Chatting with Kevin Mason about the lute family is like talking to a royal genealogist about the noble houses of Europe: you’re apt to learn about the members’ origins and histories, their proclivities and shortcomings, and other details too arcane for the layman.
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Mason, a lute historian and player, holds a PhD in “historical performance practices” from Washington University–a now-defunct program that required a thorough knowledge of musicology and the mastery of a number of period instruments. (Mason’s dissertation is an authoritative history of the theorbo, soon to be published by England’s Boethius Press.) A saxophone major at first, Mason says he switched after hearing an album of lute music performed by virtuoso Julian Bream. His infatuation with pre-Baroque music was further fanned by contacts with seasoned specialists Nicholas McGegan and Mary Springfels, who were artists in residence at Washington University.
Evidence of Mason’s passion for the lute is not hard to find in his Wrigleyville apartment. A theorbo and its siblings lie in one corner of the living room, gracefully at rest. Two smaller, half-pear-shaped blond cousins sit in open cases in the study, ripe for plucking. And on one wall, next to a cittern (another stringed instrument), is a framed poster of the celebrated Caravaggio canvas of a voluptuous young man holding a lute (circa 1595).
The Orpheus Band performs tomorrow night at 8 PM at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, 2122 Sheridan Road in Evanston, and Sunday at 3 PM in Goodspeed Recital Hall, University of Chicago, 5845 S. Ellis. Tickets are $10-$12. For more info, call 549-2969.
