Weekend Classes January 7 & 8, 2023

The long period during which the Tudor family held the English throne (1485-1603) was a time of great instability and strife which also saw remarkable cultural growth and development. A rising middle class created a market for amateur music-making in the home, music-loving monarchs like Henry VIII supported a rich musical culture at court, and shifting religious and political alignments forced composers to be flexible and creative to survive in a divided and rapidly changing society.  We will explore the musical trajectory of the Tudor years through pieces that might have been heard at court, in church, or in the home, by composers such as Christopher Tye, William Cornysh, and King Henry VIII himself..

Open to: recorders intermediate and up (other winds also welcome, as well as viols playing on lower lines) Pitch: A=440

This class is an introduction to the instruments that were used, their basic playing techniques,and how to create parts. We'll play percussion-friendly music from Medieval and Renaissance Spain, France, Italy and England. Participants can play melody instruments (A=440) and/or percussion instruments. (Participants without drums can use common household percussion instruments, such as pots, wastebaskets or cardboard boxes. Preferably empty.)
Open to all! Pitch: A=440

The manuscript of Henri Arnaut de Zwolle (1400-1466) preserved in the Bibliothèque nationale de France is the earliest surviving text describing details of the design of the organ, the lute, and strung keyboard instruments, including not only the harpsichord and clavichord, but also the first known proposal for a hammered action. Thus when the medievalist David Catalunya approached me in 2009 with the proposal of building a hammered “clavisimbalum”, it seemed only natural to begin the process there, as a number of other makers had done. Ultimately, after a careful scrutiny of the work - including a trip to Paris to examine the original - I would come to the conclusion that the text was actually of very little practical value. In this talk, we’ll be taking a deep dive into de Zwolle’s descriptions, discovering many problems and faults overlooked by generations of musicologists, after which I’ll explain the process of starting anew to re-imagine the instrument within a medieval mindset.
Open to all. Pitch: n/a