WILLIAM LAWES
Consort Sets in Five & Six Parts

Reference: AV9823

• Hespèrion XXI
• Jordi Savall

“Nor was the King’s soul so ingrossed with grief for the death of so near a Kinsman, and Noble a Lord, but that hearing of the death of his deare servant William Lawes, he had a particular mourning from him when dead, whom he loved when living, and commonly called the Father of Musick”.
History of the worthies of England, Thomas Fuller (1662)

“Nor was the King’s soul so ingrossed with grief for the death of so near a Kinsman, and Noble a Lord, but that hearing of the death of his deare servant William Lawes, he had a particular mourning from him when dead, whom he loved when living, and commonly called the Father of Musick”.
History of the worthies of England, Thomas Fuller (1662)

On 24th September, 1645, the untimely death of William Lawes at the age of 43, during the siege of Chester, prematurely deprived England of one of the most innovative and fascinating musical figures of the day. As a tribute to this brilliant composer, the too-long-forgotten “Father of Musick”, we have decided to mark the 400th anniversary of his birth with a complete recording of all ten Consort Sets in Five & Six Parts.

+ information in the CD booklet

JORDI SAVALL
Vienna, 30th April, 2002

Lawes, and Coprario, with whom he frequently played. In 1635, he was appointed “ordinary musician for lutes and voice” at the Court of Charles I, who dubbed him “the Father of Musick”. A Royalist, he followed the prince when the Court was transferred to Oxford in 1642 and enlisted in the king’s army. He fought in the civil war of 1645 and died defending a garrison in Chester that same year.

During his short career, William Lawes composed all kinds of music: vocal and instrumental pieces, religious music; he was also the most important composer of music for the theatre before Henry Purcell? His was the great age of the “masque”, the official Court entertainment? And, of course, chamber music for viol consorts, which were very popular ensembles at that time. A great lover of the theatre, Lawes distinguished himself from composers of the preceding generation by introducing a dramatic quality and unusual expressiveness into consort music. Aware of the technical possibilities of the instruments and the new sounds that could be achieved with the consort, Lawes did not hesitate to introduce innovations in his composition: dissonance, changing textures and colour, unexpected harmonic modifications in the melodic line, conceived with a great sense of the music’s architecture. These 5 and 6-part pieces exude great energy, written in the form of dance movements which compose a kaleidoscope of moods and sounds. The resulting music is sumptuous.

Tireless in his task of rediscovering English music, Jordi Savall has decided to mark the 400th anniversary of the birth of William Lawes by offering with his ensemble Hespèrion XXI the complete Consort Sets in Five & Six Parts by this outstanding composer of the first half of the 17th century. A double CD which forms a single unified whole, allowing the listener to savour the full-bodied, voluptuous consort sound of Hespèrion XXI.