Analysis and activity making

As can be seen in the analysis section of each song, the activities are divided up into those ‘without violin’ and ‘with violin’. They are intended to increase in difficulty and in this way made to suit violinists in the (a) first year of study, (b) second year  study and (c) more advanced students.

(a      a) First year activities are intended to be experienced through singing and movement. This strengthens their inner hearing and adding movement to singing is a primitive example of polyphony.

                Video 10                                                                             Video 11

    Students will subconsciously learn about phrasing and pulse    through games. Rhythms that repeated in a song are often    illustrated by the same word and together with the gesture of      the word to be played on open strings.  

               Video 12

       b) The second year build on the previous activities by playing sometimes a simplified version of the song.

                Video 13

    Activities are designed to tackle gesture, dance and hierarchy of the bar

               Video 14                                                                                 Video 15

    To help with bowing

     Video 16

     At this stage, the students are capable of writing their own lyrics as was seen in the video in the previous ‘lyrics section’. Also go further into developing the polyphony of music making by playing an ostinato or the ground bass. 

                  c) The students in the third year or more play the songs in full and issues of bowing addressed. This stage idea of the hierarchy of the bar can be highlighted.

The songs are taught in these various stages so that if they grasp the activity then they progress to the next stage. Advanced students can also enjoy the activities of the first and second years but as they understand the activities and playing quicker they progress more rapidly to the final stage of playing musically. This means that no step is missed and the lessons can be assessed as it develops. The goal of each activity should be present to the teacher although not to the student, and this with this in mind, the teacher constantly analysis whether the songs and activities are well received, if the goals are reached and what aspects need more or less attention.

Before teaching the songs, a modern edition was made. Although I wanted to follow the manuscript as closely as possible, some alterations were made in order to make the score easier to read for children or to be a simplified version of the original. [1]

-       Time signature changed from ^ to P to make note groupings visually clearer for children

-       Transposed if the songs was easier to play down the octave (Although this is only necessary for the young children)

-       Some written out ornamentation or variation in rhythm are presented in the simplest form

Preparing the material

Lyrics

In line with the main tenets of teaching, songs were chosen to develop children’s inner hearing and basic technique whilst also experiencing authentic baroque pieces. Following Kodaly’s stance of the importance of singing, I attempted to find as many original lyrics to the songs as possible. In total just three of the twenty songs I selected could be found with their original lyrics: The Hobby Horse Dance, Franklyn and Joy to Great Ceaser. The only other song with lyrics, although added later in 1848 was 29th of May. Lyrics of ballads were found with an online resource called the English Broadside Ballad Archive. A version of the Ballad Franklyn was found from an original ballad sheet facsimile in 1680.

Ex. 8: Ballad sheet of A mournful Caral: Or, An Elegy, Lamenting the Tragical. To the Tune, called Francklin is fled away. No 67, Franklyn in Apollo’s Banquet [1]

The lyrics to Hobby Horse Dance were also found in the English Broadside Ballad Archive. I faced a problem that the ballad included violent and unsuitable language for children. Therefore I made alterations in the lyrics to change the meaning behind the text.

Ex 9: The Hobby Horse-Dance No 27, Apollo’s Banquet

The remaining songs either never had any lyrics or were lost. As I wanted to design activities and wanted to develop their singing, I wrote lyrics to twelve songs and helped students write lyrics for a further two songs. 

Video 7                                                                Video 8

The new lyrics were inspired by the song’s original title and from what I thought would be attractive and fun for children. The lyrics were written with the hierarchy of the bar in mind and words chosen to help with realising the gestures of the music. Just two songs were left without words Glory of the Sun and The New Marrinet in order to highlight other elements in the activities.

 Video 9

Teaching Apollo’s Banquet: Practical Application

Before choosing Playford’s Apollo’s Banquet for treble violin, many other songs were considered. There is a vast collection of popular ballads and country-dances, published in the baroque era that could have been used with this paper. The criteria for selecting began with songs that were simple, often diatonic, had beautiful melodies and suitable for violin. The songs from many collections of the seventeenth century were considered, such as those by John Playford, Thomas Ravencroft, Edward Rimbault and Thomas D’Ufrey were considered. Also considered were songs found by researchers responsible for the preservation of folk music during the nineteenth century such as Frank Kidson, Lucy Broadwood and the founder of the English Folk Dance and Song Society, Cecil Sharp.

