Parthenia: Continental Connections

The English viol consort music that we know and love so much was influenced by many continental musical fashions. Throughout the 16th and early 17th century, court composers and musicians, traveling in the entourage of their respective courts, interacted with their foreign counterparts. Some English and European composers traveled to look for work abroad to escape religious persecution at home. In this workshop we will explore the musical connections that flowed in both directions—from European countries to England and back again. These explorations will include Franco-Flemish music in England at the court of Henry VIII, Spanish influences at Mary Tudor’s court, the love of Italian music in Elizabethan England, and Danish and German connections with England when Anne of Denmark, the wife of James I, was the Queen.