n Little Middle Ages
Notes
'n Little Middle Ages' was composed for Sirinu and is inspired by the essay 'Dreaming of the Middle Ages' by Umberto Eco (1986). Under the sub-title 'Ten Little Middle Ages', he describes ten ways in which the Middle Ages have been recreated, reimagined or re-contextualised, referencing many examples from art, literature, music and philosophy as he does so.
Performance notes
This piece takes the form of ten meditations on a medieval theme, each of which evokes one of Eco's examples. It may be performed in its entirety or as a set of selections, using the appropriate substitution for 'n' to correspond to the number of meditations performed (e.g. 'Three Little Middle Ages' would comprise the theme and any three of the meditations, performed in any order). If only one of them is to be performed, then it may be given its subtitle only and performed without the theme. Otherwise, the theme should be performed first and then the chosen meditations.
Sirinu's instrumental line-up is as follows:
- Sara - soprano, organ, pipe and tabor, tambourine
- Lewis - countertenor, fiddle, citole, tam-tam or gong
- Kira - shawm, recorders (descant, treble, tenor), bells (diatonic, one octave, on G)
- Jon - harp, hammered dulcimer, drums (high, medium, low)
- Matthew - lute, hurdy gurdy, alto voice.
Texts
Theme
Scored for: soprano, countertenor, harp and hurdy gurdy.
Text source: lyrics from Planctus David super Saul et Ionatha (c. 1130) by Peter Abelard.
Dolorum solatium laborum remedium mea michi cithara, nunc quo maior dolor est iustiorque meror est plus est necessaria. […] raucis planctu vocibus deficit et spiritus.
Translation by Peter Petic (1997):
As a consolation for sorrow as a healing for distress my harp for me – now that sorrow is heaviest and sadness most fitting – becomes more than necessary. […] my voice is hoarse from lamenting and my breath, too, is ceasing.
1. Pretext
Scored for: soprano, tambourine, fiddle, treble recorder, hammered dulcimer, lute.
Eco note: “The Middle Ages are taken as a sort of mythological stage...”
Text source: lyrics from Jerusalem Delivered (1581) by Torquato Tasso, Book I, Stanza LVII.
Nelle scuole d'Amor che non s'apprende? vi si fe' costei guerriera ardita: Va sempre affissa al caro finaco, e pende Da un fato solo l'una e l'altra vita. Colpo ch'ad un sol noccia unqua non scende, Ma indiviso è il dolor d'ogni ferita: E spesso è l'un ferito, e làltro langue; E versa l'alma quel, se questa il sangue.
Interlineary translation by Emilie de Rouillon (1836):
Mighty love! what learn we not from thee? By thy power inspired, she (Gildippe), inseparable from her loved consort's side, undaunted dared the dangers of the field. Both lives are linked together in one common fate. No blow is felt by one alone; undivided is the pain; the wounds of one cause the other to pine and languish, and with the streaming blood of one, the soul of the other forsakes its earthly tenement.
2. Barbarism
Scored for: soprano, countertenor, tam-tam, shawm, tenor recorder, harp, lute.
Text source: an anonymous Middle English lyric, circa 13th–14th century.
Ech day me comëth tydinges thre, For wel swithë sore ben he: he on is that Ich shal hennë, That other that Ich not whennë, The thriddë is my mestë carë, That Ich not whider Ich shal farë.
Loose translation / interpretation by Michael R. Burch:
Each day I'm plagued by three doles, These gargantuan weights on my soul: First, that I must somehow EXIT this fen. Second, because I cannot know WHEN. And yet it's the third that torments me so, Having no way to know where the HELL I will go!
3. Ironical Revisitation
Scored for: organ, countertenor, tenor recorder, dulcimer, lute.
Text source: a prayer of Sancho Panza from Don Quixote (1605) by Cervantes, Chapter XXII.
¡Dios te guíe y la Peña de Francia, junto con la Trinidad de Gaeta, flor, nata y espuma de los caballeros andantes! ¡Allá vas, valentón del mundo, corazón de acero, brazos de bronce! sano y sin cautela a la luz desta vida, que dejas por enterrarte en esta escuridad que buscas!
God, and the Peña de Francia, and the Trinity of Gaeta guide thee, flower and cream of knights-errant. There thou goest, thou dare-devil of the earth, heart of steel, arm of brass; once more, God guide thee and send thee back safe, sound, and unhurt to the light of this world thou art leaving to bury thyself in the darkness thou art seeking there!
4. Romanticism
Scored for: pipe/tabor, citole, shawm, harp, hurdy gurdy.
Text source: lyrics written by the AI bot ChatGPT in response to the prompt: “write a poem about the Middle Ages, a stormy castle, ghosts and computers in the dungeon”.
In a castle dark and stormy, Haunted by ghosts so sad and lonely, Lies a dungeon deep and cold, With secrets few have ever told. The Middle Ages may have passed, But their ghosts still haunt this castle vast, Their moans and wails fill the air, As lightning strikes and thunder blares. But in the dungeon, hidden away, A sight that few have seen to this day, A computer with a glowing screen, As if a portal to a world unseen. Amidst the rusted chains and stones, The whirring gears and beeping tones, The computer hums and blinks with light, As if it were alive, and not just a sight. It beckons to those brave enough, To venture down into the dungeon's rough, To explore its secrets and its lore, And see what wonders it holds in store. But beware the ghosts that haunt this place, Their wails and moans will fill your space, And as you delve into the unknown, You may find yourself not alone. For in this castle dark and stormy, Where ghosts and computers exist in harmony, There is magic in the air, And wonder in the secrets that lie down there.
