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Gabriel’s Greeting - Medieval English
Christmas Music Gabriel fram evene king (C14th) [4:25] Salva nos, stella maris (C13th) [2:49] Miri it is – Estampie (C13th) [4:15] Salve, virgo virginum (C13th) [1:36] Ave Maria, virgo virginum (C13th) [1:14] Procedenti puero (C13th) [2:29] Ecce mundi gaudium (C13th) [1:55] Ut iam cesset calamitas (C13th) [1:30] Gabriel fram evene king (C14th) [2:07] Untitled instrumental piece (C13th) [5:15] Vide miser et iudica / Vide miser et cogita / Wynter (3-part
motet, C14th) [3:27] Estampie (based on Wynter motet) [6:36] Ther is no rose of swych vertu (C15th) [4:43] Ther is no rose of swych vertu (instrumental realisation)
[2:09] Lolay, lolay. Als I lay on Yoleis nite (C14th/15th)
[10:39] Nowell, nowell, nowell! This is the salutacyon of the
angell Gabryell (late C15th) [7:13]
Sinfonye
(Vivien Ellis, Jocelyn West (vocals); Stevie Wishart (fiddle,
vocals, sinfonye);
Jim Denley (percussion); Paula Chateauneuf (lute))/Stevie
Wishart.
rec. 15-17 June, 1993. Venue not stated. DDD. HYPERION HELIOS CDH55151 [63:08]
This
is not a new CD – it was reissued in 2003 – but it seems
to have slipped through the Musicweb net, so I thought I
might add it to my recent reviews of seasonal music, especially
as it is so recommendable.
The
recording offers a varied and most enjoyable selection of
music ranging across three centuries. The earliest piece, Miri
it is, dates from around 1225, the most recent, Ther
is no rose and Nowell, nowell, nowell! date from
the end of the fifteenth century. The music falls into four
categories: Gabriel’s Annunciation to the Virgin Mary, which
gives its name to the collection, the Nativity, general praise
of the Virgin Mary and warnings to mankind to repent.
This
last category may seem out of place on a recording of Christmas
music until we remember the rigours of the medieval winter
and the dark thoughts that it brought. The problem now known
as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), seems to have afflicted
the whole of society with a vengeance. As one of the Harley
lyrics has it, “Wynter wakeneth al my care, / nou this leves
waxeth bare. / Ofte y sike & mourne sare /when hit cometh
in my thoht / of this worlds joie hou it geth al to noht.” [Winter
awakens all my care, now these leaves grow bare. Often I
sigh and mourn sorely when it comes into my thoughts how
this world’s joy goes all to nothing. Carleton Brown, Religious
Lyrics of the XIVth Century, no.9, spelling slightly
modernised.]
Miri it is (track 3) reminds us that, just as the seasons
change, decline and renew, so must mankind:
Miri it is while sumer
ilast with fugheles song,
Oc nu neheth windes blast and weder strong.
Ei, ei! What this niht
is long!
And ich, with wel michel
wrong,
Soregh and murn and fast.
[Merry it is while summer
lasts with birds’ song, but now draws nigh wind’s blast
and rough weather. Alas, alas, how long is this night!
And I,
with very great wrong, sorrow and mourn and fast.]
The translation in the
Hyperion booklet assumes that the wrong has been done to the
singer. I hesitate to disagree, since the notes acknowledge
the assistance of Dr Christopher Page and Dr Laura Knight
with the Middle English texts, but I think that the original
leaves it open to us to assume that the wrong has been
done by him.
As RT Davies notes, a great part of the poem is left unsaid.
[Medieval English Lyrics (London:Faber, 1963)] Either
way, the performance leaves us in no doubt that this is
a powerful piece, confirming Davies’s assertion that this
is sophisticated music, not that of simple rustics. Though
it
is generally true that the Anglo-Norman aristocracy were
interested only in literature in Norman French, the existence
in two manuscripts of the wonderful poem The Owl and
the Nightingale demonstrates the existence of sophisticated
vernacular poetry even at this early period.
