Tamesis Issue 215 October 2009

Editorial

The Thames Valley Early Music Forum AGM will be held at approximately 5.30pm after the end of the Latin-American Christmas event on Sunday 6th December at Drake Hall, Amersham Community Centre.

Many thanks to our contributors this month. In the absence of Sidney Ross, three people were inspired to review David Allinson�s Magnificat workshop in September, so I�ve printed them all. It sounds as if it was an excellent event and I wish I could have found time to go, though I did enjoy a probably equally good workshop of David�s in Cambridge a few months ago and, also in Cambridge, an enjoyable weekend course at Gonville and Caius with Michael Procter. It�s wonderful how many early music courses there are these days and it�s frustrating not being able to go to more. I�m particularly grateful to Wayne Plummer who produced an excellent review/synopsis of Philip Thorby�s lecture/workshop only two days after the event, sav ing me and probably a lot of other people the problem of trying to interpret the notes we took on the day. This clashed with an improvisation course at the South Bank Centre and I�d be glad if someone could find time to review that.

There is quite a lot about NEMA this month, and there are two contributions about dance, so this is probably the biggest issue we have ever had. Don�t forget that after next month�s November issue, Tamesis will only be appearing every other month (January, March etc) so you will need to think ahead more. Copy date will still be the first Monday of the month.

Victoria Helby

Chairman�s Chat

The next event is music for All Saints with Alistair Dixon, who has run several successful workshops for us in the past. I have a copy of the complete works of Thomas Tallis recorded by him with his Chapelle du Roi and very good it is too, so I'm looking forward to find out what he has in store for us.

Finally don't miss the Baroque Day on the 8th November when our Secretary wi ll be weaving her usual magic in arranging interesting one-to-a-part groupings. I do apologise to her for forgetting to thank her for organising the Recorder Day. As well as those two events she is editing Tamesis and taking the bookings for the Christmas event - many thanks. Please can we have a volunteer to co-ordinate the people looking after the Greenwich Exhibition stand (13th-15th November) as she can hardly be expected to do everything.

David Fletcher

Michael Groser

Michael was known to many members as a fine viola da gamba player. For many years he had been a member of New College Choir, and earlier of Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's Cathedral choirs. His work as a stonemason/sculptor included the carving of many grotesques and gargoyles on Oxford college buildings.

Community Centre on Sunday 4th October

As it turns out, I needn't have worried because much of the day was spent listening to Philip's entertaining and informative presentation style... and when the ensemble did play together, the overall sound was remarkably sonorous (phew!).

Since the application form stated that there would be lecture content to the day, I came armed with a clipboard, paper and pen (though I seemed to be in the minority) - I think that's why Vicky pounced on me to produce this review (that'll learn me!) Anyway, here is a greatly abridged pr�cis of my notes from the day.

Philip explained that, in recent years, the recorder has "pillaged" much of its repertoire from sources that would not originally have been played on recorders... and that the recorder did have its own true history. First, Philip revealed (to me at least) that the name "recorder" comes from an old word meaning "to sing like a bird" (how sweet!); next, that the earliest known recorder dated from the 14th century and was discovered during archaeological excavations in a sewer (not quite so sweet!) � he speculated how the i nstrument may have ended up there!

The recorder flourished between the end of the 15th century until half-way through the 17th; it was often referred to as the "English flute" (as opposed to the "German flute" which implied the transverse flute).

Philip spoke about early recorder tutors, one of which admonishes: "If your flute you'd learn to play, you must learn to de-re-de-re-DEH"; this is the anti-thesis of some modern tutors which teach children to play music as separate bricks; the whole point being that you need to think of whole phrases with shape and articulate subtly throughout. It was also expected that students would learn all of the fingerings in one step at the very start of their learning journey - not the way we spoon-feed note fingerings to children today.

Philip spent a lot of time discussing the famous tutor by Ganassi, who wrote: "Just as a gifted painter can reproduce all the creations of nature by varying his colours, you can imitate the expression of the human voice on a wind or stringed instrument... and just as a painter imitates natural effects by using various colours, an instrument can imitate the expression of the human voice by varying the pressure of the breath"; by contrast, baroque recorder tutors don't mention soft vs. loud at all!

