magnatune.com
Magnatune
2012
Traditional, Renaissance and Medieval song and dance
to celebrate midwinter and the changing of the seasons.
CHRISTMAS & NEW YEAR
1. One yeir begins (Lady
Lothian's lilt) [1:36]
Anonymous 17th century
Scottish
2. Taladh Chriosta
(Christ-Child Lullaby) [3:46]
Traditional
Hebrides (Eriskay Island)
3. Chestnut /
Daphne / Scotch Cap
Playford's The
English Dancing Master, 1651
4. There was
three kings into the East [4:42]
Robert
Burns (1759-1796)
5. The blud-red rose at
Yule [2:43]
Robert Burns, set to the tune
of 'To daunton me'
6. Christmas eve / day /
New year's night [4:41]
Traditional
Irish/English
7. Drive the cold winter
away [2:13]
Dancing Master (arrangement by Anne Hodgkinson)
A WINTER'S TALE
8.
Tourdion / Dehors lonc pré: [5:30]
16th century French / 13th century French
9. Lullay, lullow [2:50]
15th century English
10. Broome, bonny broome / Grimstock / Jog on
[4:11]
Dancing Master
THE SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS
11. Cauld blaws The Wind [1:21]
Robert Burns
12.
Stingo / Under and over / Kathren Oggie [4:45]
Dancing Master
13.
The gloomy night is gath'ring fast / O, wert thou in the cauld blast [4:36]
Robert
Burns
HOME & HEARTH
14. O'Carolan's rambel to
Cashel [3:24]
Turlough O'Carolan
(1670-1738)
15. Homeless
Wassail [3:39]
Ian Robb
16.
Calliope house / Pipe on the hob / The ale is
dear [3:37]
Traditional
Irish
17. Wassail song
[1:47]
Traditional
English
Recorded June
10-17, 2003 at Muscletone Studio, Berkeley, CA
Recorded and Mastered by Derek
Bianchi
Graphic Design & Cover Photoillustration: Doug
Chompson
Special Thanks to:
Kit Higginson for his help as producer
(tracks #2, 4, 7 & 17), and
all the Friends of Healing Muses who have
made this project possible
Homeless Wassail recorded with special
permission from Ian Robb
Words and music by lan Robb. ©1998,
performing
rights affiliation - SOCAN
℗ © 2003 Healing Muses Recordings, Albany, CA
ARTISTS
Susan Rode Morris — soprano
Shira Kammen —
violin, alto
Eileen Hadidian — recorder & baroque flute
Maureen
Brennan — Celtic harp
Julie Jeffrey — viola da gamba
Susan Rode
Morris is a singer of unusual versatility whose accomplishments
encompass a wide range of repertoire and musical styles. A native of the San
Francisco Bay Area, she has received much critical acclaim for her
expressiveness and naturlaness in singing, as well as her communicative
presence. She is a founding member of Ensemble Alcatraz and has sung with
many ensembles including Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, American Bach
Soloists, Sequentia Köln, Sex Chordae Consort of Viols,
Magnificat, Women's Philharmonic, and FOOLIA! Susan has
premiered numerous works by Bay Area composers, including opera and theater
pieces. She founded a recording company, Donsuemor, which has released three
compact discs, including songs of Henry Purcell and the 18th century Scottish
poet Robert Burns. A special love of Susan's is teaching children the joy of
singing in small private schools. She owns a baking company (Donsuemor) which
supplies the U.S. with fresh madeleines.
Twelfth Night or Epiphany, a feast celebrated January 6, was identified with the
coming of the three Wise Men. in Europe it is a special occasion for observing
surviving pagan winter solstice celebrations, encouraging the turning of
darkness into light and the coming of the New Year, and celebrating the
beginning of Carnival season.
- Eileen
Hadidian & Susan Rode Morris
Shira Kammen
received her degree in music from UC Berkeley and studied vielle with Margriet
Tindemans. A member for many years of ensembles Alcatraz, Project Ars
Nova and Medieval Strings, she has also worked with Sequentia,
Hesperion XX, the Boston Camerata, Anne Azema, Kitka, and
the King's Noyse, and is the founder of Class V Music, an ensemble
performing on river rafting trips. Shira happily collaborated with
singer/storyteller John Fleagle for fifteen years, and performs now with several
new ensembles: Fortune's Wheel, a medieval ensemble; Ephemeros, a
new music group; Panacea, an eclectic ethnic band; and Trous Bras,
a dance band devoted to the music of Celtic Brittany. She has started her own
recording label, Bright Angel Records.
Eileen Hadidian
received her DMA in Early Music from Stanford University. She has appeared in
concert throughout the western United States, and was the founder and artistic
director of Hausmusik, an early music concert series in Albany, CA
showcasing local musicians in new and innovative programs. She is the recipient
of the annual Citizen in the Arts Award, given by the City of Albany to honor a
significant contribution to the arts. Eileen's encounter with cancer has led her
to explore ways in which music can help critically and chronically ill people by
promoting relaxation, diffusing pain, and reducing anxiety. Her non-profit
organization, Healing Muses, brings healing music to Bay Area hospitals,
hospices and convalescent homes, and is the recipient of grants from the East
Bay Community Foundation and The Institute of Noetic
Sciences.
