William Corkine’s biography is exiguous: even his dates of birth
and death are uncertain. One can obviously suggest he was a
contemporary of Dowland though probably a younger one given
that his Second Book of Ayres was published nine years after
Dowland’s third set of songs. One can also note that he had
an acute ear for poetry. Among the poems he set are Donne’s
Break of Day and ’Tis true, ’tis day, what though
it be? and Sidney’s The Fire to see my woes for anger
burneth though none is contained in this 1612 set. Like
Dowland, Corkine was a lutenist, and he also played the viol
and an instrument for which English aristocracy harboured a
fondness, the lyra-viol. Another conjunction with Dowland is
that he left his native country to work abroad, leaving for
Poland in 1617. After that there seems very little known.
His first set of Ayres was published in 1610, the second two
years later. As the notes make clear this later set contains
eighteen songs for voice and accompanying bass viol. Of these
thirteen have just a bass line to go on. There is also a collection
of Lyra Viol lessons at the end of this second book, one for
two lyra viol and eleven lessons for solo instrument. In this
disc, one of the very few ever to have been devoted solely to
Corkine’s music — some of his songs are included in anthologies,
as are some of the instrumental works — we hear all the songs
and all the solo lyra lessons.
The recital was recorded in the Church of Santa Maria di Siurana
but sufficient care has been taken to ensure that there is clarity
and detail in the sound, whilst also acknowledging the natural
bloom and decay of the acoustic. Sometimes the lower notes of
the viola can boom, and obstruct the vocal line.
Corkine was an elegant stylist, reserved, moderate, not inclined
to showy declamation or to plumb the greater depths (or heights)
of love and loss. His muse remains on an even keel, the music
remaining refined and moderate, aware of constraint and the
appropriate emotive temperature for each song. The accompaniment
is supportive and never graphic or explicatory. The songs remain
predominantly slow, and in truth lack Dowland’s gift of invention,
phrasal richness and textual interplay. These, by contrast,
are more pedestrian in their sense of colour and response to
text.
It’s of some interest that he sets so many active texts; words
like ‘down’, ‘fly’, and ‘away’ are frequent in the poems, and
familiar from poetry of the time, but it’s curious that his
response to such potential vitality is so inert. Much is cast
in the melancholy vein of the time, but there’s one number that
shows his command of a fruitier vernacular, Away, away,
which is a typical instruction to a maid to put aside the modesty
‘that hides/The chieftest Jemme of Nature.’ Here Corkine gets
up to tempo and banishes restraint, as well he might given the
poem’s lascivious parade of tongues, hymens, girdles, veils
and the like.
Elsewhere, as long as one appreciates Corkine’s deliberate expressive
reserve, there are plenty of things to admire and enjoy. Two
lovers sat lamenting doesn’t stimulate him to shudder at
the words ‘silent moane’ or to colour the accompanying line
with any allusive commentary; the music remains steadfast, refined,
stoic in its avoidance of frivolity.
The instrumental music includes the expected dance forms of
Pavan, Courante and the like, though here spelled, as per the
printed original Pavin and Coranto. These also reflect the qualities
of intense reserve but also fugitive humour. The puckes delight,
which is one of his best known viol pieces, is unusually rustic
with its drone effect and flowing, hugely engaging energy. It’s
a suitable foil for the stately reserve of the other movements.
Nadine Balbeisi and Fernando Marín perform with studied intelligence.
The soprano adopts what is assumed to be the correct pronunciation,
whilst Marín carries out his dual function as accompanying viola
da gamba player and solo lyra-violist with thoughtful care as
to registrations. Corkine’s music has been well realised.
Jonathan Woolf
see also
review by Mark Sealey
Cantar alla Viola (Nadine Balbeisi (soprano); Fernando Marín (viola
da gamba, lyra-viol)) 
