COUNTING THE HOURS

J S Bach's Goldberg Variations with other music of nighttime

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COUNTING THE HOURS

JS Bach’s Goldberg Variations and other music of nighttime

INCANTATI

Petra Samhaber-Eckhardt, violin, Rachel Stott, viola d’amore,

Ibrahim Aziz, viola da gamba

with SATOKO DOI-LUCK, harpsichord, and DANIEL GILCHRIST, narrator

Goldberg Aria harpsichord

Variation 1 TRIO

Variation 2 harpsichord & TRIO

Variation 3 (canon) TRIO

Variation 4 harpsichord

Variation 5 harpsichord

Variation 6 (canon) TRIO

Variation 7 violin & viola da gamba

The Clock (Osbert Parsley 1510—1585) TRIO, harpsichord & voice

Variation 8 harpsichord

Variation 9 (canon) TRIO

Puzzle Canon (John Dunstable 1390—1453) TRIO & voice

Variation 10 harpsichord

Variation 11 harpsichord

Variation 12 (canon) TRIO

Puzzle Canon (Anonymous) TRIO & voice

Variation 13 TRIO

Variation 14 harpsichord

Variation 15 (canon) TRIO

Ma Fin est mon Commencement

(Guillaume de Machaut 1300—1377) TRIO & voice

Variation 16 harpsichord & TRIO

Variation 17 harpsichord

Dappoi che’il sole Niccolò da Perugia (14^th century) TRIO & voice

Variation 18 (canon) TRIO

Variation 19 harpsichord &TRIO

Variation 20 harpsichord

Variation 21 (canon) TRIO

The Little Owl  Leos Janacek (1854—1928) TRIO

Variation 22 harpsichord

Variation 23 harpsichord

Variation 24 (canon) TRIO

Variation 25 TRIO

Variation 26 harpsichord

Variation 27 (canon) violin & viola da gamba

Variation 28 harpsichord

Variation 29 harpsichord

So Unutterably Anxious Leos Janacek & J.S.Bach TRIO & harpsichord 

Good Night! Leos Janacek TRIO & voice

Quodlibet TRIO & harpsichord & voice

Aria TRIO & harpsichord & voice

Every third Variation of the Goldberg Variations is a canon, except the final one, which is a quodlibet, a piece which combines several already existing tunes. This suggested the idea of creating poetic quodlibets to accompany two of the instrumental pieces.  The quodlibets have been created from lines of poems by Walter de la Mare, Edward Thomas, James Thomson, Percy Bysshe Shelley and W.B.Yeats.  

The poem heard during Variation 9 is Invocation to Sleep by Anne Finch, Countess of Winchelsea.