bardic

Review: The Knowne World Bardcast Features the Music of Calontir

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Unknown Artist. Minstrels with a Rebec & a Lute.
13th c. Manasseh Codex. El Escorial, Madrid. Public domain in the US

The Knowne World Bardcast is a podcast of bardic performances from across the Society. The typical format is familiar to listeners of radio and podcasts for generation; a playlist of recordings gathered from bards who have recorded their songs and made them available. The production levels of the recordings are spotty, of course, but Lord Gideon ap Stephen does a good job of editing the program and making it interesting. It is a pleasant way to be introduced to the music of other kingdoms, and a good way to pass the time on road trips to foreign wars. Please consider subscribing on your favorite podcatcher.

Lord Gideon is on a quest to publish episodes that showcase each particular Kingdom. His goal is to have episodes for all 20 Kingdoms, and he has done several of them so far. At the time of this article, he had recently posted an episode for Calontir and, for the first time, had to split the episode into two parts.

The Calontir Episode, Part One:  In the Key of Army

“Part One: In the Key of Army” is a documentary-style episode recorded at Gulf Wars. Gideon recorded Calontir singing as a kingdom at the Calontir Party. Standards such as the Battle of Maldon, Benevento, In Praise of a New Knighthood, and many other Calon favorites. Will make any Calontiri heart skip a beat, and long to join the chorus at the earliest opportunity.

The Calontir Episode, Part Two:  The Heart, The Land

This is a more typical episode of The Knowne World Bardcast. After being impressed by Calontir’s group singing, Gideon received messages reminding him that Calontir has its own share of solo bards, songwriters, poets and performers. The call went out and many answered and  “Part Two:  The Heart, The Land” was born. From across time and space, recordings of Calontir bards were gathered and assembled into a playlist:

Lord Gideon’s “The Knowne World Bardcast” is a great addition to the wealth of SCA culture, and this close look at Calontir’s culture of song is most welcome. We will be adding KWB to our SCA Links page under “Arts and Culture”

Calontir Storycorps at Chieftains and Crown Tourney

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The Bavarian Herald Jörg Rügen around 1510. Public Domain in the US

Come, bring us your stories!

Calontir Storycorps is collecting the recollections of the populace at Chieftains and Crown Tourney this Spring! We would like to hear and record SCA stories (or at least involving SCA people): stories you were there for personally, stories that were told to you, and events/happenings you think pivotal to our history. We can record your story day of, or you can arrange a phone-call or to send us your own audio file. Why? We want to fill in the story of the kingdom, get points of view from our elder members especially, and ultimately provide a source for future Calontiri to use in creating performances and written histories in the period style. Please find/contact me (Elynor) at the event to sign up for an interview!

Legal stuff: In future we may seek to post the actual recordings or transcripts online so that they may be easily accessible to the populace.To that end each participant will be asked to sign a Society media release form, to give permission for use (and which kinds of use: audio, transcript) at the time of the recording.

YIS,
and

Select Videos of Performances at Queen’s Prize 2019

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Videos courtesy of Mathurin Kebusso

(Apologies to Elaisse de Garrigues; the video of your performance was lost)

These are clips of the complete performances.

Da’ud ibn al-Kabsh al-Garnati al- Mai’ez, called Maaz, “A hakawati style reading of stories and histories of Abd al-Rahman I”

 

 

 

Melanie de la Tour, “Musical Performance (voice and mandolin) of a John Dowland song, Awake Sweet Love”

 

 

 

Pádraigín an Ein i gh, “The Foulest Place of Mine Arse is Fairer Than Thine Face: Them’s Fighting Words, A Demonstration in Taboo Language”

PARENTAL WARNING:  This video contains adult language and themes. 

 

 

 

 

 

Duke Conn MacNeill’s Albums Available on Google Play

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Unknown Artist. Minstrels with a Rebec & a Lute. 13th c. Manasseh Codex. El Escorial, Madrid. Public domain in the US

Unknown Artist. Minstrels with a Rebec & a Lute.
13th c. Manasseh Codex. El Escorial, Madrid. Public domain in the US

For those Calontiri who remember His Grace Duke Conn MacNeill, the bard king of Calontir, two albums of his songs are now available on Google Play.  The albums, Visitacions de la Muse Polyhymnia and Valor d’Amor, recently became available for purchase and download.

Visitacions contains many songs older Calontiri will recall fondly, and several that remain classics and are sung around the fire to this day. The album was originally a cassette tape, and the recording quality shows it. But for those who want to hear “Rite of Passage” or “Crown and Kingdom” sung by the laurel bard who wrote them, it won’t matter in the least.

