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Composer Morton Feldman comes to Buffalo as the visiting Slee Professor of Music and enters into a mutually appreciative relationship with the Creative Associates. While Michael Tilson Thomas succeeds Lukas Foss as Music Director of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Foss retains his codirectorship of the Center. The tenth anniversary of the Center is celebrated with a gala concert and its first European tour. Feldman accepts a permanent faculty position and creates the June In Buffalo festival. The festival opens with a week-long residency by John Cage during which time his work Songbooks is performed. The Center's financial footing grows increasingly precarious.

This chapter discusses the first set of sources to transcribe the corpus of troubadour song: the corpus of francophone songbooks. After tracing the contours of the corpus of Occitan song in French songbooks, it turns to the various mechanisms that obscure the cultural and linguistic alterity of Occitan song in its francophone transmission in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. These include, alongside Gallicization and geographical remapping, anonymization and the compilation of Occitan songs amid francophone songs rather than in a separate section of the manuscript. When troubadour song was demarcated in some way, it was staged not as a foreign cultural artifact but instead as something whose strangeness came from its status as non- or only quasi-human. Indeed, troubadour song was repositioned as avian rather than foreign. The chapter then reveals a fundamental ambivalence in the reception of Occitan song in francophone territories: on the one hand, and most frequently, it was actively assimilated, allowing for easier appropriation, and, on the other, it was exoticized by being remapped onto an axis not of cultural alterity but of species difference.

This epilogue argues that, on the basis of French songbooks alone, there would not be sufficient grounds to conceptualize such a thing as “troubadour song.” With only francophone songbooks to use as sources, there would be only a cluster of (mostly) anonymous lyric, in which one would have to include the Occitanizing corpus alongside the songs known from elsewhere to have been composed by the troubadours. People would then see troubadour song not as a distinct repertoire in a foreign language but instead as one subset of francophone lyric. This appropriation is diametrically opposed to the reception of troubadour song elsewhere in Europe. In Italy, individual troubadours were memorialized through brief biographies or vidas. In Catalonia, Occitan was the subject of numerous grammatical treatises for would-be composers. Thus, while elsewhere in Europe troubadour song was represented as a prestigious model to be emulated, in francophone territories it was instead actively transformed to bring it closer to French, rendering it invisible. Remapped to the boundary between France and Occitania, anonymized, and linguistically Gallicized, troubadour lyric became legible as francophone, culturally and linguistically, in most francophone narratives and songbooks.

This chapter explores British pianist and composer Martin Butler’s London (2008). This is, thus far, the sole work Butler has written for voice and piano. His musical idiom is easily accessible, basically tonal with naturally flowing lines and lovely sonorities. This is a classic English ‘Lied’ which sets William Blake’s poem with impeccable taste and assurance, allowing both performers a wide range of colour and expression, and encompassing a host of delicately calibrated details of nuance and dynamic. Marked ‘A Dirge’, the piece progresses at a steady pulse, led by a resonant piano part which goes on to three staves at the start. Wide-spanning bell-like chords support a flexible, shapely vocal line, with each word set immaculately. The broad vocal range might suggest a bass-baritone—several of the lowest passages, including the exposed ending, require a rock-like steadiness and security. However, the outer sections are basically quiet, and the emotional outburst at the song’s centre, as the music presses forward, will benefit from a high placing without strain.

This chapter highlights British composer Philip Cashian’s The Sun’s Great Eye (2008). In this short but arresting work, Cashian manages, with an impressive display of sleight-of-hand craftsmanship, to assimilate some of the more obvious characteristics of fashionable minimalism within a scheme that combines repeated patterns with asymmetrical rhythmic contours. The result, ingenious and highly concentrated, is not in the least mechanical, but has charm and a natural musicality. The fascinating piano part is written on just one stave, to be shared by both hands. This emphasizes the close interweaving of both protagonists as equal partners, and adds subtly to the feeling of intimacy and unforced expression. Through elliptical rhythmic hurdles and differing alignments, the voice glides in and out, in supple, lilting fragments which must seem effortless, bearing no hint of the hard work needed to acquire perfect coordination and accurate pitching, or the necessity of counting beats in groups of two and three.