Maureen Brennan is an accomplished performer,
playing both early classical and Celtic music on the Irish harp. She has toured
throughout the U.S. and Canada in a variety of ensembles, and has performed for
cruise ships in Alaska and Tahiti. She continues as a soloist for Irish and
Scottish events throughout the Bay Area, and as the harper with Wake the
Dead, a Celtic/Grateful Dead crossover band. Maureen's appearances include
San Francisco Performances at Six, Noontime Concerts at St. Patrick's
Church, the Oakland and the Young Museums, the Lick Observatory Summer
Music Series, the Festival of Harps, and the Freight and Salvage. She
teaches at conferences throughout the U.S. and has recorded five CDs, included
the world acclaimed Harpestrv collection.
Julie
Jeffrey began her professional career in Chicago, where she served as
assistant director of the University of Chicago Collegium Musicurn under Howard
Mayer Brown and Mary Springfels. Since her move to the San Francisco Bay Area,
she has appeared in concert with Magnificat, The Newberry Consort,
A Sett of Vyolls, Class V Music, Flauti Diversi, the Carmel
Bach Festival, and 1hc California Shakespeare Festival, and she is a member of
Sex Chordae Consort of Viols. With Ensemble Sans Souci she has
explored innovative reincarnations of old and new music, and with the Celtic
ensemble Distant Oaks she continues to exercise her interest in expanding
the viol's repertoire beyond conventional boundaries.
Our recording expresses many of the
sentiments associated with the New Year, the changing of the seasons, the
rebirth of life and wishes for good fortune and prosperity, through medieval and
traditional carols, songs by the famous Scottish poet Robert Burns, and
Renaissance and traditional dances from England and Ireland.
The carol, a
traditional song type in English, originally covered a variety of subjects.
Although we have come to associate it with the celebration of Christmas, the
carol includes many songs to the Virgin and various saints, stories of the
Epiphany, the Passion, the seasons, celebrations of nature, and lullabies such
as Lullay, lullow.
The wassails are of pre-Christian origin,
taking their name from the words of the toast (wæs hæl, be whole). Wassails
usually included good luck wishes for the house, the master thereof, and all his
herds and crops for the new year. A good example is the Wassail Song. Ian
Robb's poignant Homeless wassail touches upon a different aspect of the
holiday season, the plight of the homeless in winter. Robb quotes older wassail
songs and carols in his contemporary and timely setting.
Lady
Lothian's lilt (One yeir begins) is an old song found in the Scottish volume
of the large corpus Musica Brittonica. it is unusual in that it uses a
much wider vocal range than many of the songs from the
period.
Scotland's national poet Robert Burns lived during the latter
part of the 18th century. He grew up in
very humble conditions, was educated
at home, and labored hard on his father's farms. At an early age he began to
write poetry that allowed him to express what was in his heart and mind. He also
loved music and made the collecting of Scottish songs parts of his life's work.
He travelled throughout his country collecting native tunes that existed with or
without verses, or only in fragments, and he created rhymes to complete them.
After his reputation as a fine poet was firmly established, he found a publisher
in Edinburgh with the same goal: to make a collection of Scottish songs.
Together they published the Scots' Musical Museum, to which Burns
contributed over two hundred original and revised traditional
songs.
The gloomy night is gathering fast was written as Burns was
preparing himself to leave his homeland
forever and sail to Jamaica, having
been seriously jilted by his lover. He set it to the tune Roslin Castle,
which is haunting, dark and passionate. O wert thou in the could blast is
the last song Burns wrote. As he lay on his deathbed, he was cared for by a
young nurse named Miss Jessie Lewars. He was inspired to write this one last
song to her, because of her kindness to him. He called upon her that if she
would play him her favorite tune on the harpsichord and teach it to him by ear,
he would compose verses for it.
Could blows the wind is set to the
tune Up in the morning early. The tune was first printed in Scotland
around 1755 without words, but it was a well-known melody going by the names of
Stingo, The Oyl of Barley, and Cold and Raw, and was
published by John Playford in the 1695 edition of The English Dancing
Master. This popular tutor, first published in 1651, was the first
book
to give music and dance instructions specifically for country dancing. A
compilation of well-known tunes from different sources, many of them dating back
to the 16th century, The English Dancing Master was expanded and
reprinted many times between 1651 and 1728. A number of Playford's tunes, such
as To drive the cold winter away, appeared as both songs and
dances.
Turlough 0' Carolan (1670-1738) was the last of the great 18th
century Irish harpers. Blinded by smallpox when he was eighteen, he turned to
music and the harp. His patron, Mrs. McDermott Roe, taught him the basic skills,
then provided him with a harp, a horse and a guide. Thus began O'Carolan's
career as an itinerant harper. He roamed through Ireland and composed hundreds
of tunes. Many of them were dedicated to his patrons, who would provide him with
room and board, and sometimes pay, in exchange for an evening's entertainment.
O'Carolan drew his inspiration from three sources: native folk melody, the Irish
harp tradition, and contemporary Italian composers, such as Geminiani, who lived
in Dublin towards the end of his life and whom O'Carolan met.