Ganassi teaches fingering, articulation and divisions. Fingering included fingerings for seven or so new notes at the top of the instrument that he had discovered himself. Articulation included vowel sound formed in the mouth during note production as well as the consonant used for start the note. Divisions are covered at great length with examples give for unison and all falling and rising intervals for 4, 5, 6, and 7 crochet semibreves!

Trills would come from one of three "moods": "vivace" - tr ills of a third or more, "soave" - trills of a semi-tone or less, and "mezzo" (where "you feel that there's a trill coming on and you're not in either of the other two moods") - trills of a tone.

Some tutors seemed positively to encourage vibrato (of the breath, finger or tongue) - Philip demonstrated these very effectively. He went on to question our recent revulsion for vibrato in early music performance � perhaps vibrato of all different forms was used far more than some of us would appreciate nowadays?

As the years went by, a bass recorder in B-flat was added to the bottom of the consort - this would not seem to fit in particularly well with the existing discant in G, tenor in C and bass in F. The trick is that they weren't all used together but music that worked on a four-part consort of 1x disc in G, 2x tenor in C and 1 x bass in F could be moved down to a consort of 1x tenor in C, 2x bass in F and 1x bass in B-flat using the same fingering as before. A higher instrument, a discant in D was added at the top to allow the same trick to achieve a higher tessitura.

One exercise Philip had us perform was a four-part piece where one group of us played at written pitch (for recorders - i.e. four-foot p itch, or "batmosphere" as Philip put it!), transposed down a fourth (by assigning parts to instruments and telling them to use fingerings inappropriate for their instruments (apart for the bottom line which he had written out transposed down), and finally at eight-foot pitch. We all agreed that the transposed version sounded most comfortable on recorders and th is is what would have apparently often have been done.

Finally, my favourite Thorbyism of the day was in regard of playing the recorder many-to-a-part: "[it] is very unforgiving (I'm not going to forgive you!) - you end up fading and fading, going flatter and flatter until you disappear up your own sound hole!"

In summary, it was a very educational and enjoyable day. I think we should certainly consider more events like this (with lecture content); I think it helps us think a bit more about what the music we play might really have sounded like.

Wayne Plummer

A Benevolence of Magnificats

It seemed entirely appropriate within the octave of the Anglican celebration of the birth of the BVM to spend a day looking at English magnificats pre and post reformation, thus covering a fair period of time, and with considerably different dispositions, from the development of melismatic embroidery, to monosyllabic harmonies; but with unmistakable DNA profiles in the progress.

Having just returned from Russia, where the orthodox church was in the octave of the Dormition of the Mother of God, it seemed like a very pale blue interlude; and the weather echoed this with an idyllic day, such that David had us all gyrating amidst the gravestones before we settled down to serious singing. [I wonder what the early golfers thought on the adjacent Ealing golf course!].

From a suitcase of music David introduced us to and persuaded us through magnificats by Fayrfax, Cornysh, Tallis, Gibbons, Mundy, and Tomkins; and I think that there was one by White that we just didn�t have time to fit in. As a result of the liberation of the Eton Choir Book, early music singers are noticeably more adept at coping with the intricacies of Cornysh, Brown and the like: and the group of 48 singers made a laudable rendering of the Cornysh, to the extent that we were encouraged to sing it scrambled: inevitably louder, but still quite respectably.

David was astutely selective in the material that he exposed us to; so that we sang only part of the sublime and elegant [reviewer�s preference!] Fayrfax, since it splits into solos, trios and duets elsewhere; and only the �Glory to the Father� of the Mundy; since it is not so inspiring elsewhere. Tallis� DNA was unmistakable, the elegiac [a touch of exquisite mournfulness?] in his chord progressions.

Nicola had the day well organised in the lovely little church of St Mary Perivale: very good to see the female altos helping out the few male tenors: and a fine back up team of Michael and Mary, and of David and Elizabeth. For those who missed it, I think that David is doing a very similar programme in Holland fairly soon; except that it is presented as evensong/vespers rather than the BVM!

