Royal Lewters: Music of Henry VIII & Elizabeth I's favourite lutenists [Import]

Paul O'Dette (Artist) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 13, 2003)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Harmonia Mundi Fr.
• ASIN: B00007BKAE
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #277,335 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars great CD, July 22, 2003

By 

"anomia" (Princeton, NJ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Royal Lewters: Music of Henry VIII & Elizabeth I's favourite lutenists (Audio CD)

I'm a big fan of Paul O'Dette - I stumbled on vol. 4 of his "Complete Works of John Dowland" in a used record store a while back and have been enchanted with lute music ever since.
The Royal Lewters is a collection of Tudor-era lute music: lots of charming pieces by little-known composers, and for many of the selections the composer isn't known. There is a surprising amount of variety here, many different tempos, moods, etc., everything from cheerful little dance-like tunes to more solemn, introspective pieces and laments. The recorded sound is excellent, nice and spacious.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Music of The Royal Lewters, August 12, 2005

By 

David Norton (Utah) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Royal Lewters: Music of Henry VIII & Elizabeth I's favourite lutenists (Audio CD)

Reviewing a Paul O'Dette lute recording is a difficult task, because one runs out of superlatives so quickly. This is a CD of music written by (or "thought to have been written by") the court lutenists of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I.

My only quibble with this CD is that there are almost none of the more familiar English lute pieces heard here, save for Ferrabosco's "Fantasia" and Robert Johnson's setting of "Carman's Whistle". O'Dette's playing is excellent throughout, it is just a shame that the musical compositions themeselves are frequently rather weak. Still, not every English lute player was the equal to Dowland or Cutting, and this CD is a valuable historical document of representative pieces from the lesser musicians. (NB: There is an extended group of works by John Johnson here, a lutenist whom many consider quite highly. For myself, I've never been able to develop a taste for his pieces.)

I believe that this CD and "Robin Hood" are available as a 2-CD set called "Lusty Gallant"; I would recommend the double-disc for a purchase rather than the two individual CDs.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I keep returning to it..., September 21, 2008

By 

Carnack (Damacus, MD) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Royal Lewters: Music of Henry VIII & Elizabeth I's favourite lutenists (Audio CD)

There is no doubt that Dowland is a great composer and that this collection is somewhat miscellaneous. However the performances here are transcendant (as we would expect from Paul O'Dette) and I don't think the pieces are second-rate. I'm no musicologist but I own over 200 cds of music from 1450-1650, a fair amount of it performed on lute, and this is one of my very favorites. I listen to it regularly and in the right mood My Lady Cary's Dompe can bring tears to my eyes.
By the way, the reviewer of August 2005 seems to be mistaken about Royal Lewters being part of the 2-cd set Lusty Gallants. I do not own Lusty Gallants but based on the track listings Amazon provides Robin Hood is indeed (as he says) the 1st disc of that set, but the 2nd disc contains an entirely different selection of lute pieces.