Festival Central Program Week 2 Afternoon Classes

Early Afternoon 1:45 - 3:00 p.m.

Crosscurrents: Medieval and Traditional Music of the British Isles, with Shira Kammen

Open to all instruments and voices.

Class Description

Explore the musical language of two overlapping genres–Medieval and traditional music of the British Isles–which share building blocks of melody, mode, and structure, with texts treating beautiful and often haunting subjects. We’ll frolic among stunning 13th- to 15th-century monophonic English songs, work on different approaches to these lyrics in Middle English and Latin, and make our own musical settings and accompaniments of Middle English poems, while also looking at folk ballads, jigs, reels, and other dance-tune types with diverse and interesting approaches.

Sherwood Forest, with Amy Bearden

Open to all instruments and voices.

Class Description

Join us on a journey through Sherwood Forest, exploring musical texts that tell of the famous Robin Hood and Maid Marion. We will trace the beloved characters’ popularity, focusing on the Medieval and Renaissance periods. Pieces will range from the motets of the Montpellier Codex to Renaissance English songs..

Shows and Nightly Revels: English Theater Music from Henry VIII to the Restoration, with Wendy Powers

For recorders, upper intermediate to advanced.

Class Description

Trace the evolution of London’s theater music in the 16th and 17th centuries from entertainments at the court of Henry VIII through songs in Shakespeare’s plays and Stuart masques, up to Restoration play music of John Blow and Henry Purcell..

Sweet Pipes in the 20th Century, with Letitia Berlin

For recorders, upper intermediate to advanced.

Class Description

Why do we love English music so much? The fair isle produced a treasure trove of pieces with sweet harmonies and singable melodies. We’ll focus on works from the 20th century including Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Suite for Pipes (SATB), arrangements of chorale preludes by Ethel Smyth, and Benjamin Britten’s Scherzo.

300 Years of England in Only Five Days! with Valerie Horst

For recorders, upper intermediate to advanced.

Class Description

A survey of English music from pre-Leonel Power through Antony Holborne, with emphasis on a) what makes music “English” and b) musical challenges.

Renaissance Recorders Consort, with Annette Bauer

For accomplished players of Renaissance recorders.

Class Description

One-on-a-part consort with an emphasis on blend and ensemble skills. Performance is a possibility. For players familiar with Renaissance recorder fingering who own or can borrow Renaissance consort recorders. We will not be sharing recorders in class, therefore all players must bring at least two sizes.

Early Notation: The English Sources, with Patricia Petersen

All instruments and voices welcome, a familiarity with clefs, note shapes, and rests is expected.

Class Description

So much to choose from! From the Harley MS’s Sumer canon through the early Worcester Fragments, Anne Boleyn’s Songbook, the Henry VIII MS, prints of Byrd, Tallis, Morley, not to mention the Eton and Arundel Choirbooks, and perhaps a taste of the Old Hall MS for the intrepid. Familiarity with clefs, note shapes, and rests is expected; specific repertoire will be chosen according to the skills and desires of the participants.

Renaissance Flute Consort, with Na'ama Lion

Open to Renaissance flutes, upper intermediate to advanced.

Class Description

Music for Renaissance flutes of all sizes! This year, we will explore music by Henry VIII, William Byrd, John Dowland, John Bull, and other composers from the British Isles. We will also revisit French favorites from the Attaingnant collections. Each session will open with a short warmup and technical discussion, followed by lots of playing.

Danish Mid-Century, with Wouter Verschuren, Marilyn Boenau

Open to mixed loud instruments

Class Description

The Copenhagen Part Books are a treasure trove of 16th-century music with pieces for four to eight parts by Josquin, Senfl, Kugelmann, and others. Secular tenor lieder, Protestant hymn settings, and instrumental works are all represented in this large collection. There are several pieces by Scottish composer George (Jorgen) Preston, who was at the Danish court. Unusually, the manuscript includes a few instrumentations, and they specify loud instruments, particularly cornets and trombones.

Polyphonic Connections from Island to Continent: Byrd, Bassano, and Lassus, with Liza Malamut

Open to mixed loud instruments, upper intermediate and up.

Class Description

This class will be a musical conversation comparing music written in England (Byrd and Bassano) and on the Continent (Lassus). How are these repertoires related? What compositional ideas traveled from one place to another?.

