Faye Newton soprano
Pamela Thorby recorder
Susanna Pell viol
Jacob Heringman lute
Inspired by, and reflecting, the combination of instruments shown in Titian's painting entitled “Venus and Cupid with a Lute Player” (1555-65) on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge,  a programme of Italian Renaissance vocal and instrumental music will be performed by members of the Northern Early Music Collective on Saturday 30 April at 7.15 pm.
 
This marvellous painting is of particular interest from a musical point of view, in that it presents clear and realistic depictions of mid sixteenth-century instruments and musical part books.  The programme takes these elements as a starting point, and centres on Italian (mainly Venetian) secular music of the sixteenth century, with special emphasis on love songs and on the repertoire of the middle of the century, the time in which the painting was created, by composers including Verdelot, Willaert, Ganassi, Ortiz and Arcadelt. 
 
Tickets: £25, £20 (concessions and Friends of The Fitzwilliam Museum) including pre-concert refreshments available from 01223 332904 or by emailing education@fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk.

This concert is promoted in partnership with The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge and will be performed in front of the painting.

​L’ENTENTE CORDIALE
RICHARD BOOTHBY & CHRISTOPHE COIN
bass viols
 
If the sound of one bass viol was considered full and complete, then two of them is an embarrassment of riches. Yet this combination was popular first here in England, home to some of the first great virtuosos of the instrument, including Matthew Locke, Christopher Simpson and M de Ste Colombe, and then across the channel, just as the fashion for it waned in England, providing a continuity of music from Ferrabosco to Couperin.  Join two of Europe's finest virtuoso instrumentalists, Christophe Coin and Richard Boothby, on 19 March for this special programme of Anglo-French music which explores the two sides of this sometimes complex, musically fascinating partnership.  
 
Programme
 
Matthew Locke - Duo for two bass viols in C major/minor
Fantazy, Fantazy, Courante, Fantazy, Fantazy, Sarabande
 
Christopher Simpson - Duo in F major
 
Locke - Duo for two bass viols in D major/minor
Fantazy, Fantazy, Courante, Fantazy, Fantazy, Sarabande

Simpson - Duo in G major
 
INTERVAL
 
Jean de Ste Colombe - Concert X: Les Couplets
[Chaconne], Bergeronette preste
 
François Couperin - Douzième Concert
pointé-coulé; Badinage; Lentement, et patétiquement, Air
 
Ste Colombe - Concert LI: Rougeville
Rougeville; Gigue; Sarabande; En gavote; En gigue; Menuet; Pianelle; Chacone de Rougeville 

​This concert is part of the 2016 European Day of Early Music celebrations organised by the European Early Music Network (REMA).
http://earlymusicday.eu

SATURDAY 19 MARCH 2016, 7.30pm
ST BENE’T’S CHURCH, CAMBRIDGE, CB2 3PT
 
Book online using our Events Calendar.

Cambridge Early Music
2016 Summer Schools: 31 July – 13 August

Join us as we follow the trail of Spanish music through the sixteenth century, from the Cancionero via villancicos and vihuela-songs by Narvaez and Mudarra, motets by Guerrero and Morales, and the monumental six-part Requiem by Victoria to the polychoral works of the eighteenth century by Franciso Valls and José de Nebra.

​Details & booking: www.CambridgeEarlyMusic.org/summer-schools

As a preliminary to their afternoon concert as part of our 2016 Festival of the Voice, the Three Medieval Tenors join us to direct a workshop for singers (all voices, tenors and basses particularly welcome) to develop a fuller understanding of medieval music in general and the conductus in particular.  The workshop will be led by Mark Everist from the University of Southampton and is designed to give students an insight into how these Latin songs were created and how they can be performed in the light of the very latest research.  

The workshop will begin with an orientation session describing the repertoires, their functions and styles and their historical context (tailored to the interests and abilities of the attendees).  The core practical activities will include the creation of a solo conductus from poetry supplied at the workshop, the reading and writing of medieval notation and modern transcriptions, and coaching in key aspects of performance practice.  The latter will include sessions on tuning and ensemble singing (with particular focus on how to sing in up to three parts without conventional metrical rhythm).

