I have two remarks on the Baroque lute to guitar transcriptions: -One big problem is the sound of the basses on the guitar that are relatively dull when compared to the lute. This is aggravated by the fact that lute music naturally makes of the richness of its bass register. So is it a good idea to take the best of one instrument to replace it by the worst of another? -Two: lute music relies mostly on first positions, whereas the guitar not only allows for high position fingerings but often sounds best in the higher positions. Because of those two points, I personally tend to think that the best arrangements of Weiss's music on the guitar would involve transposing upward, maybe as much as a fifth sometimes. The 8-string guitar which has both an extra bass and an extra treble could work very well in that model. But in this day of revival of the lute, there is little point in transcribing for the sake of it, without paying attention to what the guitar could actually bring in terms of its own qualities. At least at the professional level. Alain
G.R. Crona wrote: >I've always been a heretic in lute-matters, but am quite happy playing Weiss >on a guitar tuned to D-minor while octavating the basses. Perfectly viable. > >Also, the 11 string guitar is by no means a new invention. The swedish >guitarbuilder Bolin was making his "Altguitars" already in the 60's. Listen >to Göran Söllscher being a fair exponent. > >BTW wasn't this a lute list? > >B.R. >G. > > >On Apr 7, 2005 8:03 AM, Markus Lutz <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > >>Thank you, Ed, for giving this recording. >>Of course it is much easier to play Weiss (or baroque lute music in general) >>if you have a guitar with additional basses. >>A "normal" guitar has it restrictions, but anyway Weiss stays beautiful music >> even on such an instrument. >>I've begun to play Weiss and to estimate him through playing his music on a >>concert guitar. >>Also I'm not a virtuoso on it, many of the Weiss suites worked very well on >>it. >>In my eyes the main problem is how musically these adaptions are played and >>if they have the baroque spirit that Weiss has. >> >>Regarding Schneeweiss I can only add, that his paraphrases of Weissian music >>had been one of the main causes I have turned to the (baroque) lute. >>I feeled that his recordings doesn't fit at all the spirit of this music and >>I wanted to learn how it sounded and how it should be played. >> >>Best >>Markus >> >> > > > >To get on or off this list see list information at >http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html > > >
