The Second Annual Petrea Thule Early Music College October 1998

This was Petrea Thule's second day-long music event, held on Saturday, October 10th, 1998 at the All Saint's Anglican Church Hall in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. "Petrea Thule" is the SCA name for Peterborough and the surrounding area. This event was put on when Hurly Burly was the Petrea Thule Ensemble and Choir, and still affiliated with the SCA. To learn more about the SCA, you can visit their homesite at www.sca.org. To learn more about the Petrea Thule branch of the SCA, go to www.pipcom.com/~thule .

We followed a very similar format to the previous year's event: A series of classes throughout the day, followed by a potluck dinner, concert and bardic circle.

Classes that took place at the event included:

• Two drumming workshops, Basic Doumbek and Advanced Percussion (drills and advanced rhythms and expression)
• Warm-ups for dancers and Basic Middle Eastern Dance
• Elizabethan Vocal Music
• An intro to the history of the Celtic harp and two harp workshops, beginner/intermediate and advanced
• A joint Choir/Instrumental Ensemble workshop focusing on period group performance and blending instruments and voices
• A class on the Lute
• A talk on Making Instruments by Hand - tips, sources, examples
• A Recorder Workshop/Jam Session (other soft woodwinds such as wooden flute are also welcome).

As with the 1997 event, it was officially hosted by the SCA; however, the 1998 event was also open to non-SCAdians, so we had a nice turn-out from local Peterborough people as well as the usual SCAdian music crowd.

For those who may be interested, the schedule and class descriptions for the 1998 event are included below. Anyone who would like to learn more about music in Petrea Thule, or wants to host their own music event, and would like more information, can contact Petrea Thule's current Arts and Sciences minister at harpandsong@cogeco.ca, or Hurly Burly's music director at thaney@pipcom.com. [This page was updated November 2002]

9:30am-10am - REGISTRATION

10am-11am - SESSION #1
(i) Basic Doumbek (Seonag and Streonwold)
(ii) Intro to the History of the Celtic Harp (Arowyn)

11am-12pm - SESSION #2
(i) Basic Doumbek, con'd.
(ii) Recorder Workshop/Jam Session (Arowyn)
(iii) A Basic Guide to Building Musical Instruments (Tempus)

12pm-1:30pm - LUNCH

1:30-2:30 - SESSION #3 ("QUIET TIME")
(i) Harp Workshop (Arowyn) - Beginner/Intermediate
(ii) Elizabethan Vocal Workshop (Constance)
(iii) Lute Class (Anne of P-Thule)

2:30-3:30 - SESSION #4 ("QUIET TIME")
(i) Harp Workshop, con'd - Advanced
(ii) Elizabethan Vocal Workshop, con'd.
(iii) Warm-Ups for Dancers (Aenflaed)

3:30-4:30 - SESSION #5
(i) Advanced Percussion (Knott)
Joint Choir/Ensemble Workshop (Anne T. and Arowyn):
(ii) Choir with Anne T.
(iii) Ensemble with Arowyn

4:30-5:30 - SESSION #6
(i) Advanced Percussion, con'd.
(ii) Joint Choir/Ensemble Workshop, Con'd.
- Choir and Ensemble Together
(iii) Basic Mid-Eastern Dance (Aenflaed)

5:30-7:00 - DINNER/POTLUCK

7:00-8:00/8:30 - CONCERT

8:00/8:30 - 10pm - BARDIC CIRCLE, Dancing, etc. (site closes 10pm)

11pm-late! - Post-rev and Desert Revel at Tanah/Arowyn's house, just uptown from the event site

CELTIC HARP - with Lady Arowyn (Tanah Haney)

I-Introduction to the History of the Celtic Harp (1 hr.)
-basic intro to the evolution of the harp, from ancient times to the present

II-Harp Workshop, Begginer/Intermediate (1 hr.)
-will start with a brief intro to practical harp techniques and how to avoid harp-related injury; followed by a hands-on introduction to early music for harp, which will include workshopping a couple of easy period pieces

III-Harp Workshop, Advanced (1 hr.)
-will workshop period piece(s) and give people a chance to perform
-will focus on developing your own arrangements and accompaniments, learning pieces by ear, performance, and some essential differences between period and modern techniques

For more info on the Celtic harp, you can see Arowyn's page at: www.celticharper.com

CHOIR/ENSEMBLE WORKSHOP - Lady Anne Tinker (Sue Corbishley) and Lady Arowyn

I. The first session will be split into two classes, choral and instrumental. (1 hr. each)
- Warm-ups, short intro to period group performance, handing out of music, discussions of arrangement of the piece(s), practicing

II. Bring instruments and voices together, polishing piece(s) (1 hr.)

DANCE - with Lady Aenflaed (Anne-Marie Schlodder)

I-"No pain stretches" for dancers. The movements covered will aid in flexability and stamina, and there will be a brief "how to avoid injury" segment as well. (1 hr.)
II-Basic Beginner Middle Eastern Dance (1 hr.)

