
Dorian 2003
T.23: Bransles d’Escosse [actual 3:35]
Bransles d’Escosse: dances from the Baltimore Consort’s CD Adew Dundee. The Baltimore Consort will also be appearing at the Indianapolis Early Music Festival this year—and consort member Mark Cudek is also the artistic director of the festival.
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
This is our 56th summer of presenting concerts. It’s looking like this summer the whole festival will be live and in person, so we’re really, really excited and thrilled to be 100 per cent back. We have a wonderful venue at the Indiana History Center, and I have a great group of artists lined up. On Friday June 24th, we’re opening the summer with Chatham Baroque—Chatham is a trio, Andrew Fautz, Patricia Halverson and Scott Pauley, and they’re having some guests [names], and they’re doing a program called The Three Violins, and they’re also bringing in a second plucked player, and doing some rarely heard duets for theorbo and tiorbino. And that same weekend, June 25th, we’re doing out annual Family Concert, and my dear friends in the room here, the Baltimore Consort, will be doing that, and then we have the rest of the day to rehearse with author Marjorie Sandor – she wrote a book called “The Secret Music at Tordesillas,” it’s historical fiction based on the, I guess “imprisonment” is the right term, of Joan the Mad, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella. And the conjecture is that maybe she wasn’t mad, maybe she just wasn’t “with the program,” with the Inquisition, the was just silenced for over 4 decades at Tordesillas. And she has a secret musician there, a vihuela player who was brought into court at an early age and converted or forcibly baptized, but is a Jewish musician. So we’ll be doing some music from our Spanish recording, some Sephardic music, and then some new music that has been suggested by the book, or actually, mentioned in the book. It’s just an absolutely terrific book. I mean, I read it, and then immediately re-read it, and then immediately contacted Marjorie and said “Can we collaborate?” So I’m very very excited about it.
MUSIC TRACK
Adio Espana
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2009
T.1: Morena mi llaman [actual 5:21]
T.2 Avrix mi galanica [actual 1:29]
Morena me llaman, sung by [Jose Lemos], and Avrix mi galanica, from the Baltimore Consort’s CD Adio Espana, and also part of their collaborative “Secret Music at Tordesillas” project, with author Marjorie Sandor. The Baltimore Consort will be meeting with Sandor during their time at the Indianapolis Early Music Festival, for which Baltimore Consort member Mark Cudek serves as the artistic director.
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Mark: “Our second weekend, Friday July 8, presenting an intimate recital of lute songs, John Lenti and Alren Meyers, just a tremendous singer, and that weekend Kaleidoscope Vocal Ensemble; the highlight is Sheherezade Pantaki and Reginale Mobley are going to be doing the Pergolesi Stabat Mater, with members of the Indianapolis Baroque orchestra. Out final weekend, Friday July 22nd, Early Music Access, David McCormick’s group, they’re doing an interesting program, we’re going to bring in some actors from the Indiana Repertory Theatre and the program is called “Murder in Messina.” And then our grand finale Sunday July 24th is at long last, the postponed two years in a row Second Indianapolis International Baroque Competition.
Since the Baltimore Consort is with us this week, our featured release is actually a sneak preview of their upcoming new Christmas CD “A Glorious Light.”
INTERVIEW SEGMENT
Mary Anne: “In Renaissance Music . . .Christmas is a time that you do every year pretty much. People just somehow just think of Renaissance music every year at Christmastime. We released our first Christmas CD, called Bright Day Star . . . the Day Star is the sun, and of course it was a play on words with the sun s-u-n, and s-o-n son, and that’s a very medieval-renaissance way of thinking. So, in this Christmas CD, one of the song texts has the words “Glorious Light.” Back in the 19th century, when there were religious revivals and all, and there were these books of sacred harp singing, there was one, it was published in the south, and it sold over 600 thousand copies—but it’s the same kind of singing, and it’s based on having a good strong melody that often occurs in the middle of the texture, in the tenor voice or the alto voice, and not in the treble part. So, this song – what is it, Danielle?
Danielle: Babe of Bethlehem.
MaryAnne: Babe of Bethlehem.
MUSIC TRACK
A Glorious Light
Baltimore Consort
Forthcoming in fall 2022
PREVIEW Track: Babe of Bethlehem [4:41]
The Baltimore Consort – a preview of their Christmas 2022 CD “A Glorious Light” —a 30th anniversary follow up to their very first Christmas CD, “Bright Day Star.”
Angie: It has been such a pleasure to have you all here, to be in the same room with you again, thank you so much for taking the time to come here to the studios of KTTZ in Lubbock,Texas, where we are sitting, and to be with me today.”
ALL: [thanks]
MUSIC TRACK
Food of Love
Baltimore Consort
Sono Luminus 2019
T.3: The First Book of Ayres or Little Short Songs; It was a lover and his lasse (3:03)
[Fade in theme music]
Harmonia is a production of WFIU and part of the educational mission of Indiana University.
Support comes from Early Music America: a national organization that advocates and supports the historical performance of music of the past, the community of artists who create it, and the listeners whose lives are enriched by it. On the web at EarlyMusicAmerica-dot-org.
Additional resources come from the William and Gayle Cook Music Library at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.
Special thanks this week to engineer Rachel Boyd and station KTTZ at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas.
We welcome your thoughts about any part of this program, or about early music in general. Contact us at harmonia early music dot org. You can follow us on Facebook by searching for Harmonia Early Music.
The writer for this edition of Harmonia was Angela Mariani.
Thanks to our studio engineer Michael Paskash, and our production team: LuAnn Johnson, Wendy Gillespie, Aaron Cain, and John Bailey. I’m Angela Mariani, inviting you to join us again for the next edition of Harmonia.
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