Marais: Marche pour les Matelots et Airs de Matelots I-II-III - clt duo

rranged clarinet duet (clt/bass clt  with alt clt for bass clt)

The French composer Marin Marais composed the tune as a dance for his opera Alcyone of 1706, with the title Marche pour les Matelots.

The tune was subsequently included in Raoul Auger Feuillet's 1706 Recueil de contredansealong with a longways proper dance, La Matelotte, which Feuillet had himself written to go with the tune.

In 1710 John Essex (d. 1744) published an English translation of Feuillet's work called, For the Further Improvement of Dancing, in which the dance is given as The Female Saylor.

The words were written around 1860 while William Morris, then 26, was working as an apprentice in the office of the architect, Edmund Street, presumably under the persuasion of his fellow students who at that time had a taste for part-song. It became known as the Christmas Carol "Masters in This Hall" (alternative title: "Nowell, Sing We Clear")

 Gustav Holst incorporated the carol into his work Three Carols (1916–17) along with "Christmas Song: On this Day" and "I Saw Three Ships". Holst wrote the Three Carols for amateurs singing in his Thaxted festivals.

I have arranged the March and 3 of the Sailor's Airs from the opera for clarinet duet, The march is then reprised to complete the arrangement.