The addition on this recording
of an estampie based on the original melody of Miri
it is, adds to the impression that this is courtly
music. The notation in the manuscript is basic, offering
no indication
of rhythm, but the text itself provides that when it is
as well interpreted as it is here. I haven’t heard the performance
by the Dufay Collective or that by the Mediæval Bæbes [sic],
but I cannot imagine either of them bettering Sinfonye’s
performance. The juxtaposition with the Anglo-Norman Salva
nos (track 2) is appropriate: both pieces lend themselves
well to the strongly rhythmic, slightly acerbic performances
which they receive.
Later successive visitations
of the Black Death strengthened this winter’s mind of penitence,
so that the mood of Advent changed from hopeful anticipation
of Christmas to a kind of mini-Lent. Vide miser et iudica/Vide
miser et cogita/Wynter (track 11, 14th-century)
returns to the same theme but this time the invocation of
the help of Mary offers a glimpse of hope at the end:
Heu! Nisi nos protegat
felix puerpera,
Totum intellige stat in
angaria.
[Alas! If the blessed
pregnant lady did not protect us, know that everything stands
in great anguish. There may be a pun, inevitably missed in
the translation in the booklet, on felix, which can
mean both happy and fruitful.]
The theme of this 3-part
motet, like that of Miri it is, is emphasised on
this recording by following it with an estampie based
on it. Gabriel fram evene king (track 1, 2-part
realisation on track 9) and the wonderful Ther is no
rose (tracks
13 and 14) also receive this treatment.
The opening work, Gabriel
fram evene king, belongs to a very fruitful branch
of Middle English lyrics, those in praise of the Virgin
Mary. This particular lyric is an English translation (or,
rather, paraphrase) of the ubiquitous hymn Angelus ad
virginem. Those interested in looking at other examples
of this genre will find them, with translations
and notes, in the Davies collection to which I have already
referred and in the Norton anthology (see below). Gabriel
fram evene king is poem 32 in Davies’s collection.
Don’t worry about the slightly different spelling: Davies
slightly regularises this throughout the collection.
Though the Hyperion booklet spells evene as in
the manuscript, Sinfonye in their performance adopt Davies’s
spelling hevene and
sound the initial h. (English manuscripts of this
period were still sometimes copied by scribes whose first
language was not English.)
Some Middle English poems
exist in slightly variant versions. Such is the case with Lolay,
lolay! (track 15) printed in a slightly variant form
by Davies (No.38). The version on the CD is taken from a
manuscript in the Bodleian Library, the Davies version from
one in the National Library of Scotland.
Surprisingly, Davies does
not include the wonderful Ther is no rose (track 13),
familiar nowadays in modern arrangements and a fine example
of the macaronic, in which the vernacular and Latin, in this
case from the sequence Lætabundus, alternate. (Cf. In
dulci jubilo.) The rose of the courtly-love poem Roman
de la Rose, with its sexual connotations, has here been
transmogrified into the flower of virgins. Luria and Hoffman
equally inexplicably omit this piece from their Norton edition
of Middle English Lyrics (New York, Norton, 1974).
This otherwise recommendable alternative to the Davies selection
is about to be revised; I very much hope that the new edition
will include Ther is no rose. In any event, it receives
an excellent performance here, the gentleness of its treatment
making an apt contrast with the roughness of Miri it is.
The Norton anthology also
omits Lolay, lolay! but includes a very similar poem
from the Commonplace Book of John Grimestone (No.198). Neither
Davies nor the Norton include Nowell, nowell, nowell (track
16) and I did not know either the lyric or the music before
I encountered it here. It’s a real find and a wonderful
piece with which to end this recording in such a lively
performance.
Another excellent way
to explore a wide range of Middle English poetry in praise
of the Virgin Mary is via the TEAMS medieval texts series.
This series of texts, intended to offer undergraduate and
post-graduate students access to out-of-the-way medieval
texts with translations and scholarly notes in reasonably-priced
format is now available free online, an offering of incredible
generosity, thanks to the US National Endowment for the Humanities. Ther
is no rose is poem 20 in the section of Nativity
poems from the Middle English Marian Lyrics volume,
ed. K Sharpe (Medieval Institute, Kalamazoo, MI, 1998) and Lolay,
lolay! is no.25. Gabriel fram evene king is poem
3 in the Annunciation poems in
that collection; another translation, closer to the Latin
original, is no.4. (Follow the hyperlinks for the whole contents
of each section; the text should appear in a pane at the
top of the screen, the notes in a separate pane at the bottom.)
