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4 Villancicos (Canciero de Palacio)

(Canciero de Palacio) for 4 voices or instruments.

These four songs are taken from the Cancionero Musical de Palacio, a large collection written between 1505 and 1520 that has survived in the library of the Palacio Real in Madrid. There are 458 pieces in total, mostly in three or four parts. Juan Encina (1468-1529) is most generously represented, with 62 pieces, but this is fully in line with his status as the leading Spanish composer of secular music of the time: among other things, he is known to have been active in composing for the theatre.
Dindirin, dindirin is probably based on an earlier 3-part song from the Montecassino MS (modern edition in Pope & Kanazawa, The Musical Manuscript Montecassino 871, Oxford, 1978.): the present version has the Montecassino superius in the 2nd part, so the top part is really a kind of descant.
In the present edition the original note values have been halved in duple-time sections and quartered in triple-time ones. Editorial accidentals are printed small above the stave, applying to the one note only. Original accidentals are taken as applying to the whole bar. I am grateful to Jack Sage for editing and translating the texts of these songs.
These pieces can be performed in a variety of ways: a capella, purely instrumentally or with a mixture of voices and instruments. They need good characterisation: no. 1 is wittily tongue-in-cheek, no. 3 crudely sardonic, while no. 2 is mysterious, almost magical, and should certainly not be taken too fast.