5. Philosophia Perennis
Scored for: bells, soprano, countertenor, alto, dulcimer.
Text source: abridged and translated by Andrew Hugill from the Introduction Générale à la Philosophie (1921) by Jacques Maritain.
The philosophy of Aristotle and Saint Thomas is both abiding and permanent. It existed from the dawn of humanity the first principles of reason. It has remained firm and progressive while all other philosophies have been born and died in turn.
Full text in the original French:
Cette philosophie d'Aristote et de saint Thomas [...] apparaît encore comme continue et perdurable (philosophie perennis) en ce sens qu'avant qu'[ils] l'aient constituée scientifiquement et comme philosophie, elle existait depuis le premier jour dans sa racine, à l'état préphilosophique, comme instinct de l'intellgence, et comme connaissance naturelle des premières conclusions de la raison: et en ce sense que depuis sa findation comme philosophie elle est demeurée stable et progressive dans sa grande vie traditionelle, tandis que toutes les autres philosophies se succédaient sans durer.
6. National Identities
Scored for: organ, fiddle, tenor recorder, harp, lute.
This instrumental meditation comprises a collage of the starts of many of the world’s national anthems, in alphabetical order, hung around the theme played on harp.
7. Decadentism
Scored for: organ, countertenor, descant recorder, harp, lute.
Text source: two fragments from J.-K. Huysmans’ celebrated “decadent” novel À Rebours (Against the Grain).
The first two phrases are from the epigraph, itself a quotation from Jan van Ruysbroeck (“Ruysbroeck the Admirable”), the fourteenth-century Flemish mystic:
Il faut que je me réjouisse au-dessus du temps ... quoique le monde ait horreur de ma joie, et que sa grossièreté ne sache pas ce que je veux dire.
I must rejoice beyond the bounds of time ... though the world may shudder at my joy, and in its coarseness know not what I mean.
The final phrase is a cry of Huysmans’ decadent hero Des Esseintes toward the end of the novel:
Eh! croule donc, société! meurs donc, vieux monde! s'écria des Esseintes, indigné par l'ignominie du spectacle qu'il évoquait; ce cri rompit le cauchemar qui l'opprimait.
“Well, crumble then, society! perish, old world!” cried Des Esseintes, indignant at the ignominy of the spectacle he had conjured up; and the exclamation broke the nightmare that oppressed him.
It is also worth noting this passage from the novel:
Des Esseintes’ ideas on music were in flagrant contradiction with the theories he professed as to the other arts. In religious music, he really cared only for the monastic music of the Middle Ages, that ascetic music that acted instinctively on the nerves, like certain pages of the old Christian Latinity; besides, he admitted it himself, he was incapable of understanding the artful devices contemporary masters might have been able to introduce into Catholic art.
8. Philological Reconstruction
Scored for: countertenor, shawm, drums.
Text source: a speech by Panurge in Gargantua and Pantagruel by Rabelais (mid-16th century).
Panurge impresses Gargantua by speaking in many languages, including one of the earliest examples of a constructed language, which Epistemon calls “the language of the Antipodes”.
Al barildin gotfano dech min brin alabo dordin falbroth RINGUAM ALBARAS. Nin porth zadikin almucathin milko prin al elmin enthoth dal heben ensouim, kuthim al dum alkatim nimbroth, delchoth porth min michais im endoth, pruch dal MARSUPIUM hol moth dansrikim lupaldas im voldemoth. Nin hur diavolth mnarbotin dal gousch pal frapin duch in scoth pruch Galeth dal Chinon min foulthrich al conin butathendoth dal prim.
9. Tradition
Scored for: organ, fiddle, treble recorder, harp, lute.
10. Expectation of the Millennium
Scored for: soprano, fiddle, tenor recorder, dulcimer, lute.
Text source: “O Fortuna”, an early thirteenth-century poem from Carmina Burana.
The well-known setting by Carl Orff is used as a theme or background music in so many contemporary recreations of the Middle Ages that it is now a rather laughable cliché. The tone of the original poem, while not explicitly millenialist, is certainly open to that interpretation. It is unsurprising that Orff, with his extreme right-wing views, was drawn to this lyric. My setting is less sure of its expectations, drifting off uncertainly into the future...
O Fortuna velut luna statu variabilis, semper crescis aut decrescis; vita detestabilis nunc obdurat et tunc curat ludo mentis aciem, egestatem, potestatem dissolvit ut glaciem. Sors immanis et inanis, rota tu volubilis, status malus, vana salus semper dissolubilis, obumbrata et velata michi quoque niteris; nunc per ludum dorsum nudum fero tui sceleris. Sors salutis et virtutis michi nunc contraria, est affectus et defectus semper in angaria. Hac in hora sine mora corde pulsum tangite; quod per sortem sternit fortem, mecum omnes plangite!
O Fortune, like the moon you are changeable, ever waxing ever waning; hateful life first oppresses and then soothes playing with mental clarity; poverty and power it melts them like ice. Fate – monstrous and empty, you whirling wheel, you are malevolent, well-being is vain and always fades to nothing, shadowed and veiled you plague me too; now through the game I bring my bare back to your villainy. Fate is against me in health and virtue, driven on and weighted down, always enslaved. So at this hour without delay pluck the vibrating strings; since Fate strikes down