Neil Edington

12.09.09 MAGNIFICATS FROM TUDOR ENGLAND

Once inside the church the focus of the day was the response of Tudor compos ers to the fast changing religious environment in which they lived. The Tudors have been much in evidence in the media recently, but their sexual activity has been more featured than their religion. Their music has had even less attention in the television programmes yet it is a direct reflection of those changing times. By chance I was recently reading about the life of Londoners in Henry VIII's time and how dangerous it was not to be in tune with the latest approved religious position as Henry's reign progressed. It was said that on the same day a man was burnt at the stake at Smithfield for expressing independent Lutheran views, while another was hanged at Tyburn as a Papist. Composers were in the public eye and so more at risk of criticism. The elaborate settings of Latin texts for the Roman church had to be replaced with another kind of setting of English words. A setting where the meaning and communication of the text had to be seen to be more important than the beauty of the music. How difficult it must have been to consciously relinquish the luxuriant polyphony of the Latin settings where one vowel could be spun out across 10 bars (had they had bars). Replacing it with settings where the music had to be secondary to the clear exposition of the English text.

Throughout the day we moved back and forth between the two mus ical positions. From the elaborate Latin settings of William Cornysh to the familiar English of Thomas Tallis. One page of Cornysh, having been changed from white notes to black notes, contained so many demisemiquaver decorations that at first glance it could have come from a bel canto opera. Later English settings held on to occasional false relations like a souvenir from the past, but the decorated, extended lines of pre-Reformation English church music were gone. You could almost see the pathway beginning which would eventually lead to Victorian hymnody.

David presented this musical history lesson, illustrated with beautiful music, with convincing erudition and his usual quickfire humour. I can't quite recall which point he was making when the success of Celine Dion became an illustration, but it seemed apt at the time. Perhaps more intriguing was his nostalgic wish to have been part of a backing group singing diatonic triads* behind the stars of yesteryear on Top of the Pops. But that is in the past. At this workshop David worked hard throughout the day and was rewarded with an excellent choral sound, and the usual TVEMF high standard of sight reading. It was a day to enjoy much beautiful music, and to reflect on a time when one melisma too many could cost a composer his life.

David Griffiths

The venue for this rewarding day was the beautiful 12th Century church of St Mary, Perivale. The Sunny weather made us all feel happy, and the day began with David's inimitable warm-up exercises outside in the churchyard. A passing golfer or a low- flying helicopter pilot would have been amused to see all 47 of us shaking our arms and legs about among the gravestones, and emitting strange noises, which included the tricky singing of scales to numbers, with omissions thereof.

Once inside the church again, we began by reading through a Magnificat by Gibbons, chronologically one of the latest works we sang. This was followed by 'Regali ex progenie' by Robert Fayrfax, who according to a contemporary source was, when he died in 1521, considered to be 'the prime musician of the nation'. The style of this second piece was much more florid, with use of melisma; it was written only a few decades after the completion of the Eton Choir Book. We now needed some rehearsal of separate parts, as we did also in the Magnificat by William Cornyshe, a 5-part work which included some syncopation. David told us that Cornyshe was known to have written at least three full masses, all of which were lost at the Reformation; the suggestion was made that they may be walled up in some monastery and one day may be miraculously discovered! It is interesting to note that as court composers, both Fayrfax and Cornyshe attended Henry VIII at the Fie ld of the Cloth of Gold. Turning next to a Magnificat by Tallis, David told us some interesting facts about that composer's reputation. During the 18th and early 19th centuries Tallis was praised most for his simpler settings, such as the metrical psalms and easier English anthems. The Latin motets and 'Spem in Alium' were considered to be anomalies or anachronistic novelties not worthy of note. The final two works we sang through were by William Mundy, a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal under Elizabeth, and Thomas Tomkins, a contemporary of Gibbons, organist at the Chapel Royal and of Worcester Cathedral, where perhaps one can imagine this Magnificat was sung. According to David, this last work was 'more of a curate's egg than that of Gibbons'! We much enjoyed the challenge of singing 'scrambled' and the acoustics of the building seemed to lend itself to this. David's energy and friendly good humour added great enjoyment to the day, as did his scholarly comments about the composers and the music. He showed us how the Latin Magnificat, the song of Mary after the Annunciation, in the Roman Catholic rite an integral part of the service of Vespers, became after the Reformation as it were 'twinned' with the Nunc Dimittis, the song of Simeon, in the Anglican service of Evensong. Time did not allow us to attempt the setting by Robert White; however David promised to take us through another similar workshop (perhaps devoted entirely to pre-reformation settings) saying that 'The Thames Valley is the best of the Early Music Forums (Fora?)!

