Phantasm – An Encounter with Baroque English Music

For my third art interaction at Oxford through this class, I attended a traditional English music concert at Magdalen College this past Sunday. The artist group that performed the concert was called “Phantasm,” joined by Daniel Hyde on the organ. Being a classical violinist I thought I knew what I was in for before I walked over to Magdalen for the concert. However, what I expected from Phantasm was not what I actually experienced.

The biggest fact that threw me off about Phantasm was that I was expecting a classical chamber music string sextet, with violins, violas, and cellos. When the musicians walked out with their instruments it was instantly clear that they were not “classical musicians” in the most typical sense. In fact, they carried with them were not violins but “viols,” late 15th century baroque instruments that were completely different from the modern violin that we know today. While the violin has four strings and no frets, the viol, or Viola da gamba, is a six-stringed, fretted instrument that is played with a bow. Viols are most commonly strung with low-tension gut strings, as opposed to the violin, which is typically strung high-tension steel strings. Unlike violins, which are tuned in fifths, viols are tuned in fourths with a major third in the middle. In contrast to the modern-day concave violin bow, the bow used to play the viol is convex, as the bows in the baroque period typically were. The “organ” that Hyde played was also less of a traditional modern-day organ and more like a baroque-period virginal.

After recovering from this initial surprise I took my seat and prepared to listen to some baroque music. The musicians of Phantasm were very gifted and expressive musicians. Technically, I heard almost no mistakes. Musically, I felt that the pieces they chose to play were both challenging and adventurous. I had never heard of William Lawes or John Ward before. This concert exposed me to an entire field in music that I had forgotten about – early baroque music, and English baroque at that. The actual concert itself was intriguing to me, as the music Phantasm played was very rich and expressive, yet there was something rebellious about the texture of the music. With the pieces by Lawes, I noticed that while the viol typically was considered a “quiet” instrument, the music he wrote significantly defied this norm. These pieces would have moments of quiet, peaceful meditations, followed by outbursts of energy. There is a substantial amount of emotion packed into these pieces, demonstrated through the striking contrast of the music, sometimes within a matter of a few beats. The organ only added to the rich texture of Lawes’s compositions. It played a major role in tying the melodies and harmonies of all six viols together, weaving in and out of the other instruments to create underlying themes in the music.

All in all, I felt that Phantasm achieved the artistic goals that it set out to achieve. It performed expressive, adventurous, enjoyable music in the style of the baroque period, never faltering in their professionalism or stage presence. They chose music that made the audience think, about the melodies, about the shape of phrases, about the rich textures and interesting chord progressions of the music. I think they did a very commendable job in interpreting William Lawes’ music.