COUNTING THE HOURS (The Goldberg Variations)

COUNTING THE HOURS
JS Bach’s Goldberg Variations and other music of nighttime
INCANTATI
Petra Samhaber-Eckhardt, violin, Rachel Stott, viola d’amore,
Ibrahim Aziz, viola da gamba
with SATOKO DOI-LUCK, harpsichord, and DANIEL GILCHRIST, narrator

Goldberg Aria harpsichord
Variation 1 TRIO
Variation 2 harpsichord & TRIO
Variation 3 (canon) TRIO
Variation 4 harpsichord
Variation 5 harpsichord
Variation 6 (canon) TRIO
Variation 7 violin & viola da gamba
The Clock (Osbert Parsley 1510—1585) TRIO, harpsichord & voice
Variation 8 harpsichord
Variation 9 (canon) TRIO
Puzzle Canon (John Dunstable 1390—1453) TRIO & voice
Variation 10 harpsichord
Variation 11 harpsichord
Variation 12 (canon) TRIO
Puzzle Canon (Anonymous) TRIO & voice
Variation 13 TRIO
Variation 14 harpsichord
Variation 15 (canon) TRIO
Ma Fin est mon Commencement
(Guillaume de Machaut 1300—1377) TRIO & voice
Variation 16 harpsichord & TRIO
Variation 17 harpsichord

Dappoi che’il sole Niccolò da Perugia (14th century) TRIO & voice
Variation 18 (canon) TRIO
Variation 19 harpsichord &TRIO
Variation 20 harpsichord
Variation 21 (canon) TRIO
The Little Owl Leos Janacek (1854—1928) TRIO
Variation 22 harpsichord
Variation 23 harpsichord
Variation 24 (canon) TRIO
Variation 25 TRIO
Variation 26 harpsichord
Variation 27 (canon) violin & viola da gamba
Variation 28 harpsichord
Variation 29 harpsichord
So Unutterably Anxious Leos Janacek & J.S.Bach TRIO & harpsichord
Good Night! Leos Janacek TRIO & voice
Quodlibet TRIO & harpsichord & voice
Aria TRIO & harpsichord & voice

Every third Variation of the Goldberg Variations is a canon, except the final one, which is a quodlibet, a piece which combines several already existing tunes. This suggested the idea of creating poetic quodlibets to accompany two of the instrumental pieces. The quodlibets have been created from lines of poems by Walter de la Mare, Edward Thomas, James Thomson, Percy Bysshe Shelley and W.B.Yeats.
The poem heard during Variation 9 is Invocation to Sleep by Anne Finch, Countess of Winchelsea.