From the London-based viol ensemble Fretwork comes an unusual but most wondrous program called “Birds on Fire: Jewish Music for Viols.” With the help of tenor Jeremy Avis, and playing on an assortment of Renaissance and Elizabethan viols, Fretwork seeks to illustrate the cosmopolitan atmosphere that sustained musical creation at the Tudor and Stuart courts.
Although Jews had been banished from England since 1290, the Italian-Jewish Bassano and Lupo families became veritable composing dynasties, dominating music at court for the best part of a century between 1550 and 1650. Some of the composers will be more familiar than others (in particular, Salamone Rossi), but the playing is so exquisite that you may want to indulge yourself in what is really both a musical and a cultural fantasy. The recital is bracingly interrupted at three points by British composer Orlando Gough’s Birds of Fire, paying tribute to the viol music with decidedly contemporary klezmer echoes.
The sound is rich in tawny texture with a wonderfully evocative sense of ambience. After more than 30 years as a standard-setting label, nobody does viols better than Harmonia mundi.
TrackList:
1. Birds on Fire – Orlando Gough
2. The Songs of Solomon: Hashkiveinu – Salomone Rossi
3. Lumley books: Desperada no 1 – Anonymous
4. Lumley books: Pavana – Anonymous
5. Lumley books: Galliard(s) – Anonymous / Traditional
6. Lumley books: Desperada no 2 – Anonymous
7. Lumley books: Pavin and Gallyard of Albarti: Pavin – Albert Kellim
8. Lumley books: Pavin and Gallyard of Albarti: Gallyard – Albert Kellim
9. Lumley books: Desperada no 3 – Anonymous
10. Sinfonias (7) for 5 Viols: no 5 – Leonora Duarte
11. Sinfonias (7) for 5 Viols: no 6 – Leonora Duarte
12. Fantasia à 6 no 1 – Thomas Lupo
13. Birds on Fire – Orlando Gough
14. Fantasia – Philip Van Wilder
15. Pavan à 3 no 26 – Thomas Lupo
16. Fantasia à 4 no 5 – Thomas Lupo
17. Fantasia à 6 no 9 – Thomas Lupo
18. Pavan and Galliard no 1: Pavan – Augustine Bassano
19. Pavan and Galliard no 1: Galliard – Augustine Bassano
20. Fantasia à 5 no 1 – Hieronymo Bassano
21. Pavan à 5 – Joseph Lupo
22. Fantasia à 6 no 4 – Thomas Lupo
23. Fantasia à 6 no 11 – Thomas Lupo
24. Birds on Fire – Orlando Gough
25. The Songs of Solomon: Shir lamma’alot, essa einai – Salomone Rossi
– Laurence Vittes