Dulichius, with Daniel Stillman

For cornets, sackbuts, dulcians. Advanced.

Class Description

German composer Philipp Dulichius (1562-1631) was known as “the Pomeranian Lasso.” Highly regarded in his day, he worked for the Pomeranian court and the Marienkirche in Stettin. His motets have Latin liturgical texts and are set with strong, emotionally oriented music, indicating a high standard of performance of the time.

Consorts Royal: Masterpieces from the English Viol Consort Repertoire, with Lawrence Lipnik

For intermediate viols.

Class Description

Explore the development of the viol consort from its earliest continental roots to its flourishing in Jacobean England, featuring works by Tallis, Byrd, Ferrabosco, and others. .

Giants of their Times: the Viol Consorts of Jenkins and Purcell, with Rosamund Morley

For advanced viols.

Class Description

Purcell was just 19 years old when the beloved and admired octogenarian composer John Jenkins died in 1678. Most of Jenkin's fantasies for viols were composed in the 1620's and Purcell's in 1680. This class will explore the exquisite fantasia repertoire of both composers to experience the changes that 55 years of separation brought to the form.

Our Phoenix Master William Byrd, with Kathryn Cok

Open to keyboard players and anyone interested in Byrd's music.

Class Description

We will look at his keyboard music as found in contemporary collections: Parthenia, My Ladye Nevells Booke and the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book. Our focus will be on his legacy, repertoire, and performance style, including early fingering and articulation.

The Broadside Ballad, with Grant Herreid

For lutes and other diverse instruments.

Class Description

An exploration of the British broadside ballad, with accompaniments for lutes, citterns, bandoras, viols, and diverse other instruments, including recorders, flutes, viols, and other soft instruments.

When to Her Lute Corinna Sings, with Christopher Morrongiello

All singers and soft instrumentalists are welcome to attend and participate.

Class Description

In the lute songs of the Elizabethan and Jacobean composers, music is at the service of poetry. This age of Shakespeare, Jonson, Spenser, and Donne saw English verse rise to heights of expressivity still unsurpassed. To sing to the lute is an art barely separate from the art of declaiming verse. It requires clarity and beauty of tone, a natural flow of language, and a delicate sense of dialogue with the lute, the instrument of courtly love. In this course, students will discuss the repertoire and approaches to performance practice, including topics such as rhetoric, Elizabethan pronunciation, historical gesture, ornamentation, and varying the instrumentation or voices to better suit individual verses and dialogues..

Country Dancing from After Playford to Modern Times, with Cécile Laye, and NLA musicians

For New London Assembly Dancers, some spaces may be available for non-NLA participants, with the approval of the NLA director.

Class Description

This class will cover a wide time frame of dances from the late Dancing Master era to modern times. Currently selected dances include Cécile’s interpretations of Mister Beveridge’s Maggot; Trip to the Jubilee (John Essex 1710); The Humours of the Age (Kynaston 1710 – Menuet, Hornpipe and Jig); Les Ombres Chinoises (a late 18th-century cotillion, Budd 1780); plus A Trip to Macclesfield, a modern dance by Brian Wedgbury..

Late Afternoon 3:30 - 4:45 p.m.

*Choral Workshop singers are welcome to choose a late afternoon class, there is no Choral Workshop class this period.

Drop of Honey, Star of the Sea: Medieval English Songs and Carols from the 13th through the Early 15th centuries, with Annette Bauer

For mixed instruments and voices, open to all.

Class Description

Sample treasures from two centuries of English music, from early polyphonic settings, to early 15th-century anonymous carols, and chansons by English composers such as Bedyngham, Dunstaple, and Frye, that gained immense popularity on the continent. Music of English origin has been preserved in manuscripts on the island or in continental sources. Many, but not all, texts are religious in nature, in the languages of Medieval Britain - Latin, English, and French.

Cathedral, Court, and Countryside, with Patricia Petersen

For mixed instruments and voices, open to all.

Class Description

Luxuriate in the ravishing beauty of motets and masses by Byrd, Tallis, and others; thrill to the art songs of the Tudor courts; delight in the lively dances, rounds, and (sometimes bawdy) songs of the countryside.

Happy Anniversary William Byrd! with Lawrence Lipnik

For upper intermediate to advanced singers and soft instruments.

