Drop 2 of 4
Greetings from New Bag End!
Work is progressing on setting up Cetra Records for our official launch just a couple of months from now. While the design team has been hard at work in Portugal and New York, and Ian has been researching our distribution options in the UK, I’ve been enjoying myself immensely here at New Bag End, recording and mixing future releases, and getting ready to record other Cetra musicians. So far, it’s been an exciting summer!
I’ve got more music to share with you today, three tracks by three outstanding 18th-century composers: George Frideric Handel, Johann Sebastian Bach, and his youngest son, Johann Christian.
About 25 years ago now, while doing research in the library of the Duke of Buccleugh in Drumlanrig castle, Rob MacKillop found a piece by Johann Christian Bach transcribed for cetra. When Rob debuted the piece at the cittern and guitar conference in Évora, Portugal, in 2001, I recognized it and later told him that it was an arrangement of the right-hand part of JCB’s op. 5 no. 1, transposed from Bb to C. It’s not an exact transcription: a few changes have been made that have to do with adapting the piece to the range of the cetra. I offer JCB’s piece here in a version much closer to the original keyboard piece than that found in the manuscript Rob uncovered. It’s still transposed to C, to accommodate the cetra in C built by Diogo Valente, but in addition I play the left-hand part on copy of a William Gibson cittern in G, including some of the notes that are unavailable on the C instrument. It’s a lovely suite that is a lot of fun to play.
The Gigue by Handel is the last movement of his keyboard Suite in G Major (HWV 441), and it is as delightful as any jig I’ve ever heard or played. Transposed to C, it is played on the Valente cetra in C and the William Gibson Irish cittern in G.
JSB transcribed the fourth movement of his cantata Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme (Awake, calls the voice to us), known in English as “Sleepers, Awake” (BWV 140), for organ (BWV 645). This chorale is one of the master’s most loved, and most recorded pieces. It is offered here on three different citterns, weaving around each other in Bach’s magical writing: the top line is played on the Valente cetra; the bass line is played on a cetra built by Carlo Cecconi after Irish builder Thomas Perry; the middle voice (and the cantus firmus) is played on a Corsican cetera built by Christian Magdeleine.
I hope you enjoy these arrangements. Part of my mission with Cetra Records is to demonstrate that the cetra is a versatile instrument capable of playing all sorts of music, from the arrangements of Irish music offered with our first announcement, to the keyboard music of the great 18c masters, and beyond. Stay tuned for more, and tell your friends!
Thanks,
Doc
The songs from our previous drops are no longer available for free download, but you can now enjoy them all in one place by purchasing the album or streaming them on your favorite audio platforms!