This cd was created from a cassette-only recording done in 1988, with additional tracks from "Under the Drawbridge" by the Solstice Assembly and "World Music Our Way" by Mappamundi. Fulfillment, Sherburne, The Lord at First did Adam Make, Time to Remember the Poor, Ma-Oz Tsur, Y'vanim, Simu Shemen, S'vivon, Hanerot Halalu, Sussex Mummers' Carol, Gloucester Wassail, May Waltz/Woodcutter's Song, In the Bleak Midwinter, Blessed be that Maid Marie, Gaudete, Gedeonis Area, Cookham, Sainte Nicholaes, The Very First Blessing, The Holly and the Ivy, The Boar's Head Carol, Tappster Dryngker!, Rock the Cradle, Joe, Pastime with Good Company, The King, The Holly Bears a Berry, Let Memory Keep Us All, Now is Come Our Joyful Feast
Brief streaming mp3 sound clips:
In the Bleak Midwinter (The Buds)
Cookham (Sacred Harp)
Ma-Oz Tsur (Italian)
Gloucester Wassail
Boar's Head Carol
Gaudete
Some of the original cassettes remain: if you want of these cassettes for $8.95 click here.
For the same price I am also making "authorized bootleg" copies on cd for $8.95 each. These include the bonus tracks.
There is a companion songbook, 47 pages long, with all the arrangements as sung on the recording, including "Let Memory Keep Us All." This book is available for $6.95.
Click the button below if you are purchasing four or more copies of the Three Log Night Songbook for a discounted price of $5.95 each.
Reviewed by David Potorti for the Independent
"There's a lot to love about Mappamundi's first CD release: powerful vocal harmonies, complex musical arrangements and exotic acoustic instruments played with great relish. And they're all rendered with pristine clarity, courtesy of Jerry Brown's studio and Skylark Studios in Chapel Hill. Mappamundi translates as "map of the world," and the selections take us on that globe-circling journey: There's "Sinii Platochek," a popular World War II song from the Soviet Union; "Down Among the Dead Men," a number from Colonial America; "Okrug Selo," from Croatia; "Tsi Darf Es Azoy Zayn," a Holocaust text with the tango rhythm popular in the '30s and '40s; and "Now is Come Our Joyful Feast," in which "a cheerful Elizabethan text mongrelizes a gloomy shape note tune."
"That same brevity and wit characterize the descriptions accompanying the rest of the songs: "Polegnala is awakened in an irritable mood by an acorn falling on her head - she had been dreaming her sweetheart had brought her a golden ring in a multi-colored bouquet," read the CliffsNotes to "Polegnala E Todoro." Like a visit to the opera, the translations only add to our enjoyment. But more importantly, it's the music itself that leaps off the CD. Regardless of the source or style of the number, the music swings - there are no museum pieces here. And given the historic and academic bent of the group's memebers, you know you're getting the real deal.
"Beth Holmgren is professor of Slavic languages and literatures at UNC-Chapel Hill; Jane Peppler directs the Triangle Jewish Chorale and teaches singing at the Duke University Short Courses Program; Robbie Link is a ubiquitous performer/teacher/composer/arranger as well as the owner of Hillsborough's Red Hawk Music; Jim Baird teaches in the Durham school system; and multi-instrumentalist Ken Bloom has "introduced audiences to unfamiliar sounds in an entertainging way" on venues like A Prairie Home Companion - when he's not building the obscure instruments he plays, like the Bandura and the Kantele. (On World Music Our Way you'll have to settle for guitar, trombone, bouzouki, accordion, domro, fiddle, viola, concertina, bass, percussion and piano.) "This is the world music that makes us happiest," says the group. It also demonstrates the power that music, no matter when or where it's made, has in capturing our imaginations - and transporting us from the mundane to the unexpected."
For more information on this recording, and sound files, look at this page. This cd costs 13.99.
"Highlights of this one are the invention and audacity of Schwab's piano playing (she also featured on the scandalously unrepeated BBC2 American Civil War series). Whereas in so many cases the instrument shouldn't be permitted within a mile of a folk song, she skips in and around the tunes in ways you'd scarcely think possibly, cunningly aided and abbetted by Link's double bass."
