10003 – 3 Intradas

Melchior Franck (1579-1639)

Arranged by Roger Harvey

Difficulty: Easy

Price: £22.50

Programme notes:

It is good fortune for brass players that a relatively large collection of music form the achieve of the 16th and 17th century German Stadtpfeifer, or ton pipers has survived. The duties of these bands included playing at official celebrations, civic weddings and baptisms, to provide fanfares or signals played from church towers o town squares and simply to entertain. The music was usually derived from simple dance styles or sometimes more ambitiously from contrapuntal vocal music.

Melchoir Franck worked as a church musician in Nuremberg and as Kappellmeister at Coburg. As well as a huge amount of sacred choral music, he wrote a wealth of short instrumental dances, conzonas and intradas for performance by the town bands. In this selection Intradas 1 and 2 come from “Neue musikalische Intraden” a collection of 6 part pieces published in Nuremburg in 1608, while the German dance is an adaption of a 4 piece in the “Deutsche weltliche Gesange und Tanze” published in 1604.

Performance notes:

The three pieces can be played individually or as set. The outer movements should be majestic and bold without become brash. The central movement requires good cantabile control, a modest degree of tasteful expression and sensible balance between the two choirs. Suggestions are made for decorations on repeats but the players should feel free to use their own imagination and discretion.