Nigel North
Encyclopedia
Nigel North is an English lute
nist and guitarist
.
(1964–70), taking up the lute
in 1969, at the age of 15. He maintains he was more or less self-taught on the instrument. He went on to study at the Royal College of Music
from 1971 to 1974: classical guitar
with John Williams
and Carlos Bonell
, viola da gamba with Francis Baines; lute (one term) with Diana Poulton
, qualifying in 1974 with an A.R.C.M. diploma in lute performance. He completed his studies on the postgraduate course in Early Music at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama 1975–1975 and with one month's study with baroque lutenist Michael Schäffer in 1976.
, Berlin, Germany. From January 1999 he has been Professor of Lute at the Early Music Institute, Jacobs School of Music
, Indiana University
and, from January 2005, has taught the lute at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague
, Holland.
He has written the standard modern textbook on continuo
playing on the lute and related instruments: (review)
The following textbook is in preparation:
, cittern
, rebec
and violin
as well as his more usual instruments, lute, theorbo
, mandolin
and baroque guitar
on recordings with some of the English pioneers of early music
of that time, such as David Munrow
with The Early Music Consort and Alfred Deller
with The Deller Consort.
From 1974 to 1990 Nigel North played in baroque operas, baroque orchestras and chamber groups and accompanied singers in concerts, participating in over 100 recordings. Notable groups and people with whom he has worked:
With Andrew Manze
(violin
) and John Toll (harpsichord
) he formed the ensemble Romanesca
in 1988; they played together for the next 10 years.
His solo lute debut was a Bach programme at the Wigmore Hall
in 1977; in 1985 he performed all of Bach's lute works for the first time in London. Numerous recitals and recordings followed and from 1984 to 2001 he toured worldwide.
He has made transcriptions for lute of Bach's solo violin works and solo cello suites
, which he has performed at the Wigmore Hall and recorded on a 4 CD set, Bach on the Lute (1994–1998). He has published an edition of these transcriptions for lute tablature
, classical guitar and staff notation.
Other notable recordings include the complete lute works of John Dowland
(4 CDs on Naxos Records
), and a series of CDs of music by 17th-century French lutenists.
Lute
Lute can refer generally to any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back, or more specifically to an instrument from the family of European lutes....
nist and guitarist
Classical guitar
The classical guitar is a 6-stringed plucked string instrument from the family of instruments called chordophones...
.
Student days
He studied guitar on a scholarship to the junior department of the Guildhall School of Music and DramaGuildhall School of Music and Drama
Guildhall School of Music and Drama is an independent music and dramatic arts school which was founded in 1880 in London, England. Students can pursue courses in Music, Opera, Drama and Technical Theatre Arts.-History:...
(1964–70), taking up the lute
Lute
Lute can refer generally to any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back, or more specifically to an instrument from the family of European lutes....
in 1969, at the age of 15. He maintains he was more or less self-taught on the instrument. He went on to study at the Royal College of Music
Royal College of Music
The Royal College of Music is a conservatoire founded by Royal Charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, England.-Background:The first director was Sir George Grove and he was followed by Sir Hubert Parry...
from 1971 to 1974: classical guitar
Classical guitar
The classical guitar is a 6-stringed plucked string instrument from the family of instruments called chordophones...
with John Williams
John Williams (guitarist)
John Christopher Williams is an Australian classical guitarist, and a long-term resident of the United Kingdom. In 1973, he shared a Grammy Award win in the 'Best Chamber Music Performance' category with Julian Bream for Julian and John .-Biography:John Williams was born on 24 April 1941 in...
and Carlos Bonell
Carlos Bonell
Carlos Bonell is an English guitarist of Spanish origin, famous for having given concerts in the most popular music as well as collaborating several times with British television stations and Film...
, viola da gamba with Francis Baines; lute (one term) with Diana Poulton
Diana Poulton
Diana Poulton was an English lutenist and musicologist. A leading member of the Early Music Revival and associate of Arnold Dolmetsch, she played a key role in the revival of the popularity of the lute and its music. She was married to the illustrator Tom Poulton.- References :*...
, qualifying in 1974 with an A.R.C.M. diploma in lute performance. He completed his studies on the postgraduate course in Early Music at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama 1975–1975 and with one month's study with baroque lutenist Michael Schäffer in 1976.
Teaching
Overlapping his student years, in 1975 he was appointed Professor of Lute at the Guildhall School for Music and Drama, a position he held until 1996. From 1993 to 1999 he was Professor of Historical Plucked Instruments at the Hochschule der KünsteBerlin University of the Arts
The Universität der Künste Berlin, UdK is a public art school in Berlin, Germany, one of the four universities in the city...
, Berlin, Germany. From January 1999 he has been Professor of Lute at the Early Music Institute, Jacobs School of Music
Jacobs School of Music
The Jacobs School of Music of Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, is a music conservatory established in 1921. Until 2005, it was known as the Indiana University School of Music...