It is designed to appeal to enthusiastic amateur musicians as well as aspiring professionals.  All workshop materials will be provided on the day, preparation is not required.

For more information, click here.  

To celebrate the launch of their latest CD, Magnificat brings to life compositions inspired by Girolamo Savonarola, the 15th-century Dominican friar who preached passionately for political, social and spiritual reform in Florence. Savonarola’s followers stoked the famous “Bonfires of the Vanities” burning art, books and other “worldly” items. His outspoken criticisms of Pope Alexander VI ultimately led to Savonarola’s excommunication, imprisonment, admission of heresy under torture, and execution.

Amongst the “vanities” Savonarola decried was over-elaborate sacred music, yet Savonarola had a long-lasting – if inadvertent – musical influence after his death. His writings inspired some of the greatest compositions of the 16th century, including Josquin’s exquisite Miserere mei, Deus and Byrd’s masterpiece Infelix ego.

Friday 26 February 2016, 7.30pm
Emmanuel United Reformed Church, Cambridge, CB2 1RR

Tickets available through our Events Calendar.

Programme:
​Ecce quam bonum - attr. to Nicolas Gombert (c.1495-c.1560)
Missa Ecce quam bonum: Kyrie & Gloria in excelsis - Jean Mouton (1459-1522)
Laetamini in Domino - Philippe Verdelot (1475-1552)
Missa Ecce quam bonum: Sanctus, Benedictus, Agnus Dei I & II - Jean Mouton

INTERVAL (20 mins) - refreshments served

Miserere mei - Josquin des Prez (c.1450-1521)
Tribularer si nescirem - Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (c.1525-1594)
Tristitia obsedit me - Claude LeJeune (c.1528/30-1600)
Infelix ego - William Byrd (c.1540-1623)

Our prestigious 2016 Festival of the Voice will run between Thursday 12 – Sunday 15 May.  It will showcase many of the world's finest early music artists including: Vox Luminis, Voces8, The Gesualdo Six, Three Medieval Tenors and James Gilchrist, who will perform an eclectic range of music from medieval Conductus, Monteverdi, Lassus, Bach, Schubert and many others in some of Cambridge’s most beautiful and historic venues.

Highlights:
VOX LUMINIS
LIGHT & SHADOW: Music at the time of Elizabeth I
The award-winning Belgium vocal ensemble Vox Luminis explores the rich heritage of music from the Protestant tradition and showcases some of the finest polyphonic masters from the era, including Tallis, Sheppard, Morley, Ramsey and Weelkes.
Thursday 12 May at 8.00pm, St John’s College Chapel, Cambridge
 
VOCES8
BACH MOTETS
Bach’s motets are considered to be amongst his greatest output both as artistic works and technical showcases. In this concert, four motets are programmed alongside music by Giovannii Gabrieli, Praetorius and Felix Mendelssohn, who was instrumental in the revival of Bach’s music.
Friday 13 May at 7.30pm, Trinity College Chapel, Cambridge

Full programme details are available at www.cambridgeearlymusic.org/festival-of-the-voice.

Book your tickets now using our Events Calendar.  

Please note that we will be closed for Christmas from 19 December 2015 and will reopen on Thursday 7 January 2016.

From all the team at Cambridge Early Music, we hope you have a happy Christmas and New Year!  

Piero della Francesca, The Nativity​ (1470-5)

Peter Holman (course director & continuo), Judy Tarling (upper strings), Mark Caudle (lower strings), Gail Hennessy (wind), Philip Thorby (voices)
 
Join us for a celebration of the riches of Spanish Baroque music. The main pieces studied in this year’s course will be the magnificent Missa Scala Aretina (1702) by the Barcelona composer Franciso Valls (c.1672-1747), famous at the time for its ground-breaking dissonances, and the Requiem Mass written by José de Nebra (1702-68), written in 1758 in memory of the Portuguese queen Maria Barbara. Both are richly scored in the polychoral Spanish manner for several groups of singers and orchestra. During the course and the associated concerts we will study and perform a range of music written in Spain itself and its possessions, Naples, the southern Netherlands and the New World, by Joan Cererols, Sebastián Durón, José de Torres, Alessandro & Domenico Scarlatti, Francesco Durante and Leonardo Leo and others.

