I find I can read and play lute music in modern notation, but not as well as tab. If it's not lute music it is usually awkward to play without dropping parts or changing key. Try reading and playing figured bass as something more useful for lute instruments. Then you'll really appreciate having one instrument suitable for flat keys and one suitable for sharp keys. R. P.S. If you're lucky you might even learn to read figured bass from tenor clef! R.
-----Original Message----- From: angevin...@att.net [mailto:angevin...@att.net] Sent: Thursday, March 12, 2009 3:55 PM To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] reading mensural notation Perhaps like many lute players, I started out playing lute strictly from tablature. While I'm fluent reading mensural notation for singing or other instruments, I've never mastered it with the lute. I feel this is a lack, and would like to fix it - except for how much work it is! Now I currently play both a tenor in G and an alto in A. I can think of reasons why it would be "nice" to be able to read mensural notation on each of them. But since the task at hand is already difficult (and hard to motivate practicing), I really need to pick either the G or the A and just learn that for now. Like most lute players, I played some (classical) guitar first, so really it would probably be slightly easier to learn the association from A lute to mensural notation. But perhaps the G is more generally useful in the long run. Any advice from the collected wisdom? Suzanne -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