The initial songs that were collected that fit the criteria became inevitably very broad. Songs included those in comic operas, songs quoted from Shakespeare’s plays, nursery rhymes, those adapted to hymns and Christmas carols. The list of songs became lengthy and although beautiful, it lacked a link to bind them. Requiring a common thread between songs, it led to investigating songs within one single collection, that being Playford’s Apollo’s Banquet.

Selecting the twenty songs

Illegibility of the manuscript

The aim was to select twenty songs from the first edition of Apollo’s Banquet for treble violin (1670) with the purpose of teaching them to students. The initial problem I faced, in investigating the songs was the illegibility of the manuscript, as a little less than 10 percent of the songs could not be transcribed.

Ex. 2: No. 147 from Apollo’s Banquet 1670, Sir Nicholas Cully’s Dance

Songs that were legible still caused some confusion with the e‘s tail, as can be seen in the second line of the song in Ex 2.

Ex. 3: No 43 from Apollo’s Banquet 1670, The Duke of Lorain’s March

In order to ensure accuracy, songs from the fifth edition, where around a quarter of the songs were reprinted were compared and contrasted. [1] Once this was overcome, I began the process of selecting songs.

Criteria for choosing songs

Songs would need to be suitable for children, and would need to be able to teach various elements of the baroque performance practice. The final list was developed through playing and experiencing the songs and were selected based on those that fulfilled the criteria below:

•        beautiful melody
•        mainly stepwise motion
•        those with original lyrics
•        regular phrases
•        variety of keys (major, minor and modal)
•        variety of time signatures
•        rhythmic features commonly found in baroque compositions
•        idiosyncratic for beginner violinist (easy hand shapes and simple rhythms)
•        some songs upon a ground bass

Despite the original intention to only choose songs from the first edition of Apollo’s Banquet for treble violin (1670), I came across two songs whilst using the fifth edition to check for accuracy that I decided to include in my final twenty songs. First was 29th of May which I recognised from my childhood as All Things Bright and Beautiful, a country dance made into a popular Christian hymn. This was interesting to me because it is one of the songs, much like Greensleves or Scarborough Fair that has remained well known throughout many centuries. The second song is, Joy to Great Caesar, which is ‘on a ground bass’ and this type of device was an important musical feature of the baroque era. I thought it would be important to include this because using ground bass became increasingly dominant in the subsequent editions. This particular ground bass is a folia and thus can be used as the preparation for the same folia in Corelli Op. 5, No, 12.

Songs relating to further study

As discussed in the first section of this paper, the idea is to use Playford’s collection to prepare students for further study in historically informed performance practice. It was therefore also important for the twenty songs to have musical elements that are found in more difficult baroque pieces. Thus allowing students to master techniques that can be developed and used in later study. The following examples shows a Saraband included in Apollo’s Banquet and as comparison, a Saraband from Corelli’s violin sonatas. The use of the typical saraband rhythm qje, hq, qhare prevalent in both.

Ex. 6. Saraband Seventh, No 185, Apollo’s Banquet 1670

Ex. 7: Arcangelo Corelli, Op.5, No. 7, Sarabande 1700

Therefore finding these elements in simple songs, will prepare them develop skills and techniques needed in order to master Baroque pieces.

Teaching Process and analysis

1) Lessons were taught in English or in Dutch (with translated songs)

2) Students who participated were:

•  Aged between five and ten
•  Had between five months and five years playing experience
•  Taught in individual and group lessons

3) When and where:

• Lessons took place in Muziekschool Amstelveen, the Netherlands
•  Each student received between one and two lessons
•  The lessons vary for 20 minute lesson (individual) and 50 minutes (group)
• Took place in January 2016
• 50 percent of the lessons were video recorded

The songs were often taught in lessons alongside other usual repertoire. The lessons usually started with scales and included between the five or six pieces, with some small technical exercises for the right and left hand. Whilst teaching the songs from Playford, as can be seen in the videos and from the activity section, three or four activities are done to teach the same thing. Although only the activities are filmed, students would also play all the pieces (or a simplified version) on the violin. Due to time restraints the songs were only taught one or two times so often a finished product has not been filmed