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EARLY MUSIC REVIEW
The Odhecaton's Big 500th
January 13, 2001
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By Michael Zwiebach
On Saturday night at St. Alban's Episcopal Church in Albany, Hausmusik gathered a
pickup group together to celebrate a 500th anniversary. It was not
an individual being feted but a book, the Harmonices musices
Odhecaton, the first-ever print publication of music. The concert
brought together several accomplished artists in a wide-ranging program,
under-rehearsed in part.
The Odhecaton consists of ninety-six pieces and, together with its companion
volumes of secular songs, designated Canti B (1503) and Canti C (1504),
constitutes a major source for music of the so-called Franco-Flemish school
(including that Renaissance superstar, Josquin Desprez.) Like Gutenberg's
Bible, the Odhecaton's importance goes far beyond the repertory it preserves.
It inaugurated a print culture that rapidly affected and changed every
imaginable area of music production and performance. In time, the printing
revolution led to the creation and dissemination of wholly new genres, such
as the broadsheet ballad. As historical anniversaries go, then, this is a big
one.
The concert program organized the selections from the books into groups of
secular songs, a set of pieces based on a popular dance, La Spagna,
and finally, the Sanctus of Jacob Obrecht's Missa Cela Sans Plus, together
with the tune it is based on. The conceit was that these sets represented a
summer day's music at a lord and lady's country seat. The mixed consort
included vielle-player Shira Kammen, whose effervescent musical personality
brightened the proceedings considerably, lutenist David Tayler, Frances
Feldon on recorders and tenor viol, and Roy Whelden on bass viol.
Mezzo-soprano Suzanne Elder Wallace performed the vocal items.
The artists chose several beautiful and various songs with artful polyphonic accompaniments for the first set. These ranged from the roguishly witty "Shackles of Venus, burning fire!..." to the elegant "My mouth laughs and my heart weeps." Elder Wallace was perfectly in tune in the songs, technically adept and mindful of rhythm. Adding occasional variety to her delivery, she mixed in a thin, tight vibrato but for all that a somewhat uninvolved soloist, rarely looking up from her music to communicate anything of the words. The consort players, while adding warm support, also sounded constrained when they struck out on their own, as if unsure of their partners. In consequence, the instrumental numbers were a mixed bag. When they hit on all cylinders, as in "Sur le pont d'Avignon," the music floated on delicate currents. An improvisation on La Spagna, on the other hand, was less successful, and apart from a few divisions, was curiously unadventuresome and bound to the tune. Tayler's lute solos were high points, delivered with a nonchalant sprezzatura and expressiveness that cleaned the aural palate for further draughts of polyphony. The final part of the concert, the Mass movement, featured Kammen and Tayler who added their voices to Elder Wallace's while continuing to play their instruments. While this option (adopted by necessity) certainly displayed the musicians' virtuosity, the effect was of three highly individual voices, a little uncoordinated and only Elder Wallace maintaining a firm sense of line. The movement could have used direction. Still, as concert-parties commemorating the Odhecaton may be few and far between this year, the reader is advised to look one up, if the chance arises. This one was good fun. (Michael Zwiebach holds a Ph D in musicology from UC Berkeley, specializing in opera, and is a lecturer for the San Francisco Opera. ) ©2001 Michael Zwiebach, all rights reserved |