[Theme music begins]
Welcome to Harmonia . . . I’m Angela Mariani.
From epic tales of Charlemagne’s knights to sonnets drenched in lovers’ tears, the act of singing poetry is central to many early music traditions, both improvised and on the page. The performance of verse to instrumental accompaniment is common worldwide and likely as old as musical culture itself. In Early Modern Europe, song composition was closely tied to the literary trends of its day. This hour on Harmonia, we’ll hear musical manifestations of poetry ranging from Antiquity to the seventeenth century. Plus, on our featured recording, the medieval music ensemble Concordian Dawn sings us songs of fate, fortune, and love.
MUSIC TRACK
Adrian Willaert Musica Nova: The Petrarca Madrigals
Singer Pur
Oehms Classics 2009 | OC814
Adrian Willaert
Disk 2, Tr. 1 Più volte già (4:38)
Singer Pur with Adrian Willaert’s five-voice setting of Francesco Petrarca’s sonnet “Più volte già dal bel sembiante humano,” (Many times now, [her] beauty seeming kind), Canzoniere 170. From among the Petrarchan madrigals in the second part of Willaert’s 1559 collection Musica Nova.
Lots of what we think of as “old” poetry was meant to be sung. As with music, the difficulty in studying early performance traditions is that so much of it was an unwritten tradition. What has reached us is often skewed in its translation to written language over the years. The Illiad, the Ancient Greek epic among the earliest examples of European literature, is more likely a “snapshot” of material in the repertoire of Ionian rhapsodes, or poets, than the creation of a single author. Modern scholars have interpreted this ancient material in a number of ways. Here’s a short sample from classicist Stefan Hagel of the Austrian Academy of Sciences [start the track here], who’s using poetic meter along with the intonation and accent structure of Ancient Greek to inform his reconstructions of Homeric singing.
MUSIC CLIP (Soundcloud)
Stefan Hagel
Tr. 1 Illiad 1,1 (stop at 1:11)
https://soundcloud.com/st
That was scholar Stefan Hagel singing the opening of the Illiad to the phorminx, a four-string lyre, an example of a modern reconstruction of Homeric singing.
Middle Eastern literary traditions also feature plenty of sung poetry. In fact, medieval Arab scholars had better access to Ancient Greek texts than their Western European counterparts. Ziryab [zeerYAB], perhaps the most famous musician of the medieval Islamic Mediterranean, worked in Abbasid [abba-SEED], Iraq as well as Al-Andalus. A true “influencer” at the Ummayad [oo-MY-id] court in Córdoba, Ziryab is remembered as much for his contributions to fashion and cuisine as music and poetry. He is credited with adding a fifth course, or pair of strings, to the oud, the instrument that became the lute as it spread into Europe. Though Ziryab’s performances survive in description only, he shaped the Andalusian traditions that we hear in medieval Spanish music as well contemporary North Africa. Certain maqamat [mah-ka-maht] or modes used in Arab music are said to have been introduced to Iberia by Ziryab in the ninth century.
MUSIC TRACK
Músicas Viajeras: Tres culturas
Musica Ficta and Ensemble Fontegara directed by Raul Mallavibarenna
Enchiriadis 2013| EN-2037
Raul Mallavibarenna
Tr. 6 Ziryab (2:10)
Ziryab by Raul Mallavibarenna, directing Musica Ficta and Ensemble Fontegara.
The muwashshah* [mwah-sha] and zajal** [zjay-zjaul] are commonly used Arab poetic forms with origins in medieval Iberia. The muwashshah is composed in classical Arabic while the zajal is vernacular, more improvisatory, and involves dialogue between two poets or a choral refrain. We’ll hear the muwashshah “Adir lana akwab” (“Pass to us the cups”), a poem by Ibn Baqi [eeb-in ba-key], who lived in Al-Andalus three centuries after Ziryab.
MUSIC TRACK
Ortaçağ Şarkıları/Medieval Music from 13th - 15th Centuries
Ensemble Galatia
Kalan 2013
Tr. 5 Adir lana akwab (3:34)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzaLgY6UbEE
“Adir lana akwab” or “Pass to us the cups,” a 12th-century Andalusian poem called a muwashsha, performed by Ensemble Galatia.
