Using an evocative example of mediaeval Irish plainchant, from a 15th-century calfskin antiphonary from Ossory – the region surrounding Kilkenny – Siobhán will show you images of the evocative source material, and help you to read the ‘neumes’, the early music notation in which it was written down using a four-line stave. We will sing the Latin lyrics of the composition, and explore how we might play it on our harps, with attention to plausible historical fingerings, and how the Latin lyrics might inspire our phrasing.

Part 1 of a two-part session