English music during the Tudor and early Jacobean periods reached extraordinary heights. The Anglican Church, established on the dissolution of the monasteries and the break with Rome, and the Court both played a central role, but a native genius seemed to flower during those years. A sense of nationhood had appeared, and English arts generally pursued a highly individual line. While open to Continental influences, these were transmuted into something new, original, quirky and magnificent.

Architecture and painting became poetically allusive and fantastic; a new confidence in the English language gave rise to great literature; the decorative arts and the Court masque flourished. In the hands of Byrd, Bull, Gibbons, Tomkins, the lutenists and madrigalists, vocal and instrumental music grew to a stature of expressive and technical accomplishment not exceeded anywhere in Europe. This growth was so vigorous that it outgrew its strength, finally disintegrating in the general social dissolution of the Civil War.

John Dowland was a central figure in this musical firmament. Holding no court appointment during the reign of Elizabeth I, he had left England in 1594 to work in Germany, finally entering the service of Christian IV of Denmark in 1598. His music circulated in a series of influential publications in London beginning with The First Booke of Songes or Ayres in 1597. No doubt hoping for a Court appointment in England, Dowland published Lachrimae in 1604, dedicating the volume to Christian IV's sister, Anne of Denmark, now Queen of England following the accession of her husband James I and VI in 1603. One of the most famous lutenists in Europe and one of the greatest English composers, his music survived longest in the German consort repertory. Although his compatriots drew on his works for some their own keyboard pieces, his influence in England quickly passed.

In 100 tightly packed pages, Peter Holman gives a masterly account of the Lachrimae. His framework is an account of its publication history, its instrumentation, its place in the history of Renaissance dance music, and its reception history. He describes the twenty-one pieces in the collection in detail and examines their connection with the Elizabethan cultivation of melancholy. In doing so he goes far beyond the immediate confines of his subject, writing on patronage, the format of the collection, pitch and transposition, tonality, modality, and musical rhetoric. He even ventures into numerology. An illuminating account of music printing and publishing in England at the turn of the 16th and 17th centuries is followed by a brief biography of Dowland's years on the Continent. The publication history of Lachrimae is described in detail, giving us insights into the complexities and dependence on contemporary patronage, and the London music publishing trade and litigation. An idiosyncratic 'table' layout of the printed score is explained with perfect clarity. We learn much about the instruments and instrumentation, and, not surprisingly, the lute. Dance types featuring in Lachrimae (pavan, galliard and almand) are analysed, with particular emphasis on the development of the late Elizabethan pavan. The vexed question of modality versus tonality in Renaissance music is answered concisely while drawing on a rich array of historical sources, and there is the clearest explanation of the system of 'Tones' one could wish for. One page on the harmonic idiom of Elizabethan music brings the whole subject into broad daylight.

The description of the pieces is prefaced by an account of melancholy, quoting John Donne: "God hath accompanied, and complicated almost all our bodily diseases of these times, with an extraordinary sadnesse, a predominent melancholy, a faintnesse of heart, a chearlesnesse, a joylesnesse of spirit". These words are, of course, contradicted by the achievements and zest of the period, but much pleasure was obviously taken in a refined indulgence in melancholy, and great enjoyment obtained from music, regarded as a chief antidote to the disorder. Robert Burton is also quoted: music is "so powerfull a thing, that it ravisheth the soul.....by sweet pleasure,.....and corporeall tunes pacifie our incorporeall soule.....and carries it beyond itselfe, helpes, elevates, extends it."

Throughout this short book Peter Holman opens doors onto regions which, for most of us, remain arcane and difficult. He illuminates this refined, mannerist, musical world with a wealth of information and explanation, but the scholarship is worn lightly and his love and understanding of the music is pre-eminent. The revival of Dowland's music began early in the 20th century, gradually gathering pace until the present day in which Lachrimae has become one of the most frequently recorded and performed works in the early music repertoire. If you are familiar with Dowland's music, then you will find the book a useful, informative and insightful bedside handbook on a favourite subject. If all this is new to you, then the book will be a revelation and a source of fascination on music which indeed has the power to "ravish the soul by sweet pleasure". Whichever camp you find yourself in, please buy this book.

Derek Adlam