Cavalier song
Encyclopedia
Cavalier song is a Jacobean
and Carolinian
genre of song, a later equivalent to Elizabethan lute song
. Many of the surviving examples were part of a large scale lavish court entertainment, the Stuart Masque. The genre is not as widely heard as the lute song, partly due to modern sources for the songs, such as large Musica Britannica volumes being impractical for playing and singing from If playing from the original notation the lute or keyboard player needs to be able to perform from unfigured bass
.
The period has been neglected by musicologists for some years, because when the songs are played through on the piano they lack substance, and their true worth only emerges through a communicative performance. However, some songs such as Henry Lawes
's The Lark,
William Lawes
' Gather ye Rosebuds, various songs by Thomas Brewer and Nicholas Lanier
's The Marigold have found their way into singing anthologies.
Much of this repertoire was recorded and performed by the Consort of Musicke
under Antony Rooley.
Jacobean era
The Jacobean era refers to the period in English and Scottish history that coincides with the reign of King James VI of Scotland, who also inherited the crown of England in 1603 as James I...
and Carolinian
Carolinian
-Languages:*The Carolinian language, an Austronesian language spoken in the Northern Mariana Islands in the Pacific Ocean-People:*A person from the Carolinas...
genre of song, a later equivalent to Elizabethan lute song
Lute song
The lute song was a generic form of music in the late Renaissance and very early Baroque eras, generally consisting of a singer accompanying himself on a lute, though lute songs may often have been performed by a singer and a separate lutenist...
. Many of the surviving examples were part of a large scale lavish court entertainment, the Stuart Masque. The genre is not as widely heard as the lute song, partly due to modern sources for the songs, such as large Musica Britannica volumes being impractical for playing and singing from If playing from the original notation the lute or keyboard player needs to be able to perform from unfigured bass
Unfigured bass
Unfigured bass is a technique of performance of historical music where the performer has a bass line but none of the guidance of a figured bass....
.
The period has been neglected by musicologists for some years, because when the songs are played through on the piano they lack substance, and their true worth only emerges through a communicative performance. However, some songs such as Henry Lawes
Henry Lawes
Henry Lawes was an English musician and composer.He was born at Dinton in Wiltshire, and received his musical education from John Cooper, better known under his Italian pseudonym Giovanni Coperario, a famous composer of the day...
's The Lark,
William Lawes
William Lawes
William Lawes was an English composer and musician.-Life and career:Lawes was born in Salisbury, Wiltshire and was baptised on 1 May 1602...
' Gather ye Rosebuds, various songs by Thomas Brewer and Nicholas Lanier
Nicholas Lanier
Nicholas Lanier, sometimes Laniere was an English composer, singer, lutenist and painter....
's The Marigold have found their way into singing anthologies.
Much of this repertoire was recorded and performed by the Consort of Musicke
under Antony Rooley.
Further reading
- http://engphil.astate.edu/EIRC/ is Explorations in Renaissance Culture, a scholarly journal with articles about the texts employed.
- Lawes, Henry (edited Ian Spink), (2000), Cavalier Songwriter, Oxford University Press.
- Cavalier Songs: 1625-1660, Ian Spink, Musica Britannica Vol. 3.
- Sabol, Andrew J. (editor), (1959), Songs and dances from the Stuart Masque. An edition of sixty-three items of music for the English court masque from 1604 to 1641, Brown University Press.
- Sabol, Andrew J. (editor), (1982), Four hundred songs and dances from the Stuart Masque, Brown University Press.