la follia d'amore
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Landi: Canta la cicaletta. Zachary Wilder (tenor)
Enzina: La tricotea; Hoy comamos y bebamos. Kate Symonds-Joy (mezzo), Zachary Wilder (tenor), Jonathan Sells (bass) Recorded live at the Capability Barns, Fen Drayton, July 2013 |
Project overview
Solomon's Knot presents a programme of music from renaissance Spain and early baroque Italy on the themes of life, love and death. Opening and closing with pieces from an anonymous collection of Italian songs which muse on the transience of life and the possibilities of the hereafter, the programme focuses on the sweet torment of falling in love, the harshness of betrayal and playful amorous interaction.
Some songs are strophic ditties about unrequited love (Sì dolce è il tormento; Traditorella, che credi); while others use extended metaphors and virtuosic vocal writing to paint the lover’s torment: in Superbe colli the narrator describes the monuments of Rome and compares them to his love, both of which will be dismantled by the passing of Time; and in Canta la cicaletta, a grasshopper sings its song until death under the scorching sun, just as the lover hopes to die singing. Quando Rinaldo invitto and Tirsi morir volea are effectively miniature operas, describing respectively Armida abandoned by Rinaldo, and a flirtatious encounter between the Tirsi and Filli which culminates in them ‘dying’ repeatedly (death being in poetry of this period usually a metaphor for sexual fulfilment).
We have chosen some of the most rhythmically driven pieces of the period: dance forms such as the ciaccona, follia and passacaglia dominate, and illustrate the influence of Spanish styles in Italy at the time. Se l’aura spira is based on the follia pattern, and No, ch’io non mi fido uses the ciaccona bass line to rhapsodise on feminine inconstancy. Merula’s lullaby Hor ch'è tempo di dormire is perhaps the most hypnotic of all, using a bass line of only two notes which are obsessively repeated. We have included earlier Spanish music which speaks of similar themes: the rhythms and harmonies in Landi and Merula perhaps find a precedent in the villancicos of Enzina and in the mysterious, ancient songs of Martín Codax, sung by a woman looking out to sea, waiting for her lover.
Project repertoire & personnel
Anonymous (early C17) Passacaglia della vita
Martín Codax (fl. C13) Quantas sebedes amar
Juan del Enzina (1468-1529/30) Ay triste que vengo
La tricotea
Hoy comamos y bebamos
Stefano Landi (1587-1639) Superbe colli
Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643) Sì dolce è il tormento
Landi Alla guerra d'amor
Amarillide, deh vieni
Tarquinio Merula (1594/5-1665) No, ch'io non mi fido
Monteverdi Vorrei baciarti
Landi Quando Rinaldo invitto
Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583-1643) Se l'aura spira
Merula Hor ch'è tempo di dormire
Giovanni Felice Sances (c.1600-1679) Traditorella, che credi
Landi Canta la cicaletta
Sances Tirsi morir volea
Anonymous (C17) Ciaccona del Paradiso e dell'Inferno
Johann Hieronymus Kapsberger (c.1580-1651) Felici gl'animi
mezzo soprano ~ tenor ~ bass
lute/lirone ~ theorbo/baroque guitar ~ harp ~ 'cello ~ harpsichord
Performances
July 2013: Fringe in the Fen festival, Fenstanton, Cambs., UK
Solomon's Knot presents a programme of music from renaissance Spain and early baroque Italy on the themes of life, love and death. Opening and closing with pieces from an anonymous collection of Italian songs which muse on the transience of life and the possibilities of the hereafter, the programme focuses on the sweet torment of falling in love, the harshness of betrayal and playful amorous interaction.
Some songs are strophic ditties about unrequited love (Sì dolce è il tormento; Traditorella, che credi); while others use extended metaphors and virtuosic vocal writing to paint the lover’s torment: in Superbe colli the narrator describes the monuments of Rome and compares them to his love, both of which will be dismantled by the passing of Time; and in Canta la cicaletta, a grasshopper sings its song until death under the scorching sun, just as the lover hopes to die singing. Quando Rinaldo invitto and Tirsi morir volea are effectively miniature operas, describing respectively Armida abandoned by Rinaldo, and a flirtatious encounter between the Tirsi and Filli which culminates in them ‘dying’ repeatedly (death being in poetry of this period usually a metaphor for sexual fulfilment).
We have chosen some of the most rhythmically driven pieces of the period: dance forms such as the ciaccona, follia and passacaglia dominate, and illustrate the influence of Spanish styles in Italy at the time. Se l’aura spira is based on the follia pattern, and No, ch’io non mi fido uses the ciaccona bass line to rhapsodise on feminine inconstancy. Merula’s lullaby Hor ch'è tempo di dormire is perhaps the most hypnotic of all, using a bass line of only two notes which are obsessively repeated. We have included earlier Spanish music which speaks of similar themes: the rhythms and harmonies in Landi and Merula perhaps find a precedent in the villancicos of Enzina and in the mysterious, ancient songs of Martín Codax, sung by a woman looking out to sea, waiting for her lover.
Project repertoire & personnel
Anonymous (early C17) Passacaglia della vita
Martín Codax (fl. C13) Quantas sebedes amar
Juan del Enzina (1468-1529/30) Ay triste que vengo
La tricotea
Hoy comamos y bebamos
Stefano Landi (1587-1639) Superbe colli
Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643) Sì dolce è il tormento
Landi Alla guerra d'amor
Amarillide, deh vieni
Tarquinio Merula (1594/5-1665) No, ch'io non mi fido
Monteverdi Vorrei baciarti
Landi Quando Rinaldo invitto
Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583-1643) Se l'aura spira
Merula Hor ch'è tempo di dormire
Giovanni Felice Sances (c.1600-1679) Traditorella, che credi
Landi Canta la cicaletta
Sances Tirsi morir volea
Anonymous (C17) Ciaccona del Paradiso e dell'Inferno
Johann Hieronymus Kapsberger (c.1580-1651) Felici gl'animi
mezzo soprano ~ tenor ~ bass
lute/lirone ~ theorbo/baroque guitar ~ harp ~ 'cello ~ harpsichord
Performances
July 2013: Fringe in the Fen festival, Fenstanton, Cambs., UK