Philip Thorby (course director & choir), David Hatcher (viols), Emma Murphy (recorders), Lynda Sayce (lutes), Frances Eustace (loud winds)
 
Ferdinand of Aragón and Isabella of Castile ruled jointly over Spain after their marriage in 1469.  It was their sometimes brutal defence of their faith which led Pope Alexander VI in 1494 to grant them the title “Los Reyes Catolicos”. The flavour of the court - in turn pious, romantic and bawdy - is captured perfectly in the words and music of the court song-book, the Cancionero Musical de Palacio, which is the natural starting point for our week's study. We will follow the trail of Spanish music through the sixteenth century as it leads us from Spain itself to elsewhere in Europe, from the Cancionero via villancicos and vihuela-songs by Narvaez and Mudarra and motets by Guerrero and Morales to the monumental six-part  Requiem (or Offitium Defunctorum) by Victoria.
 
For full details and booking information, please see our Summer School pages.

Ring in Christmas and the New Year in style with Joglaresa and chase out the chill from the Celtic fringes of Europe with traditional carols, lullabies, dances tunes and wassails from Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales.  

Belinda Sykes voice, bagpipes
Sianed Jones fidel, voice
Angela Hicks voice, harp
May Robertson fidel, voice
Louise Anna Duggan percussion, dulcimer, voice
Guy Schalom percussion
 
FRIDAY 18 DECEMBER 2015, 7.30pm
GREAT ST MARY’S CHURCH, CAMBRIDGE, CB2 3PQ

Book tickets using our Events Calendar.
 
“Thrilling and haunting” – The Times
“Sound scholarship, a combined experience of many musical cultures, and a spirited delivery of stories” – Early Music Today
“I was blown away by their charm and originality” – The Scotsman

PROGRAMME
On Christmas Night  Traditional, England
Cuncti simus concanentes  Llibre Vermell de Montserrat, Spain C14th
Now Bring Us in Good Ale  C15th England
As I in Hoary Winter’s Night  Robert Southwell (1561 - 1595)
Wel dyma'r bore i gyd  Traditional, Wales
Nova stella apparita  Laudario di Firenze, Italy C14th
Angelus emittitur  Piae Cantiones, C16th Scandinavia
Ebbas Brudpolska (instrumental)  Ola Bäckström, b. 1959
In dulci jubilo  Piae Cantiones, C16th Scandinavia
Ave donna santissima  Laudario di Cortona, Italy C13th
Orientis partibus  C13th France
  
INTERVAL
 
The Boar’s Head (instrumental realisation)  C16th England
Personent hodie  Piae Cantiones, C16th Scandinavia
Puer nobis nascitur (instrumental realisation)  Piae Cantiones, C16th Scandinavia
Gabryell that angell bryght  C15th England
The Boar’s Head  C16th England
The Gower Wassail  Traditional wassail from The Gower Peninsular
Sola fusti senlleira  Cantiga de Santa Maria, C13th Spain
Li lai de la pastourelle (instrumental realisation)  C13th France
Beata divites  Anonymous medieval parody of the Beatitudes
Veritas  Roman de Fauvel, France C14th
Down in yon Forest  C16th England, Traditional Appalachian
Magno gaudens gaudio  C13th England

New research has uncovered the earliest known practical piece of polyphonic music, an example of the principles that laid the foundations of European musical tradition.  The piece was discovered by Giovanni Varelli, a PhD student from St John’s College, University of Cambridge, while he was working on an internship at the British Library.  For more information, click here.