Most of us can trot out several English and indeed Italian madrigal
composers of the late 16th and early 17th centuries without too much
difficulty but what about German composers? It’s true that many
musicians have forgotten that Schütz, born the same year as Grabbe,
brought out a book of Italian madrigals in 1611 as did Hans Leo Hassler but
who else? Well, now you can discover for yourselves in this recording of
secular vocal works and some instrumental ones by the little known Johann
Grabbe.
The extensive booklet notes give us a great deal of background but
say next to nothing about this collection nor is any analysis or musical
description provided. It took me quite some time to read them and even more
time to absorb them.
This is Volume 2 in a collection named ‘Renaissance im
Norden’ which CPO is promulgating. Volume 1 was devoted to Michael
Praetorius’s
Oestermesse.
First, we have an essay ‘The Renaissance in the Weser
Region’ by Heiner Borggrefe. If your sense of German Topography is as
limited as mine then the map on page 7 will be useful. The rest of the
booklet has been written by Veronika Greul and has three further sections
‘Princely Residences in Northern Germany’, ‘Count Simon VI
and Johann Grabbe’ and ‘Johann Grabbe and the Schamberg
Line’. The significance, musically, is that Grabbe was enabled, by his
enlightened sponsors including the music-loving Count Simon, and later Ernst
II, to study in Italy and to experiment with modernistic techniques on his
return. Both Simon and Ernst also encouraged other composers, like
Schütz and Pederson (who was Danish), to work at their courts and
encouraged many other aspects of the Arts. In the end the family became
practically bankrupt.
The vocal pieces here come from Grabbe’s 1609 collection,
which was printed in Venice. Its frontispiece is illustrated but the booklet
is not clear. I assume that the five dances are from elsewhere. The set,
which was written as a graduation exercise whilst Grabbe was studying under
Gabrieli has been recorded before by Anthony Rooley, on MDG but I have not
heard any of it. Rooley only recorded the madrigals.
CPO name and picture a vocal group of six and an instrumental group
of eight but the voices are very often most attractively accompanied by the
harp. This acts as a simple continuo following a fashion which was already
in use in Italy.
These pieces do not consistently grip the attention in the way that
similar pieces by the ‘greats’ of the period do. However many of
them have several attractive characteristics, with word-play and
word-painting among them. Take, for example,
Viva fiamma del seno
with its flashing lines for ‘Living flames’. Also in
O chiome
errant listen out for ‘How you fly and play’ with much
inventive emphasis on ‘scherzando’. In Ch’io non
t’ami, cor mio’ an imaginative turn of surprising harmony is
employed for the words ‘may Death not spare me’ - ‘morte
non mi perdoni’.
The favoured poet is Guaraní, also set by Monteverdi and
Lassus. Of subjects of ‘languishing’, ‘death’,
‘unrequited love’, ‘unattainable lovers’ and intense
passion are, as ever, present by the bucketful. Setting ‘oime’
to a descending tritone is another regular finger-print. This sort of
intensity of expression was characteristic of the day. It seems to have been
encouraged by Giovanni Gabrieli who, although he did not publish any
madrigals after 1597, seems to have taught their use. Yet Grabbe has his own
voice and touch, especially harmonically. This can be unpredictable and
often quite complex as in
Come sei cieceo, Amore and in
E tu
parti, ben mio.
Perhaps we can blame the large acoustic of Schloss Brake in Lemgo in
North-Rhine Westphalia for making the text rather cloudy at times. I got
used to the effect; either that or it might be because the madrigals seem to
grow in maturity. I’m not sure which, but I gradually found myself
warming to this composer and indeed to the performances. At first I found
Weser-Renaissance not much more than various shades of grey (not quite
fifty!). In madrigals like
Lasso, perché mi fuggi I missed
several points of expression. However, slowly the subtleties and the
increasingly impassioned nature of the renditions began to register and I
became more involved in the whole project. This was coupled with the gradual
realisation that this is music by a significant master of the period and
worthy of the time spent on it. I warmed to the voices and to their
approach.
I’m not sure, incidentally, why the booklet cover has a
reproduction of a Virgin and child by an artist called Hans Rottenhammer.
The music is, after all, clearly secular. This is an important, quite rare
and attractive madrigal collection.
Gary Higginson
