If you analyze several hundred English lute
songs, and compare the voice leading with several
hundred English madrigals, you will see that the
lute songs are written so that the top part can
almost always be performed down an octave--it is
a different kind of counterpoint.
The counterpoint falls into several categories,
depending on whether the other parts, if present,
sound--and whether the bass crosses with the
voice, parallel fourths change to fifths, and so on.
The Italian and Spanish repertory is differently
constructed, and the French is more often than
not similar to the English by 1605 or so.
dt
You have touched on a fundamental problem with renaissance music. So
much of it was conceived in terms of polyphony, so singing soprano and
alto lines down an octave rarely works well. The frottole collected by
Bossinensis and published by Petrucci in 1509 and 1511, for example, are
a dead loss when sung down an octave. It's OK to use instruments instead
of singers, so a soprano accompanied by a lute and/or a few viols
playing the lowest voices will work well.
Unfortunately, transposing the cantus down an octave is unsatisfactory,
since it obscures the polyphony. That is presumably why Fuenllana did
what he did. Rather than transpose the top line down an octave, he gave
one of the lines to a singer to sing at the correct pitch, including
some songs where the soloist sang the bass line. I think that is the way
for a solo bass singer to proceed with polyphonic music.
A hundred years later, songs were conceived more as solo songs, and I
have in mind English lute songs from 1597 onwards. Although many of them
were published so that they could be sung as part-songs with four
voices, they are essentially solo songs. We know from Robert Dowland's
_Musical Banquet_ (London, 1610), that the songs in that collection were
to be sung down an octave by a man, not at the written pitch. Doing that
generally works well with other English lute songs too, but that isn't
going to help you find repertoire as a bass singer.
There is much you can do if you find a friendly soprano, including
singing duets such as Dowland's "Flow my teares" or the dialogue "Humor
say", but that doesn't answer your question about solo songs for a bass
singer. I hope there will be some more specific suggestions forthcoming
from Lutenetters to add to Fuenllana's songs.
Best wishes,
Stewart.
-----Original Message-----
From: lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu [mailto:lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu] On
Behalf Of Hector
Sent: 24 January 2011 09:55
To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu
Subject: [LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
Dear Franz,
There are many songs in the alto range that should fit you comfortably.
The 'problem' is that you will be singing at a transposed range (down an
octave) thus not matching the lute in the 'usual' way. I really don't
mind that, although some people do care. You can also take songs in the
soprano range and transpose them down a 4th or 5th and play them with a
big lute in E or D (a classical guitar will do the trick for six course
music). The 'singing' line for many of the vihuela songs is the tenor
line, you could take those songs and transpose them down a 4th or 5th,
play them with a big lute and voila!
Quick vihuela examples:
Milan: Con pavor recordó el moro
Narvaez: Y la mi cinta dorada
Valderrábano: Fuga a tres, primero grado (for solmisation, bass line)
There is also Valderrábano's 'Segundo Libro de motetes y otras cosas
para cantar y tañer contrabaxo y en otras partes tenor' [Second book of
motets and other things to sing and play the bass and in other instances
the tenor].
Hope this helps,
Hector
On Jan 24, 2011, at 8:45 AM, Franz Mechsner wrote:
> Dear Lutenists,
>
> I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or
> vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find
any
> for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed
> for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty -
weren't
> there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they
could)
> in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources?
>
> Best regards
> Franz
>
>
> --
>
>
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