, Indiana University
Indiana University
Indiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...
and, from January 2005, has taught the lute at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague
Royal Conservatory of The Hague
The Royal Conservatory of The Hague is a conservatorium of music, providing higher education in music and dance, it is located in The Hague, Netherlands.-The Conservatory:...
, Holland.
He has written the standard modern textbook on continuo
Figured bass
Figured bass, or thoroughbass, is a kind of integer musical notation used to indicate intervals, chords, and non-chord tones, in relation to a bass note...
playing on the lute and related instruments: (review)
The following textbook is in preparation:
- Lute and Early Guitar - a Performance Practice Handbook Original didactic sources from 1500 - c.1760, for lute and guitar. Sources in facsimile, with translations and full editorial comment; covering the working repertoire of a modern lutenist. It will be a book in which one may find the answers to performance practice questions taken directly from original sources.
Professional career
His recording life began in the mid-1970s; while studying at music college, he played violViol
The viol is any one of a family of bowed, fretted and stringed musical instruments developed in the mid-late 15th century and used primarily in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. The family is related to and descends primarily from the Renaissance vihuela, a plucked instrument that preceded the...
, cittern
Cittern
The cittern or cither is a stringed instrument dating from the Renaissance. Modern scholars debate its exact history, but it is generally accepted that it is descended from the Medieval Citole, or Cytole. It looks much like the modern-day flat-back mandolin and the modern Irish bouzouki and cittern...
, rebec
Rebec
The rebecha is a bowed string musical instrument. In its most common form, it has a narrow boat-shaped body and 1-5 strings and is played on the arm or under the chin, like a violin.- Origins :The rebec dates back to the Middle Ages and was particularly popular in the 15th and 16th centuries...
and violin
Violin
The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....
as well as his more usual instruments, lute, theorbo
Theorbo
A theorbo is a plucked string instrument. As a name, theorbo signifies a number of long-necked lutes with second pegboxes, such as the liuto attiorbato, the French théorbe des pièces, the English theorbo, the archlute, the German baroque lute, the angélique or angelica. The etymology of the name...
, mandolin
Mandolin
A mandolin is a musical instrument in the lute family . It descends from the mandore, a soprano member of the lute family. The mandolin soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections. A mandolin may have f-holes, or a single...
and baroque guitar
Baroque guitar
The Baroque guitar is a guitar from the baroque era , an ancestor of the modern classical guitar. The term is also used for modern instruments made in the same style....
on recordings with some of the English pioneers of early music
Early music
Early music is generally understood as comprising all music from the earliest times up to the Renaissance. However, today this term has come to include "any music for which a historically appropriate style of performance must be reconstructed on the basis of surviving scores, treatises,...
of that time, such as David Munrow
David Munrow
David Munrow was a British musician and early music historian.- Biography and career :Munrow was born in Birmingham and was the son of Birmingham University dance teacher Hilda Norman Munrow and Albert Davis 'Dave' Munrow, a Birmingham University lecturer and physical education instructor who...
with The Early Music Consort and Alfred Deller
Alfred Deller
Alfred George Deller CBE , was an English singer and one of the main figures in popularizing the return of the countertenor voice in Renaissance and Baroque music during the 20th Century....
with The Deller Consort.
From 1974 to 1990 Nigel North played in baroque operas, baroque orchestras and chamber groups and accompanied singers in concerts, participating in over 100 recordings. Notable groups and people with whom he has worked:
- The English ConcertThe English ConcertThe English Concert is a baroque orchestra playing on period instruments based in London. Founded in 1972 and directed from the harpsichord by Trevor Pinnock for 30 years, it is now directed by harpsichordist Harry Bicket...
(Trevor PinnockTrevor PinnockTrevor David Pinnock CBE is an English conductor, harpsichordist, and occasional organist and pianist.He is best known for his association with the period-performance orchestra The English Concert which he helped found and directed from the keyboard for over 30 years in baroque and early classical...
) - The Academy of Ancient Music (Christopher HogwoodChristopher HogwoodChristopher Jarvis Haley Hogwood CBE, MA , HonMusD , born 10 September 1941, Nottingham, is an English conductor, harpsichordist, writer and musicologist, well known as the founder of the Academy of Ancient Music.-Biography:...
) - The Brandenburg Consort (Roy GoodmanRoy GoodmanRoy Goodman is a conductor and violinist, specialising in the performance and direction of early music...
) - Orchestra of the Age of EnlightenmentOrchestra of the Age of EnlightenmentThe Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment is a British period instrument orchestra. The OAE is a resident orchestra of the Southbank Centre, London, associate orchestra at Glyndebourne Festival Opera and has its headquarters at Kings Place...
(Rene Jacobs) - Red Byrd
- FretworkFretworkFretwork is an interlaced decorative design that is either carved in low relief on a solid background, or cut out with a fretsaw, coping saw, jigsaw or scroll saw. Most fretwork patterns are geometric in design. The materials most commonly used are wood and metal. Fretwork is used to adorn...