Class Description

A musical celebration to mark the 400th anniversary of William Byrd’s death. Contemporaries such as Robert Dow held him in the highest esteem: "Among singers you are as the sun in the sky, good Birde.” To celebrate Byrd we explore a sampling of works from different eras in his life including sumptuous motets and anthems to instrumental consorts and rollicking secular works. Survey the musical development of this great composer whose music defined an age. Including works by Parsons, Tallis, with continental contemporaries featured for contrast and comparison.

Recorder Fun: Between the Lines and in the Cracks, with Frances Blaker

For recorder players, intermediate level and beyond.

Class Description

We will play a lot of music from the British Isles. We will try everything! We will leave no stone unturned in our quest for interesting, absorbing, beautiful and just plain fun music. We’ll learn about lesser-known composers. We’ll play lesser-known works by well-known composers. We will dip our toes into all the time periods: Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, 19th century, 20th, and even 21st century. We will play a lot, which will help you to become ever more fluent on your instrument.

Music in the 18th-Century Drawing Room, with Letitia Berlin

For upper intermediate to advanced recorders.

Class Description

The amateur recorder player kept publishers like Walsh and Roger busy in the 18th century, bringing home works by Schickhardt, Arne, Boyce, Handel, and Corelli to play with friends in their drawing rooms. As Johann Mattheson wrote early in the 18th century, “He who in the present time wants to make a profit out of music betakes himself to England. The Italians exalt music: the French enliven it; the Germans strive after it; the English pay for it well.” We will meet in our AEMF drawing room to play concerti by Schickhardt and Boyce, songs by Arne and others from the Apollonian Harmony, and traditional Scottish ballads set by Barsanti.

Advanced Notation: The Contenance Angloise, with Valerie Horst

Open to those with experience reading original mensural notation.

Class Description

After years of isolation, English composers and the English sound began to exert their influence everywhere on the Continent, producing some of the finest and most interesting works of the 15th and 16th century, which we will celebrate. .

Baroque Ensembles

For voice, recorder, flute, oboe, bassoon, viol, violin, harpsichord, other.

Class Description

These one-to-a-part Baroque ensembles are for advanced treble and basso continuo players who are musically and technically prepared to explore challenging repertoire. Our first priority will be to provide advanced players with well-matched ensembles. If there are more players of treble instruments than of continuo, one set of treble-line players in a trio sonata class may share a continuo section (and a coach) with another set, or some treble players may receive their second or third choices. When requesting this class, please list clear second and third class choices. Indicate pitch: “440” or “415” or “either.”Faculty may include Alissa Duryee, Kathryn Cok, Na'ama Lion, Sally Merriman, Wendy Powers, and others.

Orlando de Lassus, with Wouter Verschuren

Open to mixed loud instruments. Advanced.

Class Description

This class will work on nuanced and expressive music by Orlande de Lassus (1532-1594), one of the greatest composers of the 16th century. Franco-Flemish by birth, Lassus worked in Italy for several years before becoming maestro di capella at the Bavarian court, a post he held for over 30 years. Lassus was widely admired in his time and his work is considered a pinnacle of late Renaissance music.

Odhecaton, with Priscilla Herreid

Open to mixed loud instruments.

Class Description

Henry VIII (reigned 1509-1547) owned a large number of musical instruments and had a variety of instrumental ensembles at his court, including the celebratory shawms and sackbuts. They played, among other things, Franco-Flemish music, which was included in Henry’s music collection. Petrucci’s Odhecaton (1501), the first printed volume of polyphonic music, is a primary source for this repertoire. Priscilla will coach the group using AEM’s 500th anniversary edition.

Motet Mélange, with Daniel Stillman

Open to cornets, sackbuts, dulcians.

Class Description

Join Dan and play from transcriptions of some of his favorite Continental motets. This music is highly articulate of text and deeply satisfying to play on wind instruments.

Uncommon Treasures: an Exploration of Lesser-known English Masters, with Rosamund Morley

For intermediate viols.

Class Description

Daman, Harding, Mallory, Mundy, Strogers, White, and many others are among the composers whose names we might know but whose music we have never played. Explore this exotic repertoire of fantasies, dances and motets to discover an unfamiliar sound world. Players must be prepared for some doubling and to play an occasional In Nomine line. The ability to read at least two clefs is a plus but not required for this class.

