Working through the Troparium

So I did a thing. For the SCA East Kingdom’s Crowns Arts and Sciences Championship and Display, I decided to do a performance, of “Anni novi circulus” from MS 289. After working up the tune in MuseScore and getting the words from the David Hiley manuscript, I fired up Zoom and after about 20-ish takes, got a clean-ish performance. And no, I was not competing, only displaying, I do not need that kind of pressure in my life! (Insert nervous laughter here.)

Here is the link to a video and the accompanying essay I wrote about the piece, performance choices, etc.

“Anni novi circulus”: A Rendition from MS289 – Adelisa Salernitana

In case there’s a problem viewing the above link, here is the performance itself.

Enjoy!

Also, Trouvere Medieval Minstrels did a livestream of songs from the Troparium on Facebook Live. If you recall, Gil from Trouvere was the one who brought my attention to the Hiley manuscript. Because her partner Paul can actually read medieval notation, they have been going through the original Troparium manuscripts online at the Biblioteca Nacional de España in Madrid, working on new tunes and reworking others. Buy them a coffee!

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More medieval Sicilian music

I haven’t had a lot of time to do much in the way of research lately. I keep trying to change that, but overall, I am a lazy lump and being a freelance writer and editor, I have clients to keep happy, because eating and keeping my bills paid is nice.

At present I am looking into pieces of music in anticipation of getting my rehabbed rebab/citole back one of these days. One of the pieces I would like to play is one allegedly from the Troparium de Catania, called “Anni novi circulus,” and it’s a Christmas song.

There’s just one problem: I cannot find the damn lyrics anywhere and my Latin is not good enough to just listen to the versions I have found and write the words down. You think one scholar would have analyzed the text in an article but apparently when it comes to early medieval music, the Troparium de Catania doesn’t get a lot of scholarly love.

MS 19421 allegedly has “Anni novi circulus.” But Madrid also has three other manuscripts of Norman Sicilian music. There’s MS 288; MS 289; and Vitr 20/4. They’re all scanned images and not searchable except for me straining my eyeballs. Pretty simply, I am just trying to find the three words “Anni novi circulus” and hoping that the rest of the words of the song are there. Wish me luck!

Here is Al Qantarah’s version of “Anni novi circulus.”

Trouvere Medieval Minstrels also did a version of “Anni novi circulus” on their CD “Magna Melodia”; here is a video with a snippet of the song and some glorious images of the Cathedral of Monreale and the Capella Palatina. The CD itself is available on iTunes and Amazon.

An UPDATE!

The fabulous Gill Page of Trouvere graciously replied to my inquiry, and has told me the words are in MS 289. But even better, there is actually a thesis available from David Hiley, where he transcribed the pieces of 289, with lyrics.

I have just bashed out my own version in SoundCloud, and now look forward to transcribing and performing more of these pieces.