Next, we’ll hear a Galician-Portuguese text in the form of a zajal, from the Cantigas de Santa Maria associated with King Alfonso the Tenth of Castile.
MUSIC TRACK
Músicas Viajeras: Tres culturas
Musica Ficta and Ensemble Fontegara directed by Raul Mallavibarenna
Enchiriadis 2013| EN-2037
Alfonso X (El Sabio)
Tr. 4 Cantigas No. 181, "Pero que seja a gente, Virgen Madre" (2:08)
Cantiga 181, the 13th-century poem “Pero que seja a gente,” which narrates the victory of King Abu Yusuf in Marrakesh against an invading force, in which he was miraculously assisted by a banner of the Virgin Mary, who “helps her friends,” as the lyrics say, “even if they may be of another faith.” Sung by Rocio de Frutos with Raul Mallavibarenna, Musica Ficta, and Ensemble Fontegara.
Still in the thirteenth century but a bit further north, scribes in Iceland compiled two volumes of Norse mythology known as Edda. These give us a glimpse into the type of epic sung by Icelandic bards going back to the Viking era.
MUSIC TRACK
Edda: Myths from medieval Iceland
Sequentia
Deutsche Harmonia Mundi / BMG Classics 1999(05472773812)
Tr. 2 Veit ek at ek hekk (“Odinn's Rune-verses”) (5:40)
Benjamin Bagby performing a piece whose title translates to (“Odinn's Rune-verses”), sung to Bagby’s medieval lyre.
We have many medieval lyric texts from what is now France, the courtly love poetry sung by troubadours in the south and trouvères in the north. What survives is transcribed in costly illuminated manuscripts, and only a few of these include music notation. Troubadour poetry appears from the late eleventh century and is composed in Old Occitan, the literary language of medieval Provence. These practices reached Northern France slightly later, where trouvères sang their lyric in Northern French dialects.
MUSIC TRACK
Le Tournoi de Chauvency
Ensemble Aziman, Anne Azema
Phaia Music 2007 | K617197
[Gautier d'Espinal]
Tr. 5 Se par force de merci (2:57)
13th-century French trouvère Gautier d'Espinal’s poem “Se par force de merci” (“by the power of mercy”), arranged by Anne Azema and performed by Ensemble Aziman.
[Theme music begins: Ensemble Alcatraz, Danse Royale, Elektra Nonesuch 79240-2 / B000005J0B, T.12: La Prime Estampie Royal]
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:
Sulla Lira: The Voice of Orpheus
Le Miroir de Musique
Ricercar 2015 | RIC354
Anonymous
Tr. 5 Romanesca - Passamezzo de lira (excerpt of 5:05)
(fades out at :59)
Welcome back…we’re exploring musical forms of poetry this hour.
Few song manuscripts survive from fourteenth and fifteenth century Italy relative to other European cultural centers. This led some scholars to theorize that Italy experienced a musical dark age at the time. More recent study has revealed that this couldn’t be further from the truth; it just so happens that the most popular styles, even those enjoyed by elite patrons like Lorenzo de’ Medici, belonged to oral traditions.
MUSIC TRACK
Sulla Lira: The Voice of Orpheus
Le Miroir de Musique
Ricercar | RIC354
Poliziano (text)
Tr. 3 Dunque piangiamo, o sconsolata lira (5:15)
That was “Dunque piangiamo, o sconsolata lira,” (“then let us weep, disconsolate lyre”) as reconstructed by Le Miroir de Musique and sung by Giovanni Cantarini with Romain Baptiste on lira da braccio. These verses were sung by the character of Orpheus in Poliziano’s Fabula d’Orfeo, a banquet entertainment given in Mantua during Carnival of 1480. Though no music was written down, descriptions of the event praise the performance of Baccio Ugolini, a Florentine diplomat who sang to his lira da braccio in the role of Orpheus.
Even as music printing technology developed in the sixteenth century, singing poetry outside of individual compositions remained a popular entertainment. When Ottaviano Petrucci published his fourth song collection in 1505, he included a number of musical formulas for poems of specific types, including sonnets, capitoli, and Latin verse.
