ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE 2024

Projects on the Topic of Ornamentation in the Early and Late Baroque Eras

Accenti

Hannah Ely, voice · Harry Buckoke, viol

Cascata

Despite Caccini’s cautions to the contrary, English sources of his music contain some of the most florid examples of vocal ornamentation ever notated. These pieces share pages with »Englished« versions of famous Italian works and new pieces by composers such as Lanier, Webb and Wilson. Cascata explores the Italian influence and distinctly English style of these almost forgotten works.

Accenti wish to delve deeper into how this florid English approach to the new rhetorical musical style coming out of Italy created a unique regional sound. Through our residency we hope to meticulously explore these works comparing how the ornamentation style differs from earlier Italian diminution treatises and how the embellishment of the English language inspired new contours within the music.

The vocal works in our programme are also rare examples with written accompaniments for lyra viol. Due to the limitations of the instrument these intabulations notate ornamental techniques which embellish the material by working with the resonance of the instrument to create the sense of multiple voices or dividing longer notes into cascades of scales and arpeggios that describe the harmony. Lyra viol technique is often contrasted with division viol technique however 17th century sources suggest the interaction between these approaches was more prevalent than we acknowledge today. Approaching the repertoire from this angle means we can learn from these valuable examples and understand them better through treatises such as Christopher Simpson’s Division Viol (1659), we hope to reconstruct some of the techniques rich and rarely performed practice of singing to the viol.

We aim to perform a programme that showcases the gems of this repertoire alongside our own diminutions and intabulations we incorporate this style into our own music making.