Accademia del Piacere immerses itself in the study and performance of one of the most famous yet most overlooked manuscripts from its own city: the Cancionero de la Colombina. This remarkable musical manuscript, which contains almost a hundred pieces, was compiled in the 15th century for the Dukes of Medina Sidonia and later acquired by Hernando Colón (Ferdinand Columbus), son of Christopher Columbus, for his impressive library. Today, it is kept in a building adjoining Seville Cathedral. Fahmi Alqhai and his ensemble perform a selection of its works with the vocal and instrumental forces for which the music was written, using replicas of period instruments.
Undoubtedly one of the great musical monuments of the Spanish Renaissance, the Cancionero de la Colombina was very probably copied at the ducal court of Medina Sidonia, whose Seville residence stood very close to the central Plaza del Duque. For five centuries the manuscript has been held in the Colombina Library, one of the most important in Europe historically, housed in a building adjoining Seville Cathedral. Compiled in the years surrounding the discovery of America, the book was acquired in 1534 by the founder of the Colombina collection, Hernando Colón (Ferdinand Columbus), Columbus’s son and an extraordinary bibliophile. It contains almost a hundred pieces from the distinctive 15th-century Andalusian school, many of them still anonymous today and others identified as the work of Juan de Triana – a musician linked to the chapel of the ducal house – Juan Cornago and other composers of the time.
Exquisitely written, the manuscript is of enormous importance as the main source of the distinctive 15th-century Sevillian school of polyphony, linked to the city’s immense cathedral, then under construction, where the aforementioned Juan de Triana worked. Most of the pieces are written for three voices and are marked by that peculiar Andalusian style. It was clearly influenced by the international style that emanated from the Franco-Flemish school of polyphony (indeed, the manuscript includes pieces by Ockeghem and Urrede), but it has unique features: its own musical forms – such as villancicos in their original, typically Spanish secular form – and a passionate character explicitly acknowledged by other European composers of the time. The manuscript gains further cultural value from the crucial historical moment Seville was living through: from the city, which would thereafter hold the monopoly on trade with the Americas, its musical style would radiate to all the colonies.
Rarely performed and even more rarely recorded, this music was the focus of a project, supported by a BBVA Foundation Leonardo Grant, whose aim was the historical recovery of this Sevillian Renaissance gem. That is why it is especially rewarding for the members of Accademia del Piacere and for their director, Fahmi Alqhai.
Juan Ramón Lara
Fahmi Alqhai — violino da gamba, viola da gamba & direction
Alena Dantcheva — soprano
Gabriel Díaz — countertenor
Ariel Hernández — tenor
Jesús García Aréjula — baritone
Javier Jiménez Cuevas — bass
Rami Alqhai — viola da gamba
Johanna Rose — viola da gamba
Carles Blanch — vihuela
Marta Graziolino —harp
Francisco Javier Núñez — organ
Pedro Estevan — percussion
Jacobo Díaz — shawm
David García — sackbut
Luis Castillo — dulcian
Recording and editing: Félix Vázquez
1. Praeludium-La Spagna
Anonymous & Fahmi Alqhai
2. Salve Sancta Parens
Anonymous
3. Nunca fue pena mayor
Urrede
4. Commo no le andare yo
Anonymous
5. Propiñan de Melyor
Anonymous
6. Gentil Dama
Anonymous
7. Quien vos dio tal señorío
[Juan de] Triana
8. Calbidi Castigliano + Folia
Joan Ambrosio Dalza & Fahmi Alqhai
9. Con temor bivo
[Juan de] Triana
10. Muy crueles bozes dan
Anonymous
11. Interludium-Ave Maris Stella
Jacob Obrecht (Cancionero de Segovia) & Fahmi Alqhai
12. A los maytines era
Anonymous
13. Que bonito niño chiquito
Anonymous
14. Los hombres con gran plazer
Anonymous
15. Pues con sobra de tristura
Enrique
16. Niña y viña
Anonymous
17. Postludium-La Spagna, otro género de contrapunto
Anonymous & Fahmi Alqhai
Track notes
As an instrumental introduction to the programme, Fahmi Alqhai arranges the plainchant known as La Spagna, writing polyphonic voices over it for Renaissance ensemble, following the practices of the instrumentalists of the time.