MUSIC TRACK
Musa Latina: L’invention de l’Antique
Daedalus and Roberto Festa
Alpha 2009| ALPHA144
Antonio Caprioli
Tr. 5 Strambotti, ode, frottole, Book 4: Ut vidi, ut perii (3:39)
That was a “way of singing Latin verses” by Antonio Caprioli in Petrucci’s fouth book of Frottole, set with Virgil’s “Ut vidi, ut perii.” The ensemble Daedalus performed, directed by Roberto Festa.
The materia de francia or “matter of musical manifestations of the poetry of France” was a common subject of epic verse in Italy and beyond. Set during the crusades, these stories narrate the fantastical adventures of Charlemagne’s knights, most famously Orlando. These poems were traditionally improvised by canterini, itinerant poet-singers who entertained in public squares and at private events. Written versions, especially Ludovico Ariosto’s “Orlando furioso,” became popular during the sixteenth century. In 1561, Jacquet de Berchem published polyphonic settings of 91 stanzas from this work.
MUSIC TRACK
Jacquet de Berchem: La favola di Orlando
Daedalus and Roberto Festa
Accent 2011 | ACC95112D
Jaquet de Berchem
Tr. 3 Proemio: Le donne, i cavallier', l'arme, gli amori (2:39)
The first ottava, or eight-line stanza, of Ariosto’s “Orlando furioso,” set by 16th-century, Franco-Flemish composer Jacquet de Berchem and performed by the ensemble Daedalus with Roberto Festa.
Claudio Monteverdi famously drew criticism due to his expressive use of dissonance in madrigals of his Fifth Book. In response, he coined the term “seconda prattica,” second practice, to describe composition that prioritized textual expression over theoretical rules.
MUSIC TRACK
Quinto libro dei madrigali: Claudio Monteverdi - 1605
La Venexiana
Glossa 2007 | GCD920925
Claudio Monteverdi
Tr. 1 Cruda Amarilli (3:01)
La Venexiana with “Cruda Amarilli” (“Cruel Amaryllis”), Claudio Monteverdi’s setting from Act I, scene 2 of Battista Guarini’s pastoral tragicomedy Il Pastor fido. From the Fifth Book of Madrigals, published 1605.
Our featured release this hour comes to us from Concordian Dawn ensemble for medieval music. Their 2021 album Fortuna Antiqua et Ultra collects “songs of fate, fortune, and fin’amor” from the troubadours through Guillaume DuFay. Led by tenor and harpist Christopher Preston Thompson, Concordian Dawn specializes in twelfth- through fourteenth-century vocal music, striving to make the social-philosophical themes of medieval texts accessible to modern audiences.
MUSIC TRACK
Fortuna Antiqua et Ultra
Concordian Dawn
MSR Classics 2022 MS1805
Gaucelm Fadit
Tr. 8 Jamais rien tal non porroit far amor (3:09)
Troubadour Gaucelm Fadit’s “Jamais rien tal non porroit far amor,” performed by Karin Weston, soprano, and Niccolo Seligmann, vielle, on our featured recording by Concordian Dawn.
A number of tracks on Fortuna Antiqua et Ultra feature songs from longer narrative texts, including the Roman de Fauvel and Guillaume de Machaut’s Remede de fortune. A combination of narrative and lyric poetry, the protagonist of Machaut’s Remede is a lovesick poet guided by an allegory of Hope. Machaut included seven diegetic songs with musical notation that illustrate the poet’s growth over the course of the tale. The rondeau “Dame, mon cuer en vous remaint” is the lover’s final composition.
MUSIC TRACK
Fortuna Antiqua et Ultra
Concordian Dawn
MSR Classics 2022 MS1805
Guillaume de Machaut
Tr. 6 Dame, mon cuer en vous remaint (4:47)
Guillaume de Machaut’s “Dame, mon cuer en vous remaint” (“Lady, my heart remains in you”), performed by Concordian Dawn on their 2021 MSR Classics release Fortuna Antiqua et Ultra: Medieval Songs of Fate, Fortune, and Fin’Amor. Rondeaus like this one, along with the virelai and ballade, constitute the “formes fixes” of French lyric poetry, those most commonly set to music in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
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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.
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 is Chelsey Belt.
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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