Some simple Tudor strums with ersatz elaborations
There is very little extant Renaissance guitar music written in England, but in The Osborn Commonplace Book there are a number of pages dedicated to the instrument. I have previously blogged most of them here (in revised format). For the sake of completeness here are three more.
Having complained in an earlier post about the lack of a discernible melody in song intabulations by Le Roy, I now (inconsistently) present these rare but minimal pieces.
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| Two simple galliard strums from The Osborn Commonplace Book, f. 47r A bit like a fake book, but without the melody. |
Basically, the first two pieces are a pair of simple strums entitled "gallyard", possibly to a melody or dance which we do not have. In transcription I have followed the original manuscript closely, and presume that the syncopations across bars are what was intended. (The bar-lines in the MS refer, I think, to sections of the original air or verse.) I used stem directions to make for clear reading rather than to represent different voices – though the first string may contain an echo of the original airs.
The modern ukulele player will find the chord shapes reassuringly familiar. There is often no attempt to root the chords, which implies strumming: you presumably bashed away to your heart's content.
They do, however, make thin pickings for the ukulele player, so I have presumptuously added some variations to the first two (the galliards), along the lines of Le Roy's elaborations in the previous post . All a bit of fun, but they are quite playable. Have a go!
Note added 10/7/2020. The day after I made this post, a copy of John M Ward's Cheerful and Sprightly Musick dropped through the letterbox. I hadn't realised it, but the book contains transcriptions of all the Osborn guitar pieces. Brilliant!
It transpires that Ward barred these galliards not in constant 6/4 time, but in a mixture of 3/4 and 6/4. This format certainly skips round the syncopation across bars in the 6/4 version. For the uber-geek I have added a link below to a pdf file showing the two transcription styles. Something to get my head round.
Analysis
First galliard (No. 10)
The harmonic structure is simple and in the key of C major, using I, II, IV, V:C G C F / C | G / D G / / | C G C F / C | C G / C / / |
C C F C / / | G / D G / / | C / F C / G | G C / C / / ||
These are the chords of the passamezzo moderno ground, but in a different order.
See my blog on Renaissance grounds (chord sequences).
Second galliard (No. 11)
Again, simple harmonies (I, (IV), V, vi, ♭VII),:C / G C / / | G C G B♭ / / | B♭ / / C / / | G Am* / G / / |
C / G C / / | G C G B♭ / / | B♭ / / C / / | C G / C / / |
C / F C / G | F G / C / / ||
[Am* indicates a harmonic movement that may be parsed as Am7 Am6 in modern terminology: quite unexpected in such a simple strum.]
The harmony moves unexpectedly (to modern ears) into B♭ (♭VII), which is typical of the passamezzo antico, although it doesn't follow that pattern.
Verse setting (No. 6, no title)
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| A rather more complex strum from same MS. |
For this piece I had the luxury of transcribing for ukulele with the aid of Page’s version for modern guitar (in The Guitar in Tudor England, pp 143 – 4, see Resources page), which certainly helped with reading the cramped calligraphy of the MS and getting the timings sorted.
Page has reconstructed a three part vocal original; I have indicated the presumed melody notes by upward stems and by highlighting them in yellow, although they are somewhat confused during the decorated cadences in bars 7 and 15. He also shows how the instrumental part can fit a popular Tudor verse form and also be used as a setting for metrical psalms.
The harmonies are:
F | A F | Am F | C | C | G Am | E | A | A // …
Am | G Em | Dm | C G | Am Dm | G | A | D | D ||
It is evident that the second half, resolving in A major, does not really reflect the first half, which resolves in D major. The only explanation that I can see is that the final D is the major form of Dm, the relative minor of the first chord, F. If the D is due to the application of the tierce de Picardie then the home key may be Dm.
This gives us the chord set: i, I, ii, II, III, IV, v, V, VII. Phew!
Downloads
A compilation of the three pieces is free to download in the following formats:
Also, a concordance of the two setting possibilities can be found here.