Reviewed in "English Dance & Song," Spring 1995:
"This is a lighthearted recording of well-loved tunes ... Jacqueline Schwab's piano playing is the highlight of this cd. She colours her accompaniment to reflect the mood of the lyrics. Delicate and etherial one minute, dancing and lilting the next, her playing is rich and bold and she uses the entire range of the instrument. An unexpected treat is the bass playing of Robbie Link. He solos both with bow and without, providing counter-melodies far beyond the usual oom-pah. [Peppler's] viola, with its dark, woody tone is especially effective on "The Lass of Glenshee."
Jane Peppler teamed up with bassist Robbie Link and Jacqueline Schwab (pianist with the wonderful English country dance band Bare Necessities and pianist for Ken Burns' Grammy-winning Civil War series on PBS) to present this romantic, funny, haunting collection of 17th and 18th century country songs. Sedgefield Fair, Bushes and Briars, Reynard the Fox, The Lass of Glenshee, The Ploughboy, Artichokes & Cauliflowers, Adieu, Adieu, Mothering Sunday, Barracks Street, Bonny Lass of Anglesey, Rambling Comber, Maidstone Hall, Buy Broom Besoms, Black-Eyed Susan, Come Lasses and Lads
This CD costs 11.99
Streaming mp3 sound clip:
Sedgefield Fair
CD Review: "An all-seasons follow-up to Three Log Night, a regional Christmas favorite, Under the Drawbridge is an impressive introduction to the elegant, elastic vocal stylings of North Carolina's Solstice Assembly, an inventive 18- voice choral group that specializes in updating folk songs that span the last 800 years. These modern minstrels, favorites on the East Coast Renaissance festival circuit ... whether singing a cappella or accompanied by guitars, fiddles, percussion and recorders, showcase forceful harmonies with reverent relish and a youthful spirit. The alternately festive, romantic, and haunting arrangements mirror a variety of familiar vocal settings, including madrigal choruses, barbershop quartets, even such peers as the Bobs and the Roches... The most lasting pleasures ... are the older songs, all performed with an earnest affection that accents their beauty rather than their age." As featured on National Public Radio's Weekend Edition; debuted the peculiar genre of Medieval Beach Music. Down with the Rosemary and Bays; Cro-Magn the Barbarian; Li joliz temps d'estey; Rainbow; Rainmaker; Padaj kiso; Margot labourez les vignes; The Silent Bird; Pokraj more loze; Con el viento; Touch but my lips; Hard Times; White Collar Holler; Blind Bartimus; Once I had a sweetheart; John the Revelator; No hiding place; Cadgwith Anthem; The Hock Cart; Windham; Cuando el rey Nimrod; Resonet in laudibus; Long Journey; Let memory keep us all; Black-eyed Suzy
This CD costs 11.99
Streaming mp3 sound clip:
Sigh No More, Ladies
Philadelphia City Paper: "To ease an ache for beautiful singing, try the Solstice Assembly's Some Assembly Required. The voices blend perfectly, in a surprising array of styles, from the Bobs' modern a-cappella-with-attitude to French sea shanties and back to the Renaissance. Think of all the hyperbole about celestial sounds and angelic harmonies, double them and apply them here.'' CUE Magazine: "The Solstice Assembly then took the stage, and I mean TOOK IT, with an earthy vocal/choral style that reaches far back into folk traditions. Their singing tone is a full-throated delivery that commands attention and delivers great excitement and driving energy." Whitsuntide is Come, Sigh No More, Love is Come Again, Ripe and Bearded Barley, Roulez!, Vegan Fight Song, Spontaneous Human Combustion, Agincourt Carol, Gaude Mater Polonia, The Peddler's Song, Fine Knacks for Ladies, Chicken on a Raft, Double Cheese and Ham, Go Back Home, Canaan's Land, Northfield, Schnirele Perele, Up Above My Head, No Ozone, Drive Dull Care Away, Imi Notna Leviva-li, One More Shopping Day, Last Month of the Year, So Will We Yet, Suzannana
This CD costs 11.99