Valor is much better technically, and continues to demonstrate His Grace’s talents as a songwriter and singer. “Captive Heart” is an especially pleasant surprise for those who did not follow Conn’s work after his departure.

 

https://play.google.com/store/music/artist/Conn_MacNeill_Bob_Charron?id=Ajdh5ig3gm5oc5tkli7tcis2qdi&hl=en

Angus of Blackmoor Songs

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Unknown Artist. Minstrels with a Rebec & a Lute. 13th c. Manasseh Codex. El Escorial, Madrid. Public domain in the US

Unknown Artist. Minstrels with a Rebec & a Lute.
13th c. Manasseh Codex. El Escorial, Madrid. Public domain in the US

The CalonSound Project has a new posting up in The Tapes section. This is a tape from 1990 of songs sung by Angus of Blackmoor.  Included songs are:

  1. Brother Knights of Calontir
  2. Song of the Calon Huscarl
  3. King William’s Wall
  4. Song of Roland (no, not that one 🙂 )
  5. Valen’s Song
  6. Odin’s Bards

Skald of Their Majesties’ Court Competition at Valor/Bardic Bedlam

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From the Dean of the Bardic College:

“What is a Norse court without a skald?” asked Prinz Logan and Prinzessa Ylva.

At the Valor/Bardic Bedlam event, eight weeks after Their ascension to the thrones, the royal couple will hold a skald competition.

They request a story/poem/song/other depicting the glory of a particular person, group, or the Calontir army in general at Lilies War or Pennsic… or some other event that occurred between Crown Tourney and Valor (inclusive). A Norse style is mandatory.

Some “documentation” is a plus, either written or spoken, explaining the historical basis for the piece, but it needn’t be in great depth.

Truth is optional. Exaggeration is expected.

The winner shall be named Skald of Their Majesties’ court, will likely be asked to perform the piece several times during Their reign, and might be asked to sit with Them in court a time or two, on a cushion or stool.

Unknown Artist. Minstrels with a Rebec & a Lute. 13th c. Manasseh Codex. El Escorial, Madrid. Public domain in the US

Unknown Artist. Minstrels with a Rebec & a Lute.
13th c. Manasseh Codex. El Escorial, Madrid. Public domain in the US

Calontir CD Vol II Available for Download

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The CalonSound Project has made the image file (.iso) of the Calontir CD Vol II available for download.

The CD includes two songs, Swan Road and Loki’s Song, written and sung by Mikal the Ram.

The CD can only be distributed as a physical CD or as an ISO file, due to the permissions of the artists involved. Most modern computers are capable of burning CDs from an ISO without any special software.

Midrealm Bardic Madness October 31st

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Midrealm’s Bardic Madness is upon us.

Bardic Madness XVII , “Fillet of a Fenny Snake”, will be hosted by The Marche of the Unicorn, in the Barony of the Flaming Gryphon, on October 31st

(MacMillan Hall, Miami University, 531 E Spring St, Oxford, Ohio 45056)

We will explore the relationship between Shakespeare and Halloween. Yes, there are many Macbeth references 🙂

Some of the challenges that day will be:

  • “Speaking For-Seuss-ly”
  • “Look Ma, No Hands” (that’s Shakespeare Puppet Theater, Titus Andronicus Edition)
  • “At Last, Poor Yorick” (give voice to a dead person, fictional or real)

And our “Come As You Aren’t” party!

For a full list of challenges and more info on the event, go to
http://www.no-gorsedd.com/bmxvii/

And, in particular, please contact me if you’d like to be a patron or teach.

Llywelyn Glyndyverdwy
(Mark Cipra) cipram@sbcglobal.net

Drakenfjord Songbook Taken Down

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The Drakenfjord songbook, Bardic Babblings, has been taken down.

Katrin Karlsdottir, the compiler of the songbook, issued this statement on the SCA BARDS email list:

I am very sorry to all whose works are in the Bardic Babblings file
currently up on the Drakenfjord website. The Book is a copy of my
personal lyric sheet collection with my annotations regarding where
they all came from trimmed out and a few articles I was using to teach
a bardic class It was never supposed to be published at all! Now that
I am aware the files were thrown together and published I am working
to get it taken down asap.

She later reported:

I got it down. I have no idea how long it has been up. I pulled the
whole library page until we can double check copyright information on
everything!

Again, my sincere apologies to all.