John Dowland's Lute Songs: Third and Fourth Books with Original Tablature

By John Dowland

One of the few English musicians whose fame as a composer spread throughout Europe during his lifetime, John Dowland (1563–1626) was also unsurpassed in his day as a lute virtuoso. The composer of 88 lute songs, Dowland had twice applied for the position of lutenist at the court of Elizabeth I and was rejected both times — for religious reasons, it was thought. (He had converted to Catholicism during a Protestant reign.) His talents, however, were welcomed at courts in Germany, Venice, Florence, and Denmark. Since the early 20th century, Dowland's excellence as a song writer has been well established; and many of his compositions for lute — long shrouded in obscurity — have become well known.
This collection of 45 songs includes all the works in his original Third Booke of Songs or Aires; in A Pilgrime's Solace (his fourth collection); three contributions to his son Robert's A Musicall Banquet; plus a lovely galliard — a dance for solo guitar.
Together with Nadal's Lute Songs of John Dowland (First and Second Books), published in 1997, this compilation completes Dover's newly edited and engraved editions of Dowland's lute songs — a rich oeuvre sure to be studied and enjoyed by singers, guitarists, and music lovers alike.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Release date: May 23, 2013
• ISBN: 9780486171463

Book preview

Solace

The applause of them that judge, is the incouragement of those that write:

My first two bookes of aires speed so well that they have produced a third . . .

INTRODUCTION

John Dowland (1563–1626) was one of the greatest musicians of the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras, and his lute songs are among the most highly developed vocal works in the Western tradition. Having spent his late adolescence in France, the influence of the air de cour—most likely those of guitarist Adrian Le Roy—seems most natural as a model for Dowland’s airs. But his genius lay in his distinctive blend of continental styles, an overriding element of English lyricism, and the directness of the profound melancholy that dominates his work—a trait much in accord with aspects of the Elizabethan spirit.

Dowland published eighty-eight lute songs. Eighty-five appeared in four volumes, the remaining three in his son’s anthology of 1610, called A Musicall Banquet. The immensely popular First Booke of Songes or Ayres, published in 1597—the first English publication for voice and lute—was reprinted five times during the composer’s life, in 1600, 1603, 1606, 1608 and 1613. No other composer of lute songs was so complimented, nor was any other book of this type reprinted even once.

The full title¹ of this collection reflects Dowland’s awareness of the contemporary fondness for singing in a madrigal fashion:

The First Booke of Songes or Ayres

of foure partes with Tableture for the Lute:

So made that all the partes together, or either of them severally

may be sung to the Lute, Orpherian or Viol da gambo.

Although it seems that the solo-song version was the ayre’s primary form, most of Dowland’s lute songs were published with alternate versions for a four-part vocal ensemble, suitable as well for consort performance. In all cases the lute tablature was printed below the cantus while the three lower voice parts were printed so that a group sitting around the book could read each part-line with ease.

All songs in The First Booke included four-part versions and were strophic in form. In The Second Booke, the first eight songs were published with cantus, bassus, and lute tablature only; through-composed (non-strophic) songs appeared for the first time; and the maturation of the lute part as a musically equal partner began the transformation of the ayre from accompanied vocal piece to art song. Dowland published this new collection in 1600, under the title:

The Second Booke of Songes or Ayres,

of 2. 4. and 5. parts:

With Tableture for the Lute

or Orpherion, with the Violl de Gamba

The present Dover edition contains the forty-five songs that followed The Second Booke, completing Dowland’s remarkable contributions to the lute-song literature. Twenty-one songs appeared in 1603, in

The Third and Last Booke of