This chapter assesses composer/pianist Michael Finnissy’s Outside Fort Tregantle (2008). This song is less of a display piece than a contemplative reverie. Unsurprisingly, though, the pianist is given a dauntingly virtuoso, rhythmically and harmonically complex part. Through all this, the singer drifts serene and undeterred, in gently undulating lines, creating an almost impressionistic effect. Good breath control, clarity, and evenness of tone are prime requisites, and time will need to be allowed for familiarization with pitches. The music’s modernist idiom is highly individual and fascinating, and to capture its haunting quality requires deep thought and insight. At the slow opening tempo, phrases will need plenty of support in order to be sung in one span. Ultimately, for the intelligent singer, the piece constitutes a distinctive test of empathy and sensitivity.

Music in Canada during World War I illuminates the country’s history and cultural identity. In some ways it paralleled music in Britain: for the public, initial enthusiasm was followed by disillusionment and resistance to conscription; for soldiers, music was a diversion and an inspiration. The interplay between French- and English-speaking cultures, however, was unique to Canada. Le Passe-temps (Montreal) published many scores and articles that reflected Francophone concerns; and the Anglophone public and troops united in publishing various soldiers’ songbooks, some associated with specific regiments. Little memorial music was composed, but the war poem “In Flanders’ Fields” by Canadian John McCrae became a lasting and universal contribution to remembrance.

This introductory chapter provides an overview of how troubadour song came to occupy a unique place in the French literary canon. The story of the current misprision of troubadour song as French begins in the earliest stages of its transmission in francophone space. Far from being treated as a foreign entity, Occitan lyric was already considered “native” in French sources, even long before Occitan-speaking territories were officially annexed to France. To tell this story of assimilation, the process through which Occitan song was domesticated, this book surveys the two types of medieval material—songbooks and lyric-interpolated narratives—that quote or compile Occitan song in native francophone territory. The chapter then looks at the relationship between the troubadours and their francophone counterparts, the trouvères. It also describes birdsong, and explains two of the assimilative strategies that are common to both songbooks and the lyric-interpolated romances that quote the troubadours: Gallicization and geographical remapping of troubadour song into either francophone or transitional regions between French- and Occitan-speaking territories.

This chapter presents a selection of Isaac Watts's hymns, his greatest contribution to evangelicalism. Watts's hymns had a direct influence on the supplemental songbooks published by John and Charles Wesley as well as other early evangelicals who followed his method. These hymns include “Christ Jesus the Lamb of God, Worshiped by All the Creation,” Revelation 5:11–13; “Godly Sorrow Arising from the Sufferings of Christ”; “Crucifixion to the World by the Cross of Christ,” Galatians 6:14; “Man Frail and God Eternal”; and “The Messiah's Coming and Kingdom”.

Chapter 3 shows how many collections of printed music compiled miscellaneous pieces from opera and concerts, as well as folk tunes, drinking songs, and even instrumental music into anthologies that could be purchased. These collections offer the opportunity to understand what publishers believed would sell; in other words, songbooks betray the developing tastes of London audiences through the lens of miscellany print culture.

This chapter addresses British composer Joe Cutler’s Bands (2008). This touching, insightful piece, deceptively simple, demands immense concentration and empathy. The text, by the composer’s father Richard Cutler, is a moving encapsulation of the traumatic experiences faced by child evacuees during the Second World War, as they left home and parents and boarded trains for unfamiliar places. With immense skill and daring, the composer strips his material to the bone with a pared-down, static harmonic base and stark, repetitive vocal lines to convey graphically the desolation and numbed emotions of the departing children. Rhythmic fluidity is provided by the interplay between irregular patterns in the piano’s left hand punctuated by percussive right-hand acciaccaturas, while the singer maintains a steady quarter-note pulse through syncopations and tied notes. In view of the plethora of high Gs, some prolonged, a tenor would perhaps be most comfortable, although a very light baritone with a secure high range could sound suitably disembodied.

This chapter focuses on Emily Howard’s Wild Clematis in Winter (2008). In this piece, perfect control and precision of intonation are required of the singer. Even from the start, the mezzo is left exposed on long-held pitches, often in the potentially vulnerable register-break area. The piano sets the atmosphere with delicate, oscillating semitones, merged by the pedal, grounded by a constantly repeating G natural in the bass. This pattern is to continue through much of the song. Meanwhile, the singer’s exquisitely poised, hypnotic lines gradually gather intensity over a wide spectrum of dynamics. Phrases become more passionate, with single repeated notes conveying a wealth of meaning in their carefully graded dynamics. Throughout, the accompaniment stays within a restricted pitch area, and there are plenty of cues to keep the singer anchored.