Hispalis splendens
Magna Musica.
This Salve, dedicated, of course, to the Virgin Mary, is one of the few sacred pieces in the Cancionero de la Colombina and also one of the few written in four voices.
Salve sancta parens,
ennyxa puérpera regem
qui celum teramque regit
in sécula seculorum.
Virgo Dei, in tua se clausit
viscera factus homo.
Gloria… Sicut erat in principio
[et nunc, et semper, et in saecula]
saeculorum. Amen.
The Flemish composer Juan de Urrede, or Johannes de Wreede (c. 1430 – after 1482), spent much of his life in Spain. This song, the most famous of his works, survives in many 15th-century manuscripts; indeed, its fourth voice here is based on the one preserved in the Verona manuscript (Italy).
Nunca fue pena mayor
ni tormento me faze ver
por mejor la muerte
tan estraño, con menor daño
que el tormento con el dolor
que resçibo del engaño.
Y este conosçimiento
en pensar el pensamiento
faze mis vidas tristes,
que por amores me distes.
Today’s word “villancico” comes from “villanesca”, which in turn refers to pieces such as this typical example of a secular work from the Colombina manuscript: with racy lyrics and a rustic, “villana” setting, it describes an encounter in the countryside between a girl and a shepherd, who ends up shouting out for all his belongings.
Commo no le andare yo
mesquina
tan desmayada
Dixo la niña al pastor
miras pastor que tetas
dixo el pastor a la niña
¡mas me querria dos setas!
¡…mi çurron mi çamarrón
mi cayada mi almarada
y mi yesca y mi eslabón!
One of the best-known pieces in the Cancionero de la Colombina is this highly unusual instrumental dance, a rare example of the genre, since the “ministriles”, or instrumentalists, usually played music written for voices.
The probable composer of this work is Juan Cornago (c. 1400 – after 1475), possibly from La Rioja, a musician in the chapel of Alfonso the Magnanimous of Aragon. Besides the Colombina, the piece is also found in the Cancionero de Palacio.
Gentil dama, non se gana
otro bien de vos mirar,
sy no ver y desear.
El deleyte que se faze,
mirando vuestra beldat,
notando vuestra bondat.
Juan de Triana (1460-1494), or simply “Triana” in the manuscript, is in all likelihood the compiler of the Cancionero de la Colombina for the ducal house of Medina Sidonia. From the Seville district of Triana, as his surname would suggest, he was a musician at Seville Cathedral and at the same time served the ducal chapel.
¿Quién vos dio tal señorío,
que, sólo que vos mire
mi libertad cative,
que sea vuestro y no mío?
Esto causó fermosura
que quiso que vuestro fuese.
Eso mesmo la mesura
dio favor que me prendiese.
As an interlude, Fahmi Alqhai arranges other Renaissance instrumental dances similar to the Propiñan from the Cancionero, such as a dance by the Italian composer Dalza or the anonymous folía.
Juan de Triana (1460-1494), a musician regularly listed on the Seville payrolls of the House of Medina Sidonia, is the most frequent composer in the Colombina manuscript, with twenty works, among them this simple three-voice villancico.
Con temor bivo, ojos tristes,
a la dicha que tenéys
que nunca más os veréys
tan ledos como vos vistes.
Politics and political events in Catalonia are also present in the Cancionero de la Colombina, in the form of a villancico with a concordance in the Cancionero de Palacio (thanks to which we can reconstruct the complete lyrics).
Muy crueles bozes dan
catalanes blasfemando:
¡Fuera, fuera, duque Juan,
que es casado el Rey Fernando!
Torna, torna, Barçelona,
a tu señor natural
[Françia juega dedos val:
¡Sus, e mate por la dona!
Correos vienen, correos van
por todo’l mundo gritando:
¡Fuera, fuera, duque Juan,
que es casado el Rey Fernando/]
Although Jacob Obrecht (1458-1505) was born in Ghent, his music is found in Spanish Renaissance manuscripts such as the Segovia songbook, and here Alqhai uses it as a new interlude between the works of the Colombina.