I have concentrated on
the vernacular lyrics because of their high quality in an
age when Latin was the norm. Some of them, of course, like Gabriel
fram evene king, are translations or paraphrases. Others
also owe much to Latin and French models, like Lolay,
lolay, an example of the chanson d’aventure.
In such lyrics the poet riding forth, usually on a Spring
morning,
encounters a beautiful young lady, heartbroken at her desertion
by her courtly lover. In our example, the adventure involves
another beautiful young lady, the Virgin Mary. The poet
hears the dialogue between herself and the infant Jesus
in which
he hints at the fate which awaits him, thus linking a Christmas
lyric with the dialogues of Jesus and Mary at the foot
of the cross which you will find in another section of
the TEAMS
anthology of Marian lyrics: “wat schal to me befall / heer
after wan I cum til eld”. [What shall befall me hereafter
when I am older.”] Be assured that the Latin texts are
just as well worth hearing, just as well performed and
recorded.
Both Latin and vernacular
texts receive the appropriate pronunciation – nothing to
set the scholarly teeth on edge, though I did just wonder
about the hard g in regina (track 2).
The opening Gabriel
fram evene king is performed without accompaniment;
later it receives a text-less realisation accompanied by
the sinfonye (track 9). Most of the other pieces are performed
with instrumental accompaniment. The wonderful untitled
instrumental piece (track 10) leads into the penitential Vide
miser, accompanied only very discreetly on the sinfonye – a
microcosm of the amazing contrasts between different
aspects of medieval literature and music. Without wishing
to get
into the debate about the extent to which medieval singing
was accompanied, suffice it to say that it is well done
here, by Stevie Wishart, the director, and her two colleagues
on percussion and lute. Tracks without accompaniment
(1 and 5) emerge with greater freshness. Wishart plays
fiddle
and sinfonye, the instrument which gives its name to
the whole group. (Better known as the hurdy-gurdy, but
not
to be confused with the later hurdy-gurdy or barrel-organ.
The Wikipedia article hurdy-gurdy offered sound
information, with illustrations, when I looked at it, but
remember that wiki articles are subject to change, sometimes
by the ill-informed.)
The booklet is almost
de-luxe in quality – as usual with Helios reissues, fully
the equal of the original full-price version and far better
than any other bargain label. (With the exception of some
Brilliant Classics issues: their version of Monteverdi’s Ritorno
d’Ulisse, which I hope to get round to reviewing some
time soon, contains a thick and scholarly booklet which
puts some full-price sets to shame.) The recording, too,
is up
to Hyperion’s usual high standard, with no sense that it
ever came between me and the performances. The texts of
all the lyrics are included, together with accurate translations.
In the Middle English texts the booklet even attempts to
reproduce the obsolete letter yogh, employing a
3 for the purpose. (I shan’t try to reproduce the true
shape of yogh here, because, as a non-ASCII character,
it would probably disappear on the webpage.) Don’t be put
off by the use of u for v and vice-versa. The understated
cover, showing angels and men rejoicing above the scene of
Mary and the infant Christ, worshipped by ox and ass, the
whole contained within the initial C of Cantate Domino,
Sing unto the Lord, sets the tone for a stylish and enjoyable
hour of Christmas music with a difference. (Poor old Joseph,
not much admired in the middle ages, just sneaks into the
scene.)
The whole reissue is worthy
of the warm welcome which Glyn Pursglove gave to another
Sinfonye recording, Bella Domna (CDH55207) : “It belongs
in every collection of medieval song.” Gary Higginson, welcoming
Sinfonye’s Courts of Love reissue (CDH55186) admitted
to having had some initial doubts about Bella Domna and
the current CD, Gabriel’s Greeting, but professed
himself now freshly captivated by both.
The Sinfonye approach
to medieval music is different from that of the Gothic
Voices, several of whose Helios reissues I have been reviewing
recently;
both are very recommendable. It isn’t just the seasonal spirit
that inspires me to make this a Bargain of the Month. One
warning: if you buy this CD, you’ll probably want the other
two as well.
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