- London Baroque
- Peter PearsPeter PearsSir Peter Neville Luard Pears CBE was an English tenor who was knighted in 1978. His career was closely associated with the composer Edward Benjamin Britten....
(Aldeburgh FestivalAldeburgh FestivalThe Aldeburgh Festival is an English arts festival devoted mainly to classical music. It takes place each June in the Aldeburgh area of Suffolk, centred on the main concert hall at Snape Maltings...
, 1976) - James Bowman
- Michael ChanceMichael ChanceMichael Chance CBE is an English countertenor.Chance was born in Penn, Buckinghamshire, into a musical family. After growing up as a chorister he attended Eton College, Berkshire, and later King's College, Cambridge...
- Nancy ArgentaNancy ArgentaNancy Maureen Argenta is a Canadian soprano singer, best known for performing music from the pre-classical era. She has won international acclaim, and is considered by many as the leading Handel soprano of her time.She was born in Nelson, British Columbia, Canada...
- Emma KirkbyEmma KirkbyDame Carolyn Emma Kirkby, DBE is an English soprano singer and one of the world's most renowned early music specialists. She attended Sherborne School For Girls in Dorset and was a classics student at Somerville College, Oxford, and an English teacher before developing a career as a soloist...
With Andrew Manze
Andrew Manze
Andrew Manze is an English violinist and conductor.As a guest conductor Manze has regular relationships with a number of leading international orchestras including the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Munich Philharmonic, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra,...
(violin
Baroque violin
A baroque violin is, in common usage, any violin whose neck, fingerboard, bridge, and tailpiece are of the type used during the baroque period. Such an instrument may be an original built during the baroque and never changed to modern form; or a modern replica built as a baroque violin; or an...
) and John Toll (harpsichord
Harpsichord
A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
) he formed the ensemble Romanesca
Romanesca
Romanesca was a song form popular in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. It was most popular with Italian composers of the early Baroque period...
in 1988; they played together for the next 10 years.
His solo lute debut was a Bach programme at the Wigmore Hall
Wigmore Hall
Wigmore Hall is a leading international recital venue that specialises in hosting performances of chamber music and is best known for classical recitals of piano, song and instrumental music. It is located at 36 Wigmore Street, London, UK and was built to provide London with a venue that was both...
in 1977; in 1985 he performed all of Bach's lute works for the first time in London. Numerous recitals and recordings followed and from 1984 to 2001 he toured worldwide.
He has made transcriptions for lute of Bach's solo violin works and solo cello suites
Cello Suites (Bach)
The Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello by Johann Sebastian Bach are some of the most performed and recognizable solo compositions ever written for cello...
, which he has performed at the Wigmore Hall and recorded on a 4 CD set, Bach on the Lute (1994–1998). He has published an edition of these transcriptions for lute tablature
Tablature
Tablature is a form of musical notation indicating instrument fingering rather than musical pitches....
, classical guitar and staff notation.
Other notable recordings include the complete lute works of John Dowland
John Dowland
John Dowland was an English Renaissance composer, singer, and lutenist. He is best known today for his melancholy songs such as "Come, heavy sleep" , "Come again", "Flow my tears", "I saw my Lady weepe" and "In darkness let me dwell", but his instrumental music has undergone a major revival, and has...
(4 CDs on Naxos Records
Naxos Records
Naxos Records is a record label specializing in classical music. Through a number of imprints, Naxos also releases genres including Chinese music, jazz, world music, and early rock & roll. The company was founded in 1987 by Klaus Heymann, a German-born resident of Hong Kong.Naxos is the largest...
), and a series of CDs of music by 17th-century French lutenists.
Published editions of lute music
- Oxford University PressOxford University PressOxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
Lute Series - Lute Music by William ByrdWilliam ByrdWilliam Byrd was an English composer of the Renaissance. He wrote in many of the forms current in England at the time, including various types of sacred and secular polyphony, keyboard and consort music.-Provenance:Knowledge of Byrd's biography expanded in the late 20th century, thanks largely...
(Volume 6), 1976 - Lute and Bandora Music by Alfonso Ferrabosco (Volume 8), 1979, Stainer and Bell
- Tablature for 2 Lutes Volumes 1 and 2 (English Renaissance Treble and Ground Duets), 1983, Faber Music/Indiana University Press
- Varietie of Lute Lessons, Robert DowlandRobert DowlandRobert Dowland , son of composer John Dowland, was an English lutenist and composer. He was the author of two collections of music - "A Varietie of Lute Lessons" and "A Musical Banquet". He succeeded his father as royal lutenist in 1626....
's anthology of 1610 (in preparation).
Sources
- Stephen Haynes: 'North, Nigel', Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed 2007-05-06),
- 'North, Nigel', Hutchinson Encyclopedia of Britain, Helicon Publishing, March 2005
External links
- http://www.nigelnorth.com/ - personal website
- Linn Records: Nigel North
- Indiana University: Nigel North