Anna-Lena Elbert, soprano - Friederike Heumann, viola da gamba, lyra viol & direction -

Evangelina Mascardi, Renaissance lute - Angélique Mauillon, triple harp

Dreames & Imaginations - Music from around 1600 by R. Jones, W. Corkine, T. Hume, J. Danyel, T. Ford & J. Dowland for Voice, Lyra viol, Lute & Harp

Late blossoms are particularly beautiful – this general wisdom is perhaps most true for music and especially true for the ayres of the English Renaissance. Late blossoms, however, seem to always carry with them the knowledge of their own transience. Behind the great, inexplicably poignant beauty, the finitude already glimmers: dreams are illusions; longing is unfulfilled yearning; love is unhappy love; happiness is past happiness; and sleep is eternal sleep. This immersion in the transience of all earthly things had a name in late 16th and early 17th century England: melancholy.

To cultivate melancholy as an aesthetic pleasure – perhaps no composer of the time mastered this art better than John Dowland (c. 1563–1626). But he was by no means the only one: Robert Jones (c. 1576–1615), Tobias Hume (c. 1579–1645), Thomas Ford (?–1648), William Corkine (unknown, early 17th century), and many other composers contributed to this intellectual trend in various ways. The intimate poetry of the 'golden Elizabethan age' is set to music by the singer, lutenist and composer Robert Jones in his »Second Booke of Songs« (London 1601) – "set out to the lute and bass viol by tablature after the lyre fashion".

All these composers contributed in their own way to the rich flowering of English Renaissance music by expanding the boundaries of musical forms and instrumental techniques, and by seeking out new, captivating sounds. Thanks to the excellent ensemble Anna-Lena Elbert (soprano), Friederike Heumann (viola da gamba, lyra viol) Evangelina Mascardi (Renaissance lute) and Angélique Mauillon (harp), this music blossoms once more in its former glory, and we – the listeners – can be enchanted by its beauty and inventiveness. Moreover, we are also invited to develop our own “dreams and imaginations,” melancholic or otherwise, to this music!

[extract of the CD booklet / further detailed info in the booklet]

CD programme / Tracklist: