Courante - Ayre - Saraband from Suite 1 by Matthew Locke

Suite 1 (The Broken Consort), Courante - Ayre - Saraband
By Matthew Locke (c. 1630-1677)
Chicago Recorder Trio: Lisette Kielson, Mirja Lorenz, and Patrick O’Malley
Audio courtesy Barry Hufker
Videography by Pat Weaver
Early Music Missouri continued its 2023-2024 season with “Sweet Discord”: a concert featuring Chicago Recorder Trio playing a program that ranged across centuries and styles, from medieval music from Italy and Spain to the high Baroque to new music, including a piece composed by a member of the ensemble.
Musicologist/performer Peter Holman has described Matthew Locke (c. 1621/23 - 1677) as “the most important, influential and prolific English composer of his generation.” Locke composed prolifically, producing both instrumental and vocal music for the royal court of Charles II. This suite draws from a large manuscript collection of Locke’s chamber music, most written before the Restoration. Presented to Charles II in a massive manuscript in 1672, it remains associated with the private music of the court and holds several distinct groups of music for specific ensembles, including The Broken Consort. This term dates to the sixteenth century and refers to an ensemble of mixed or dissimilar instruments, in this case, violins and bass viol, instruments from two distinct families. Locke drew on a Tudor tradition of viol consort music centered on home or private court performances and many of his suites feature old-fashioned movements like highly contrapuntal pavans and, in this case, fantasies. But Locke also attempted to please the French tastes of Charles II with more contemporary dances like sarabands and courantes. Locke’s spikey harmonies and surprising harmonic twists reflect traditional English viol music, yet the French inflections reflect the king’s continental tastes.