>On Nov 13, 2007, at 6:47 AM, Nigel Solomon wrote: > >> Everything about it screams guitar to me: the sound, the nails, the >> general approach. Yes, a guitar that looks a bit like a lute! > >To me, everything about it screams liuto attiorbato, like a good many >historical instruments in museums with fingerboard lengths under 60 >cm and extension strings of 75-85 cm, played with nails the way >historical Italian players would likely have played it.
And early German and British 'cellists bowed underhand, while overhand bowing was being developed by Italians as a new virtuoso technique. We drive ourselves crazy trying to define, categorize, and pigeon hole the past to complete our present understanding and arrive at a comfortably defined musical territory or neighborhood to play in. As for "guitars that look like lutes" check this out- (scroll ALL the way down...) Nothing new under the sun, is there? http://www.lutesandguitars.co.uk/htm/cat11.htm The theorboed guitar - the Chitarrone Francese ? Although this archlute-like instrument is also included in the continuo instruments section of the website, we have listed it here also because it appears to represent an overlooked approach to playing figured bass. The instrument depicted in this very accurately-draughted painting has five courses on the fingerboard (with the top string clearly single) and nine diapasons - compared to what would be expected on a similarly-sized archlute: six double fingerboard courses and eight diapasons. There is a reasonable likelihood that it was, in fact, used by guitarists who strung and tuned the fingerboard courses like a guitar, and who would be used to reading from the bass clef, so that they could realise a figured bass part and play continuo on a theorboed guitar, rather than learn the completely different archlute tuning. The player's left hand almost exactly corresponds to chord 'L' in the alfabetto system (L corresponds to a difficult fingering for a C minor chord) Sanz uses engravings of hands to illustrate the chord positions in his 1697 book. >BTW, Giardino Armonico is playing here at A=392 (their D is the C on >my wife's piano), so Luca's A would be G at A=440. The CD recording >of the same concerto that Pianca and Giardino released in 1992 was at >A=415. -- -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
