The Tudor Fair Blog
Haec Dies! Music for rebirth and renewal.
Every once in a while there’s a piece of music that paints such a beautiful picture of happiness, rebirth, renewal, and the essence of Easter, that you just have to get up and dance a jig. That’s what Byrd’s Haec Dies does for me. Latin for This is the Day…
How to Self-Publish a Book in a Week
Yep, in case anyone is wondering, I do indeed have a lot of creative projects on the go right now. It’s been a study in project management keeping them all going, to be honest, and I’m truly glad that some of them are wrapping up soon. It will free up…
Why you should become intimate with Dido & Aeneas
Between 1684 and 1688 English music, opera, and music history was changed when Purcell wrote Dido & Aeneas, one of England’s earliest operas written by the Grandaddy of English Baroque. Now, 350 years later, it is still alive and well as a new recording by the Armonico Consort demonstrates, and…
Alison Weir on Tudor Feminism, Norah Lofts, and the Cult of Anne Boleyn
About 2o years ago I read Alison Weir’s Six Wives of Henry VIII. I remember starting it, laying in my bed in my attic bedroom when it was snowing outside. I was immediately hooked on this saga of drama and the way lives could be forever changed because of the inability…
Music for Impressing a King: Taverner’s Missa Corona Spinea, Wolsey, and Henry VIII
In March 1527 Henry VIII and his wife Catherine of Aragon visited Cardinal Wolsey’s new foundation – Cardinal’s College – in Oxford. John Taverner, one of the most famous composers of his time, was commissioned to write an appropriately stunning piece of choral music that would wow the King and…
Five Things You Didn’t Know About Mary I (but probably should)
Mary Tudor (aka Mary I, aka Bloody Mary) is the Person of the Month over on the Tudor Times website. I did a podcast episode on her about a year and a half ago, and I wanted to revisit this much-maligned woman. So here, for your reading pleasure – some random…
5 Key Takeaways on the Rise of the Tudor Navy
I’ve been on a bit of a Boat Craze over on the Renaissance English History Podcast for the past few months. I did an episode on the Rise of the Tudor Navy, the Iron Industry of the Weald (which helped propel the navy forward with the blast iron furnace that…
Cordoba: The 11th Century’s Most Cosmopolitan City
If you were looking for the hippest place to be in 11th century Europe, you wouldn’t go to Paris. Or London, which was an outpost badgered by centuries of Viking invasions, and was about to be conquered by the Normans. You wouldn’t go to Berlin, or Florence, or even Rome.…
Early Music Saturday: Madrigals of Madness from the Calmus Ensemble
I have said it before, and I’ll say it again – I find the best music via the Millennium of Music show, which is on both Sirius and NPR. I have a membership and can listen to old episodes (it’s the best $2.99/month I spend) and I was perusing episodes…
How Scotland arrived in Westminster
This week I’ve been re-reading Alison Weir’s The Lost Tudor Princess, Alison Weir’s book about Margaret Douglas, Henry VIII’s niece via his sister Margaret, who married the King of Scotland. When her husband died, she married again for love, and had Margaret, who, because she was born on English soil became a…
Teba: A Spanish Castle with a Scottish History
A crumbling castle in rural Andalusia with a Scottish history? And you can go wander around for free, and it only costs like €2 to get in to the building itself? Say what? Yep, that’s the Castle of the Stars at Teba. Teba itself is a pueblo blanco (white village –…
Everything New is Old Again: The ORA Choir launch
In about a week and a half I’m going back to London to attend (and write about) the launch of the ORA Singers, a new choir that is based on commissioning contemporary composers write reimagined reflections of Tudor masterworks. Full disclosure – I know Suzi Digby, the founder. About 5 years…