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• 7 Lieder from the Leopold Codex

7 Lieder from the Leopold Codex

for 3 - 4 instruments with optional tenor voice.

These songs are taken from MS Mus. 3154 of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich, a collection sometimes referred to after the inscription on it which reads “Magistri nicolai leopoldi ex insprugga (Innsbruck)”; various theories have been advanced as to who the Leopold in questions was, none of which can be in any sense conclusive. The manuscript appears to have been written over a period, from 1487 to 1511, and, together with the codex of Nicolas Apel, with which it shares several concordances, is the main source of German music of around 1500.
The repertoire in Munich 3154 is mostly sacred, though several pieces are untexted. However, there is a group of secular songs that seem to be unique to this source, and which are in a rather distinctive style somewhere between the Glogauer Liederbuch and the generation of Hofhaimer; we have included most of these in the present edition. Modally they are curious at times, but they should not be judged by the standards of later music. It is very good to have a four-part version of Ich sachs eins mals, which survives only in two 3-part settings in Glogau. Es saßen höld in einer Stuben is a remarkable little piece, with its cross-rhythms in the tenor melody, itself a model of melodic elegance and economy: sadly no text has survived. In Jesu corona Virginum / Ein frischen Buelen the main melody - in the altus - is presented in smaller note values than one would expect, and pitted against a more slow-moving tenor: unusually, the main theme is heard three times. The untitled piece at the end is also unusual in a number of respects: the three upper parts share the same range, so that sometimes the tenor rises to the top; the fact that there is no repeated section at the beginning suggests that it is not a normal Lied, and may possibly have been composed as an instrumental piece.
In this edition the original note values have been halved in the duple-time pieces and quartered in the triple. No. 7 has been transposed down a fourth. Editorial accidentals are printed small above the stave, applying to the one note only.
In performance the most important consideration is the balance between the parts: the main melody, which is in the tenor in all but no. 5 (here in the altus) must ring out clearly; in a purely instrumental performance this can be achieved by choosing a contrasting instrument for this part: in no. 7 the cantus and tenor seem as if they should be equally in the foreground.