DRUMMING PART 1- with Lady Seonag (Sandy Woodhouse) and Lord Streonwold (Stephen Benetti)

Class Title: Basic Doumbek (Two 1 hour sessions)

I-Introduction to the Middle Eastern Hand drum

• types of drums (doumbek, darabuka, djembi, tar)
• care and feeding of the drum
• warming up the drummer
• how to hold the drum
• how to hit the drum and get its basic sounds (DUM, Tek, Ka)
• chanting and counting rhythms
• the "Square four" warm up exercise
• drum "etiquette" (maintaining the cadence, the "pulse", playing quietly-why and when, accents)

II-Four basic rhythms: Baladi, Mas Moudi, Saiidi, Laz
-Followed by: A (longer) basic rhythm & making music with the rhythms
-Chiftitelli, signaling and executing changes, putting rhythms together, free jam

DRUMMING PART 2 - with Lord Knott (Brock Massel) (1.5-2 hrs.)

Title: Percussion drills and technique
Sub: Practising to make Arabesque music from your drum
Format: Drill practice interspersed with examples in songs that you will play. Bring your Drum!

Topics :

• Sound quality
• Hand drills
• Timing drills
• Pulse and pocket
• Arabesque guidelines for improvisation
• Evoking emotion

Resources: lesson notes and brief discography will be provided.

ELIZABETHAN VOCAL MUSIC - with Lady Constance (Katherine Penney) (2 hours)

Lady Constance would like people to participate on one of two levels:
1. As an observer
- would require showing up for the class with whatever supplies are needed to take notes well

2. As an active participant
- would require participants showing up for the class with a period piece they are relatively familiar with. She would rather not teach them the music of the piece, rather, the proper way to perform it. She can provide pieces (even with a tape if necessary) at request.

She would also like people to have the opportunity to recognize and express appropriate period performance practice, without it becoming a judging session.

HOUR #2: Limit participants to 6 or so, and have everyone bring a copy, or at least the title/author of the piece they'll be doing
- Allow everyone to perform without hearing lecture (15-20 min) Lecture/demo for 15-20 minutes, incorporating subtle critiques of each performance into the lecture (she promises to be "nice"!)
- Work together as a group for 10-15 minutes (more if possible) allow everyone to perform, giving everyone the opportunity to write a "brag sheet" for every performer, noting the good performance practices of the participant. This second step, if there are 6 participants, should take about .5 hour
- Close, expressing the good points about what each of the participants has learned.

INSTRUMENT MAKING - with Lord Tempus (Kevin B.R.E. Torfasson) (1 hr.)

This will take a different perspective than Tat Stanley's talk last year on building harps. It will focus more generally on what is involved in making wooden instruments by hand, such as which wood is good instrument wood, costs involved, which instruments are good to start with and which are better to leave until you've had some experience, where to find source material, tricks of the trade, etc. Tempus will bring several examples of easy-to-make instruments such as the mountain dulcimer.

THE LUTE - with Lady Anne of Petrea Thule (Anne Crown)

This will be a one-hour general talk on the lute, with examples in music, pictures, and the real thing! This is not an interactive workshop per say, but feel free to bring your lute, or any questions you might have. Lute players are welcome to join the joint choral/instrumental workshop later in the day.

RECORDER WORKSHOP/ JAM SESSION - with Lady Arowyn

This will be more of a jam than an instruction session. Feel free to bring music of your own for us to try (be sure to bring extra copies!); I'll have plenty there too. Bring your own music stand, as I don't guarantee there will be a lot of spares. I'll also dedicate the first 10 min. of the workshop to answering questions about the recorder. A reminder that recorder players (and other woodwinds!) are encouraged to join the afternoon choral/instrumental workshop.

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