There are a significant number of pieces with introductions, such as "I saw my lady weep" "In darkness let me dwell", and, notably, John Daniel's setting of his brothers tryptich "Grief keep within", to name but a few. An analysis of the extant introductions, in which the music is through composed and integral to the composition, argues persuasively for a style that does not simply repeat or reform some of the song material into an intro.
Pieces also have interludes and postludes of various sorts, the Spanish repertory has some of the finest of these. A somewhat different option is to play short pieces before and after each song and string them into a medley. dt At 07:52 PM 7/23/2008, you wrote: >Hi everybody, > >Recently, working with a new singer on my English Lute songs program, I >started to wonder why these songs do not have an introduction or an >instrumental part in the middle or at the end. Were lutenists expected to >improvise or to compose extra bits of music for performance? In case they >didn't do it, are we suposed to do so? I don't recall hearing anybody >(besides Edin Karamazov) doing so. For example, Anthony Rooley with Emma >Kirkby presented these songs with no intro whatsoever. > >Any thoughts? > >-- > >To get on or off this list see list information at >http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
