Daily entries from the 17th century London diary
If you would like to write a summary for this topic, email phil [at] gyford [dot] com
Cavalier Ballads
“The Cavalier Songs and Ballads of England from 1642 to 1684” edited by Charles Mackay is available online in at least two different formats.
The best way (I’ve seen) to browse through it is to go to the Project Gutenberg edition (scanned and proofed by David Price, online since September 1997):
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=1030
Difficulties with this version are that it’s all on one page, with all footnotes on the bottom.
Songs are on individual pages at the following website, but they’re all mixed up with songs from other historical periods, so browsing is much more involved. But if you know the song you want, it’s easier to read here and the footnotes are on the same, brief, individual web page:
Index page — Songs of England
http://www.acronet.net/~robokopp/english.html
This site also has Mackay’s introduction here:
http://www.acronet.net/~robokopp/english.html
An example of another sort of music that Pepys would have been familiar with from ‘Early English Books Online’:
This is from ‘Ayres and dialogues, for one, two, and three voyces by Heny Lawes, 1596-1662. London : Printed by T. H. for John Playford 1653’
The left hand page has the tune and a bass part that could be played on either a viol or lute. It would possible for one person to both sing the tune and accompany themselves. (This is what Pepys was doing on 18th February 1660 http://www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1660/02/18/index.php) Experienced players would know how to fill in the harmony. If more singers were available then the right hand page has has a second voice harmonising with the tune and a third part for bass voice. The second voice part is printed upside down so that it can be read easily when the singers are sitting round a table with the music laid on it.
The text is:
Once Venus cheeks that sham’d the morn. her hew let fall;
her Lips that Winter had out-born, in June look’d pale;
her Heat grew cold, her Nectar dry,
no Dew she had but in her Eye,
the wonted fire and flames to mortifie.
When was this so dismal sight?
When Adonis bad Good-night.
Tom and Dick
[Repost of another interesting political ballad, also from Roger Miller for 28 March, 1660:]
This is the text of the Drapers
A multi-media weblog of Christopher Schaub’s Renaissance lute & voice practice, including a new piece of music recorded and posted daily. The music was recorded live, on the day of the post, in Chris’ apartment. Not polished, but a work in progress.
Ballad that Pepys probably heard:
http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/ballads/ballads.htm
and famous music from his time:
http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/ballads/ballads.htm
All at the site of the Bodleian Library at Oxford University
Music and ballads published about General Monck, the Rump Parliament, King Charles II, etc. See at the Bodleian this enormous and exhaustive archive, the best I ever saw in my entire life:
http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/ballads/ballads.htm
A link working as of Jan 05 to a sampling of Sam’s song, Beauty Retire:
http://www.emusic.com/album/10592/10592276.html
There is a good web page on “English Song in the Elizabethan and Stuart Periods” at
http://www.hoasm.org/IVM/EnglSongGuide.html
with a good list of more than forty composers to the left. This includes a few I didn’t know (despite all the renaissance songbooks that have circulated in my otherwise musical family).
MUSIC FOR MANY MIGHTY MADRIGALS
PDF file versions of many of the transcriptions of these songs are
available by clicking on the individual
composer’s name from this page
http://www.oldmusicproject.com/madrigals.html
and then clicking on the song title.
Pepys Ballads
“In organizing his ballads, Pepys came up with categories which seemed to him to reflect the groupings of the broadsides that he had collected. Volume 1 of the five volumes is assumed mainly to consist of the ballads gathered by John Selden, whose collection Pepys purchased to begin his own, and the following essays survey the ballads included in Volume 1. As the archive expands, trends in the later volumes will be analyzed.”
http://emc.english.ucsb.edu/ballad_project/pepys_categories/index.asp
Pepys ballads - Facsimile Transcriptions
150+ ballad lyrics transcribed
http://emc.english.ucsb.edu/ballad_project/transcriptions/index.asp
Some contemporary music…
Jeremy Barlow & the Broadside Band:
http://www.broadsideband.co.uk/asx/JB005.asx
More samples on:
http://www.broadsideband.co.uk/Recordings.htm
Diary link:
http://www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1663/07/06/#c54144
The Pepys Ballads sung a cappela
scroll down and click on the “Song” of your choice - uses Quick Time Player.
http://emc.english.ucsb.edu/ballad_project/sample_songs/index.asp
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