Ave, Maris Stella, Dei Mater alma,
Atque semper virgo, Felix coeli porta.
Solve vincla reis, Profer lumen caecis,
Mala nostra pelle, Bona cuncta posce.
Virgo singularis, Inter omnes mitis,
Nos culpis solutos, Mites fac et castos.
Sit laus Deo Patri, Summo Christo decus,
Spiritui Sancto, Tribus honor unus. Amen.
Taking this piece from the Colombina together with Commo no le andare yo, we can follow the journey of the word “villancico”: from denoting pastoral works with a rustic (“villano”) setting, it came to mean Christmas songs, like this charming piece devoted to the motherhood of the Virgin Mary. Like other villancicos of the period, both pieces share a similar form, including a short choral refrain.
A los maytines era,
antes era del alba,
que la Virgen para ella
verificara.
Nueve meses avya
que la Virgen sagrada
al su fijo traya
en el seno ençerrada.
Desque fue allegada
la ora del esperança,
parió sin dudança
al qu’el mundo fiziera
What is striking about this further Christmas villancico from the Colombina is its modernity, both in its subject matter and in a melodic line that feels strangely close, almost familiar.
¡Qué bonito
Niño Chiquito!
Pariendo la virgen,
dos buenas mugeres
servían al parto
y fazíanle plazeres
al niño.
Desque lo ovo parido
la virgen con prudencia,
luego lo adoraron,
dándole rreverençia
al niño.
La Virgen María,
como era moçuela,
ciñólo cuerdamente
con una faxuela
al niño.
Ángeles del çielo
muy dulçe cantavan
«Gloria in excelsis Deo».
Asy lo acallavan
al niño.
Much of the Colombina manuscript consists of anonymous three-voice villancicos in a typically Andalusian style, including the strong influence of the Franco-Flemish musicians that had spread throughout Europe. This is a perfect example.
Los hombres con gran plazer
no saben qué se fazer.
Angeles de alto viçio,
cada quai de su oficio,
fazed al nyño serviçio
que nos quiso oy nascer.
Celestiales cortesanos,
industriat con vuestras manos
algunos juegos humanos
con que lo vamos a ver.
Y tales fuegos levemos
con que todos le alavemos
y a una voz le ofrescemos
ser de infinito poder.
E, porque más le obliguemos,
a la madre alabaremos,
grandes loores le daremos,
pues tal fue su merescer.
Reyna que tal pariste,
Dél Virgen remanesciste,
singular plazer sentiste,
al tiempo de su nasçer.
Pues de todos eres señora,
por nos al tu fijo improva,
qu’en el logar donde mora
El nos faga renascer.
The Enrrique of the Cancionero de la Colombina refers to Enrique Foxer, also known as Enrique de París (d. 1488), a Frenchman linked to the Aragonese court of whom only two songs survive, both in our manuscript.
Pues con sobra de tristura
distes fin al coraçón,
vos le dat la sepultura,
Señora, por galardón.
Vos fuistes la vencedora
que crudamente vençió,
vos quedáys por matadora
de la muerte que’l murió,
no nos falte compasión.
Although written for four voices, Niña y viña is another of the typical villancicos of the Spanish Renaissance for which the Cancionero de la Colombina is a key source: the last line of each stanza serves as a refrain, its theme is typically amorous, and its Italian equivalents are the villanelle and pastorelle.
Niña y viña
peral y havar,
malo es de guardar.
Levantéme, o madre,
mañanita trida,
fuy cortar la rosa,
la rosa florida.
Malo es de guardar.
Viñadero malo
prenda me pedía,
dile yo un cordone
de la mi camisa.
Malo es de guardar.
Viñadero malo
prenda me demanda;
yo dile una cinta
de la muy delgada.
Malo es de guardar.
The motto of the ducal house of Medina Sidonia, sung over the plainchant of La Spagna, closes this concert programme devoted to the great Renaissance manuscript compiled for that house: the Cancionero de la Colombina.
Praefere Patriam Liberis
Parentem Decet. Amen.
As an encore, the concert’s opening piece once more.
