Program Notes

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Holborne – Fruit of Love; Honey-suckle; Marie-gold; Faerie Round; Paradizo 

On the title page of his 1599 collection Pavans, Galliards, Almains, and other short Æirs, Anthony Holborne (or his publisher) sought to expand his potential market by saying that these pieces could be played by “Violins, Viols, or other Musical Wind Instruments.” We have taken him at his word by combining various early wind and string instruments (viols, violins, violas, harps, recorders, douçaines, bagpipes, and dulcians). 

 

While “The Fruit of Love,” “Honeysuckle,” and “Marigold” have clear associations with the botanical theme of this concert, “The Fairy Round” and “Paradizo” may require further explanation. Although there is no indication of a historical use of the term, a fairy ring currently refers to the phenomenon of mushrooms appearing in a near perfect circle. “Paradizo” is an allusion to Philip Sidney’s poem Arcadia, which is set in the eponymous land of pastoral beauty. 

 

Crequillon – Des herbs ais 

In addition to the popular Florilegia of the sixteenth century (books dedicated to ornamental flowers), less ostentatious plants and their uses were catalogued in books called Herbals. Crecquillon certainly had that spirit in mind for “Des herbs ais,” a celebration of the healing power of herbs. Fans of visual art may know of Crecquillon’s music from a painting by Hieronymous Bosch. No, not the famous music written on the butt of a condemned soul in Hell performed by demons in his triptych, The Garden of Earthly Delights…but (butt?) rather the Concert in the Egg, featuring an equally bizarre venue for performance – the inside of an egg. We opted for a particularly reedy texture to highlight this celebration of the piquant side of plant life.

 

Wilbye – Sweet honey-sucking bees; Lady, when I behold; Adieu, sweet Amaryllis 

As with the Holborne dances, this music was primarily intended as at-home entertainment for friends to play or sing together. However, not every friend-group contains four or five singers of the appropriate ranges! Iconography from the time suggests that a healthy mix of voices and instruments was common in at-home music making. We chose to perform the two-part madrigal “Sweet honey-sucking bees – Yet, sweet, take heed” in what has become the conventional madrigal style of unaccompanied voices, but arranged “Lady, when I behold” and “Adieu, sweet Amaryllis” for a single voice with instruments covering the other parts.  

 

In both “Sweet honey-sucking bees” and “Lady, when I behold,” Wilbye compares the sweetness of flowers with the sweetness of a lover’s lips. While the amaryllis is now generally known as a certain type of showy flower, the name was not tied to a specific plant until the eighteenth century. The term had previously been in use, however, as another name for the lily. It is not difficult to imagine “Adieu, sweet Amaryllis” as both a bittersweet farewell to one's beloved, as well as a lament for the departure of the flowers in autumn. 

 

Sermisy – Vignon, vignon, vignon, vignette 

Showcasing that most wonderful gift of plants, wine, this piece draws attention to its potentially deleterious effects. The top two voices behave themselves fairly well, appropriately following metric cycles. The bottom voice, however, slurs its words by staggering around the metric patterns established by the other two voices, e.g. singing strong syllables on weak beats and adding extra beats here and there. We opted to have three men sing the bass part in unison in order to underscore this expressive feature. Perhaps Sermisy understands the pace at which basses consume their wine…or perhaps he is drawing attention to the second half of the phrase too often cut short: “in vino veritas, in aqua sanitas” (in wine truth, in water sanity).

 

Morley – In dew of roses 

Sir Thomas Morley was perhaps the most famous composer of secular music in England during his own lifetime. “In dew of Roses” is taken from his First Book of Madrigals to Four Voyces (published in 1594), a cycle of 20 poems that tell the story of a pastoral love triangle. Here, the textual roses evoke the cycle’s verdant setting, as well as the redness of sad Lycoris’ cheeks.

 

Clemens non Papa – Au joli bocquet 

While seemingly an innocuous tale of a simple floral picnic, the “growing of the violet” could also function as a metaphor – perhaps for the burgeoning of love in one’s heart, or perhaps for something else that needed to be encoded in analogy. Given the pastoral setting of the grove, the mysterious package, and the ambiguity of the word voire (“Yes!” or “Really?!”) we will leave it to you to interpret it as you will. One thing is certain: as his name points out, Jacobus Clemens non Papa was certainly not the Pope. 

 

Susato – Den hoboeken dans 

Published in Susato’s 1551 collection of dance music, Danserye, it is unclear whether Susato wrote this piece from scratch, arranged a previously used melody, or simply included a well-known dance piece from the time. Although the collection gives no indication that he was not the composer of this piece, it contains other pieces that are known to be arrangements of tunes by other composers or anonymous tunes that were popular at the time. This dance in particular is associated with the Flemish town of Hoboken, from which NYC’s neighbor across the Hudson receives its name. While the tune refers to the location and not to the word Hoboken itself, we note that Hoboken derives from the medieval Dutch words for Tall Beeches, and that New Jersey is, after all, The Garden State! A fantastical image of beech trees dancing might come to mind as our woodwind instruments (a total of four miniature trees) play this tune. 