Owners and Copiers: The Noble Patrons who Supported English Viol Composers, with Patricia Ann Neely

For viol players.

Class Description

A typical English household would have enjoyed the pastime of playing consorts as an evening’s music recreation. A chest of viols may have been a staple as would have a collection of part books copied from various sources. In this class we will not only play the music that was popular among the members of these communities, we will also explore some original sources and learn more about the day-to-day life from those patrons who had their own stories to tell of their relationships with composers. These were the writers who were occupied not only with playing the music, but also the matter of expressing their opinions on performance practice, musical aesthetics, theory and pedagogy, and life in general. Composers and patrons included in this class will be Richard Mico who was in the service of Lord Petrie, Essex (1608-30), Thomas Lupo, Orlando Gibbons, and William Byrd who were in the service of Prince and then King Charles I, John Jenkins who was in the service of Roger North, and various other English and some Italian composers. Players should be comfortable reading both alto clef and treble clef down an octave on tenor parts.

Broken Consort Ensemble, with Jason Priset

Open to instruments of all types, including lutes, viols, and wire strung instruments, as well as recorders, flutes, viols, and other soft instruments.

Class Description

There is some discussion about what exactly a “broken consort” was in late 16th-century England. Morley’s Consort Lessons (1599) and Rosseter’s Lessons for Consort (1609) specify a lute, bandora, bass viol, cittern, treble viol, and flute as defining a consort, but it wasn’t until Lord Chancellor’s records of 1660 that the term “broken consort” was mentioned for this specific instrument ensemble.

From Lute to Continuo Song, with Grant Herreid

Open to lutes and singers

Class Description

An exploration of the beginnings of continuo accompaniment in England.

The Sources of Scottish Lute Music, with Ronn McFarlane

For lute players

Class Description

The class will examine the manuscript sources of Scottish lute music, read through some of the tunes, look at aspects of the style, and follow the evolution of Scottish lute music in the 17th century.

Beginning Renaissance Notation for Singers, with Carol Marsh

Open to singers.

Class Description

Ever wonder about the music-making experience of a 16th-century chorister? Bring Renaissance music alive by singing directly from the manuscripts and prints of the period (without the indignities of primitive plumbing). We will learn the basics of white mensural notation using original sources: the beautiful Henry VIII manuscript (includes music by the King himself); the Anne Boleyn music book (her favorite continental composers such as Josquin and Mouton); and the Baldwin and Sadler partbooks (music by Byrd and Tallis).

Vocal Technique with Historical Inspirations for the 21st-Century Singer, with Emily Eagen

Open to all singers.

Class Description

This weeklong version of Emily's popular AEM online class is a vocal technique and repertoire class–with a twist! Singers of all levels are welcome to participate in this daily vocal workout, and from the beginning we will be up and singing. Build confidence and versatility as we do exercises for resonance, breath, articulation, and phonation, and stretch our range and stamina. The twist? We will draw inspiration from ideas from 17th- and 18th-century vocal pedagogy as we sing. What imagery, wisdom, and science helped singers use their voices in these centuries? What is "news we can use" today to help us sing? We'll draw from historical ideas of the voice to gain inspiration as we do a full vocal workout, then sing some simple songs from the Renaissance and early Baroque to try out the ideas. Gain new tools and tips for your voice, and leave with a stack of some of the most beautiful songs of the eras, as we travel back in time while we sing!

Masters Of Doom: The Fundamentals Of Frame Drumming

Open to all.

Class Description

Dum, Pah, Tak! Master the primary frame drum techniques that give you (and others) confidence. Physical time-keeping paired with vocal rhythm shortens the distance between your brain and hands. Simple notation develops a catalog of patterns and fosters creativity. Pulse and dynamics invite us to feel how each part of a groove might dance differently. Our sessions will weave through ecstatic and meditative vibes. Revitalize yourself with a positive drumming experience. Please bring the drums you have, there is a limited number provided to share.

New London Assembly: Modern Treasures with Marvelous Tunes, with Brad Foster and NLA musicians

For New London Assembly dancers, some spaces may be available for non-NLA participants, with the approval of the NLA director

Class Description

This session will include a selection of modern dances with great tunes from both sides of the Atlantic, ranging from well-known and familiar treasures to new and less familiar material..