Very many thanks to Nicola Wilson-Smith for her organisation, to the helpers who provided tea and coffee, notably Michael and Mary Reynor, and special thanks to Mary for the delicious cakes.

Anna Gray

NEMA Survey of Early Music Performers

1 To bring together all concerned with early music and to forge links with other early music organisations in the UK and around the world. NEMA also acts to represent musicians in the early music field to outside bodies, when required� 2 See Andrew�s article on Henry Purcell�s keyboard music in the 2009 Early Music Yearbook and his editorial in issue 24 of EMP. (male and female), instrumentalists and ensembles. The charts are headed by J S Bach, Andreas Scholl, Dame Emma Kirkby and The Sixteen respectively. However, the favourites lists contain a huge number of some 670 composers and artists. The latter include many pop, jazz and folk performers. Early music fans certainly can�t be criticised as narrow, obsessive specialists. Dear reader, when you get to this part of the report, do spend some time googling the artist�s name followed by �samples�; I guarantee that you will make some discoveries. It also notes that the latest Early Music Register lists about 200 early music ensembles in the UK alone, massively up from about 40 in 1972. We conclude that the professional early music scene is very healthy, almost too much so, because many excellent artists and groups are in danger of being swamped. The rest of this article contains findings and reflections on my own particular hobby- horse, early music singing. In my role as organiser of NEMA�s conference Singing Music from 1500 to 1900 held in July 2009, I felt that it would be a good idea to include a question on early music performers� preferred vocal styles, so that we could compare them with delegates� opinions. Respondents were asked to choose which vocal style (�Operatic�, �Early Music Mainstream� or �Clear Smooth Sweet Chaste�) they liked best for Handel�s arias. Although conference delegates used the same voting slips issued to survey respondents, they were additionally prepared by three recorded performances of Handel�s Lascia ch�io pianga, sung in the three different styles by the same singer, soprano Peyee Chen. The results of this experiment (see chart) are truly astonishing because they evidence the huge gap which exists between what informed consumers want and what they actually get. What they nearly always get, of course, is the modern operatic style which has prevailed for 150 years now, i.e. huge volume overpowering historically correct orchestral accompaniments, combined with head-mistressy lower larynx timbre and a wide throbbing vibrato, although only 8% of respondents prefer this style. 51% chose the compromise �Early Music Mainstream� style, as developed by singers such as Dame Emma and Suzie LeBlanc. 41% favour �Clear Smooth Sweet Chaste�. This was a surprise because this style is never heard today in professional Handelian performance, even though the historical record suggests that this style was the norm for around 200 years throughout Europe, until at least 1830. Incidentally, this experiment knocks on the head a widespread notion that, once a singer has formed their style, he or she is stuck with the product, typically the �one size fits all� operatic voice. Peyee Chen demonstrated to the conference that a good, wel l-trained singer with a beautiful natural voice can vary their sound and style to suit almost any music, in terms of volume, timbre and a vibrato ranging from wide to zero. Finally, a message for those of you who are not yet NE MA members. Do complete the form in your July issue (No. 213), or download it from our website, and send to us with your subscription, thereby qualifying for the 2010 Yearbook and the next Early Music Performer, both of which are due out shortly. You will get good value.

Richard Bethell

NORVIS 2009 1 � 8 August 2009

Each evening after dinner, there was a concert, by students or tutors or both together which were well attended and very enthusiastically received. Most evenings finished with an �Epilogue� in the chapel � perhaps a poem followed by some music or a song. It was a relaxing and thoughtful half hour to end the day. One evening was devoted to a ceilidh led by Alistair Anderson who played, most eloquently, his Northumberland Pipes and concertinas before the dancing began. The final evening concert included the choir work studied, with the Baroque Orchestra as well as solo and consort items. What a huge effort all the tutors put in to make the course a resounding success. They must have been exhausted. My first NORVIS was a joy from start to finish and my congratulations go to all who made it work. I hope to be back another year!

Edna Coop