 

Bateson – Those sweet, delightful lilies 

There are many diverse meanings given to the lily, including purity in love; passion; prosperity; and mourning. The music and text seem at first to indicate the latter, as the opening phrase “Those sweet delightful lilies which nature gave my Phyllis,” could be understood to depict the growth of flowers on a loved-one’s grave. Talk of anguish and frequent use of descending musical gestures would seem to further illustrate the sorrow of a mournful lover. 

 

Another possible meaning, however, must be taken into account. In 1588, ten years prior to Bateson’s publication of this piece, a book of Italian Madrigals called Musica Transalpina was published in England which newly popularized death as a metaphorical as opposed to a literal experience. While further attempting to keep these notes PG-13, we’ll say that death stands in for a certain climactic moment. It is possible that here Bateson is reconciling the dual meaning of death with the equally ambiguous lily, creating a piece that equally delights and mourns in the passion and anguish of love.

 

Dowland – O sweet woods; White as lilies was her face

Dowland was one of the most well-regarded (and highly-compensated) composers of the late sixteenth/early seventeenth century, known for his collections of consort music and his expressive setting of melancholic texts. “O sweet woods” praises the “solitariness” that the earth provides in contrast to the “false pleasures” of fame and love; the earth ultimately serves as “love’s childbed, nursery, and tomb.” 

 

“White as lilies was her face” is a mostly homorhythmic setting of a similarly dark view of a past love. The text opens by stating “White as lilies was her face, when she smiled, she beguiled. Quitting faith with foul disgrace, virtue, service thus neglected, heart with sorrows hath infected”…and matters do not seem to improve from there.

 

Martini – La fleur de biaulte

This work is taken from one of the most influential musical publications of the early sixteenth century – Ottaviano Petrucci’s Harmonice musices odhecaton. This was the first collection of polyphonic music to be printed using printable type; this innovation helped both to widely disseminate the pieces and musical styles contained its three volumes, and to spur the explosion of music printing throughout the sixteenth century and beyond.

 

Isaac – Quis dabit capiti meo aquam? 

The only sacred piece on our program is also our only sixteenth-century piece not from England, France, or the Low Countries. In fact, calling it a sixteenth-century work is somewhat of a misnomer. Although it was first published in 1503, it was written a decade earlier, in honor of the death of Lorenzo de’ Medici (Lorenzo the Magnificent).  

 

As a plant of victory and peace, the laurel mentioned honors Lorenzo. The poet, Angelo Poliziano, makes sure to describe how the shade of the laurel made music more beautiful, in tribute to Lorenzo’s fervent support of the arts. 

 

Matus – Evermind 

In appreciation for the many roles that plants play in our worlds (both real and imagined), I wrote “Evermind” about a fictitious plant in a fictional land. Simbelmynë is a flower from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings that grows on burial mounds. Gandalf describes this flower, saying, “How fair are the bright eyes in the grass! Evermind they are called, simbelmynë in this land of Men, for they blossom in all the seasons of the year, and grow where dead men rest.”  

 

Tolkien imagined the people of Rohan as proto-Anglo Saxons, which is why he used the Old English word for Evermind as the name of the flower. In the spirit of Old English literature, I wrote the text of this piece focusing on alliteration instead of rhymes; the second half is structured as Old English verse. Thanks to Andrew Albin for his help with this endeavor! 

 

I felt the need to write this piece in late 2020 when a scene from the movie The Two Towers would not leave my head. While holding this flower, King Theoden says, “no parent should have to bury their child.” I heard my own father say nearly those exact words that April after my brother, Chris, died of COVID. Plants and Tolkien have always comforted me greatly, and my hope is that they might always continue to bring comfort to us all.

Notes by Ben Matus, ed. by Tracy Cowart and Sian Ricketts

 

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TEXTS AND TRANSLATIONS

 

Des herb ais assez, belle,

pour toy guerrir,

sans aultre part ung medicin querir,

pour a ton mal donner allegement,

puis tu sais bien

quanteffois et comment,

je t’ay servy sans quelque recompense.

Je ne dis pas tout ce mon cueur pense

 

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Vignon, vignon, vignon vignette,

qui te planta il fut prud’hom,

tu fus coupee a la serpette

Vignon, vignon, vignon, vignette,

quant tu passes 

per mon gourgechon,

Vignon, vignon, vignon, vignette,

qui te planta,

qui te planta il fut prud’hom

vignon, vignon, vignon, vignon, vignette,

vignon, vignette qui te planta,

qui te planta il fut prud’hom.

 

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Au joli bocquet croist la violette.

Je vis hier Jaquet

dire’a Michellette –

faisons un banquet

sur ce verd tronquet,

lors de sa malette, belle’et violette,

tira un pacquet.

Voire dict la fillette,

au joly bocquet croist la violette.

Voire dict la fillette,

au joly bocquet croist la violette.

 

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Quis dabit capiti meo aquam?

Quis oculis meis

fontem lachrimarum dabit,

ut nocte fleam.

Sic turtur viduus solet,

sic cygnus moriens solet,

sic Luscinia conqueri.

Heu miser, 

O dolor, dolor.

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Laurus impetus fulminis

illa illa iacet subito,

laurus 

omnium celebris

musarum choris,

nympharum choris, choris.

 

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Sub cuius patula coma

et Phebi lira blandius insonat

et vox dulcius.

Nunc muta omnia

Nunc sur da omnia.

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