Brighton Festival – Rune: Decameron Musicale

Five excellent musicians – that is three singers, one also playing a Vielle (an early type of violin), an animated recorder player and a harpist. This was an old-fashioned concert, charming but academic and elite. They had strung together a musical entertainment that took five themes from the Decameron, Boccaccio’s compendium of earthy medieval stories. The playing was fine, the singing delicate and emotive but the storytelling was unconvincing. We might think that all the music of the 14 century, while beautiful, was sad or ill-fated, even when the recorder was going at full pelt. To quote Shakespeare ‘It had a dying fall’. Perhaps it was just those modal cadences and the seemingly endless melismas – but no, it was the lack of communication. All we were given were the titles of the works and just a hint of the tales they told. Medieval Italian and French make so much more sense if we can follow the text and a translation.

Instead of a lusty romp through bawdy Tuscany we indulged in a quaint reverie. I particularly liked the use of the harp, cleverly accompanying with special effects, picking out emphases in the ensemble and providing a gentle tinkling while the introductions were being delivered (just discreet tuning but charming non-the-less).

Rune

These are very accomplished players and an experienced audience certainly had much to enjoy, but it could have been so much brighter. We chuckled sympathetically when Jean Kelly’s music vanished from her tablet. Technology – Huh! She dealt with it well, but that was unscripted. Only May Robertson performed with humour when she introduced Intelligence, but by then it was too late to lighten the rest of the programme.

This concert was presented in Association with Brighton Early Music Festival for which Rune, or as they were called then Rūn, performed much of the same programme in 2023. This year’s concert was dedicated ‘as a Memorial to Deborah Roberts BEM who nurtured so many new young artists and ensembles over many years’. I hope Rune will take heed of the BREMF mentoring in stagecraft and in curating their programmes.

Brighton Dome Studio Theatre,
7 May 2025

Rating:

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RUNE:
Angela Hicks (soprano)
Daniel Thompson (tenor)
May Robertson (vielle, voice)
Daniel Scott (recorder)
Jean Kelly (harp)

Fortune
Fantastic tales with peculiar plots based on the turns of Fortune
Francesco Landini (1335-97) : Per la ’nfluença
Philippe de Vitry (1291-1361) : Providence, la senee
Francesco Landini :  Fortuna ria

Virtue
A walk in the walled garden of the palace.
English sacred music that was copied in northern Italy
Francesco Landini : Ecco la primavera
Anonymous (14th-century England) : Ad rose titulum
Anonymous (14th-century England) : Flos vernalos

Love
In the palace, tales that are both beautiful and tragic
Francesco Landini : Si dolce non sonò; Adiu, adiu, dous dame
Gilles Binchois (1400-1460) : Triste plaisire et douloureuse joye

Trickery
A picnic in the fields
Anonymous (14th-century England) : Petrone
Jacopo da Bologna (fl 1340-d386) : Io me son uno che per la frasche

Intelligence
Returning to the palace, around the fountain
Guillaume de Machaut (1300-1377) : Ma fin est ma commencement
Johannes Ciconia (1370-1412) : Una panthera