Tempus est Iocundum - Medieval Song

Vocals & arrangement by Farya Faraji. This is a song from the Carmina Burana, a collection of poems from the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries, written principaly by Goliards, young clergymen who satirised the Church with irreverent poetry, often of a sexual or bawdy nature, mostly in Latin.

Around a fourth of the manuscript’s poems are accompanied by musical neumes, such as this one. The melody heard here was reconstruced by Thomas Binkley in the 60’s, however it is hypothetical as the neumes used in the manuscript are a more archaic form of neumatic notation that does not indicate precise pitch relationship between successive neumes, only whether the preceding note was lower or higher in pitch, therefore the original melody may have been very different.

The arrangement follows historical medieval practice, with a mostly heterophonic arrangement (all instruments follow the same melodic line while ornamenting it differently), the vocals emply some level of ornamentation with rapid articulation and pulsating vocal vibrato as was common back then, (which I describe in detail in this video https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hxcH7S2BaiQ), and I added the typical harmonisation of the era based on transposing the same melody up a fourth or a fifth from the original melodic line, a practice rooted in Organum. (Talked about in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNY4b0aRLcQ

Lyrics:
Tempus est iocundum,
O virgines,
Modo congaudete
Vos iuvenes.

Oh - oh, totus floreo,
Iam amore virginali
Totus ardeo,
Novus, novus amor est,
Quo pereo.

Mea me comfortat
Promissio,
Mea me deportat
Negatio.

Oh - oh, totus floreo,
Iam amore virginali
Totus ardeo,
Novus, novus amor est,
Quo pereo.

Tempore brumali
Vir patiens,
Animo vernali
Lasciviens.

Oh - oh, totus floreo,
Iam amore virginali
Totus ardeo,
Novus, novus amor est,
Quo pereo.

Mea mecum ludit
Virginitas,
Mea me detrudit
Simplicitas.

Oh - oh, totus floreo,
Iam amore virginali
Totus ardeo,
Novus, novus amor est,
Quo pereo.

Veni, domicella,
Cum gaudio;
Veni, veni, pulchra,
Iam pereo.

Oh - oh, totus floreo,
Iam amore virginali
Totus ardeo,
Novus, novus amor est,
Quo pereo.

English translation:
This is the joyful time,
O maidens,
rejoice with them,
young men!

Oh! Oh! Oh!
I am bursting out all over!
with first love
I am burning all over!
New, new love
is what I am dying of!

I am heartened
by my promise,
I am downcast by my refusal

Oh! Oh! Oh!
I am bursting out all over!
with first love
I am burning all over!
New, new love
is what I am dying of!

In the winter
man is patient,
the breath of spring
makes him lust.

Oh! Oh! Oh!
I am bursting out all over!
with first love
I am burning all over!
New, new love
is what I am dying of!

My virginity
makes me frisky,
my simplicity
holds me back.

Oh! Oh! Oh!
I am bursting out all over!
with first love
I am burning all over!
New, new love
is what I am dying of!

Come, my mistress,
with joy,
come, come, my pretty,
I am dying!

Oh! Oh! Oh!
I am bursting out all over!
with first love
I am burning all over!
New, new love
is what I am dying of!

Видео Tempus est Iocundum - Medieval Song канала Farya Faraji