La Contenance Angloise: The English Influence on Franco-Flemish Renaissance Music
December 13, 2015
The Ann Arbor Grail Singers presented an unusual concert on La Contenance Angloise: The English Influence on Franco-Flemish Renaissance Music. Directed by Carmen Cavallaro, the 16-voice women’s choir was accompanied by Marilyn Fung, viola da gamba; Gail Arnold, bray harp; Beth Gilford, recorder; and Laura Crytzer, sackbut.
The concert included works by Dunstable and Dufay, as well as other English and Flemish composers transitioning from the Late Middle Ages into the Early Renaissance. Psalms and motets were punctuated by Gregorian chants, and the choir was joined by guest soprano Deborah Friauff for Dufay’s lament on the loss of Constantinople in 1453.
La Contenance Angloise, the English Manner, is a distinctive style of polyphony developed in fifteenth-century England. A phrase coined by French poet Martin le Franc, the Contenance referred to a characteristically English sound found in the music of composers such as John Dunstable, which greatly influenced the major Burgundian composers Guillaume Dufay and Gilles Binchois. Its full, rich harmonies were popular in the fashionable Burgundian court of Philip the Good, and as a result influenced European music of the era in general.
Domenico Scarlatti: Vocal Masterpieces
May 22, 2016
The Ann Arbor Grail Singers presented an unusual concert of the music of Domenico Scarlatti. The choir was accompanied by Mary Riccardi and Daniel Foster, Baroque violin; Linda Speck, viola; Jocelyn Schendel, cello; and Anne Crawford, chamber organ.
Although Scarlatti is best known today for his 555 keyboard sonatas, he composed in a variety of forms including operas, cantatas, and sacred music. Featured in this performance were his Misa de Madrid, a setting of the Magnificat, and two versions of Salve Regina: one for female choir and the other sung by guest mezzo-soprano Deborah Malamud, accompanied by a string quartet.
Domenico Scarlatti was born in Naples in 1685, the same year as Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel. He was the sixth of ten children of the composer Alessandro Scarlatti. Although he spent much of his life in the service of the Portuguese and Spanish royal families, Scarlatti also worked in Rome from 1709 – 1719. While in Rome, he is said to have competed with Handel in a trial of skill where he was judged superior to Handel as a harpsichord player, although inferior on the organ.