2009/8/7 Peter Martin <peter.l...@gmail.com>: > "He [Goethe's dad] spent longer tuning his lute than he did playing it" > > So is Goethe the originator of this widespread calumny on the lute? Or > was he repeating an old joke?
Johann Mattheson in his Neu-eröffnete Orchestre from 1713 wrote: ‘Denn wenn ein Lauteniste 80. Jahr alt wird / so hat er gewiβ 60. Jahr gestimmet.’ (When a lutenist reaches the age of 80, he must surely have spend 60 years tuning.) To which he added: ‘Das ärgste ist / daβ unter 100. insonderheit Liebhabern / die keine Profession davon machen / kaum 2. capable sind / recht reine zu stimmen.’ (The worst is that among 100 amateurs, those that do not make a profession of it, hardly two will be able to tune really well.) David - back to tuning -- ******************************* David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com www.davidvanooijen.nl ******************************* To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
