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Easter Parade / Maria Muoter Reinû Maît

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Easter Parade / Maria Muoter Reinû Maît --- 2020-04-12

‘Maria Muoter Reinû Maît’ is'ein Geisslerlied' – a ‘flagellant song’. 'Geisslerlieder' were the songs sung by wandering bands of self-flagellating penitents in mediaeval Europe (particularly in Italy and Germany), mainly during two periods in the 13th and 14th centuries. It was during the second period, at the time of The Black Death, that a priest, Hugo Spechtshart of Reutlingen (1285-1360), noted down the words and music of some 'Geisslerlieder' as he heard them sung. He presented them in his work 'Chronicon Hugonis sacerdotis de Rutelinga' (1349), making him perhaps one of the earliest known collectors of vernacular song. Reutlingen lies in modern-day Baden-Württemberg, south-western Germany (coincidentally, it also happens to be the town where Alasdair’s mother Annegret was born). Recorded in Devon, Glasgow and London, 2019/2020.