This chapter assesses Tod Machover’s Open Up the House (2012). Machover has long been recognized internationally as an outstanding and influential all-round musician and polymath, whose areas of expertise comfortably straddle the twin worlds of arts and science. Most readily associated with groundbreaking innovation in musical technology—often applied to ambitious operatic, educational, and symphonic ventures—he is nonetheless able to tailor his talents to embrace more modest, small-scale forces, as shown here. This exhilarating little piece fizzes with vitality from the outset. The piano’s continual, pulsing, eighth-note chords drive the music along, ensuring that momentum never flags. The incisive soprano writing calls upon the singer’s brightest, most radiant resonances. The piece builds cumulatively, with leaping, plunging intervals, spiked accents, and insistent repetitions. The singer must conserve stamina for the long notes at the ends of phrases, and plan breath spans accordingly.

This chapter addresses British composer Colin Matthews’s Out in the Dark (2008). This little song is but a modest sample of Matthews’s work, which covers virtually all genres. The piece’s tessitura means it can be tackled by most voices, since extremes of register and dynamic are avoided. In view of the buoyancy of timbre required, and the crucial instruction semplice, a soprano is most suitable, able to float a sweet ‘silvered’ sound with a distinctively bright sheen such as often found in singers of French songs. The tone can be ‘pure’ in the widest sense, but definitely not devoid of expression or vibrato or affectedly naïve. Apart from the initial pianissimo, no dynamics are marked, and this represents a challenge to the poise and powers of concentration of both performers. The voice part moves steadily through the work in unadorned lines, with a natural, lilting one-in-a bar feel, made more flexible by the interplay of two against three.

This chapter examines Robert Saxton’s The Beach in Winter: Scratby (for Tess) (2007). This piece, originally commissioned for the NMC Songbook, is now to be found as the last song of a major seven-movement baritone cycle Time and the Seasons. Its idiom is a far cry from Saxton’s earlier modernist works. The music is mellifluous, basically tonal, and beautifully turned, with voluptuously expressive vocal phrases that cover a wide range. The composer gives the baritone plenty of scope to span spacious phrases and articulate contrasting emotions, amid continual changes of key signature. Lines dart around the registers a good deal and the singer will need to control dynamics and vary timbre throughout his range. The pianist propels the music along with a continuous, ever-shifting texture of wave patterns—first rippling, then surging and pounding, or quite suddenly scattering in spray. Rhythms are pliable and there are many instances of irregular divisions, pitting fours against threes in the piano part.

This chapter assesses Michael Torke’s House and Home (2012). This sparkling tour de force is guaranteed to brighten up any recital. Torke is a master of post-minimalism and his work is consistently enjoyable, full of flair and verve. The entertainingly emphatic text is taken from Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part II: Mistress Quickly’s angry diatribe at Falstaff’s uncontrollable appetite. Performers will be aware that passages of repetitive machine-like rhythms, especially in a tonal idiom, have great audience appeal, but can be much harder to bring off than more expansive, obviously virtuosic music. There is a real danger of going off the rails in the cumulative excitement generated. Assiduous preparation is essential in order to produce the desired result of unflustered elan. Moreover, placing consonants in exact rhythm warrants careful attention, and breathing must be strictly in tempo—the slightest hesitancy will be noticeable.

This chapter highlights Roderick Williams’s A Coat (2008). Williams is a baritone of innate musicality and enviable technique, as consistent as he is versatile. Tailor-made for his own voice, the piece spans a wide range in pitch and dynamic and teems with subtle colours and detailed nuances which evoke comparison with Hugo Wolf, especially in the refinement of the word-setting. His ear for balance is particularly acute—he doubtless has experience of songs with over-heavy piano parts, where the singer must struggle to communicate a text. An intriguing, flexibly atonal idiom is eminently approachable. Williams does not shy away from rhythmic complexity, but embellishes vocal lines within a steady pulse, giving a feeling of natural musical flow and almost improvised freedom, yet the overall structure is disciplined and concise.