Research has always played a vital part of Nancy Hadden’s work. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Leeds, with a thesis on the Renaissance flute which will be published as
Playing the Renaissance Flute. In 2007, she was awarded an Arts and Humanities Research Council Fellowship in the Creative and Performing Arts at Southampton University. As an editor of early flute music she continues to produce newly researched editions of important Renaissance and Baroque flute repertoire. Her articles on historical flute playing are published by Cambridge University Press, Ashgate, STIMU and many scholarly journals.
Her thesis on the history and playing techniques of the Renaissance flute is available as a download or in printed form.
‘From Swiss Flutes to Consorts: History, Music and Playing Techniques of the Transverse Flute in Switzerland, Germany and France, 1470-1640’
Ph.D. thesis (University of Leeds, 2010)
Volume 1 traces the history of the flute from its earliest documented appearance as a military flute through the rise of the flute consort and its music in the 1530s and 1540s, to the latest known uses of the keyless flute in mid-seventeenth-century Germany and France.
Volume II, ‘Playing the Renaissance Flute’, presents a complete pedagogy, based on original source materials. Each chapter covers different technical areas: posture and holding the flute, fingering, range and transposition, embouchure, breath and sound, tuning, articulation. A table of original fingering charts are included, as well as an edition of the complete chansons for flute consort published by Pierre Attaingnant in 1533.
Forthcoming Publications
Playing the Renaissance Flute
A complete practical guide to playing the Renaissance flute by authority and performer Nancy Hadden. The book will include a short introduction to the history and design of the flute, a list of suggested repertoire, and individual chapters on historical playing techniques based on historical sources and on Nancy Hadden’s considerable experience as a player.
Chansons for Flute Consort, Zephyrus Press
The complete chansons published for four flutes by Pierre Attaingnant in Paris, 1533, comprising nine pieces from his Chansons musicales and nine pieces from Vingt et sept chansons. Composers include Claudin de Sermisy, Pierre Certon, Nicolas Gombert, Jean Richafort, Benedictus Appenzeller, and many others. Only the soprano part book for Chansons musicales survives. Missing parts have been collected from concordant sources. In the course of her research, Nancy Hadden discovered a complete source for ‘La plus gorgiase du monde’, making this piece available for the first time.
German Songs for Flute Consort, Zephyrus Press
Two volumes of German tenor-lied: Volume 1 is selected from LXXV Hubscher lieder for flute consort published by Arnt von Aich (ca. 1519), with compositions by Adam von Fulda, Sebastian Virdung, Heinrich Isaac, Paul Hofhaimer. Volume 2 is selected from the Frisch teutsche liedlein (Georg Förster, 1552),by Senfl, Hofhaimer, and others.
Publications and Scholarly Writings
‘From Swiss Flutes to Consorts: History, Music and Playing Techniques of the Transverse Flute in Switzerland, Germany and France, 1470-1640’, Ph.D. thesis (University of Leeds, 2010).
(Review) ‘Flute Music from the Bach Circle’, Early Music, May, 2010, 300-303.
(Review) ‘Flute Music, Familiar and Unfamiliar’, Early Music, February, 2008, 131-133.
‘From Swiss Flutes to Consorts: the Flute in Germany ca. 1480-1530’, Basler Jahrbuch für Historische Musikpraxis 29 (Basel, 2005), 125-144.
‘The Transverse Flute in the Seventeenth Century’, From Renaissance to Baroque, ed. Jonathan Wainwright and Peter Holman (Aldershot, 2005), 113-144.
‘In Search of the Sound of a fiffaro’, Musicque de Joye: Proceedings of the International Symposium on the Renaissance Flute and Recorder, ed. David Lasocki (Utrecht, 2005), 187-202.
‘The German Flute in Eighteenth-Century England: Instruments and Repertoire’, Early Music Performer (October, 2000), 9-11.
‘Hotteterre English’d: Flute Method Books in Early Eighteenth-Century England’, Early Music Performer (April, 2000), 8-12.
‘Some Observations on Flute Pitches: Settala’s Flutes’, RFCN 2 (1989), 5-7.
‘The Flutes of the Accademia Filarmonica, Verona’, Musick, April, 1988, 7-11.
