Except that the way the 7 course vihuela players did it was strictly mental- by tuning the 4th course down from f to e, and just "thinking" of it as G instrument with a "high" treble course, despite the actual pitch level and range being identical to a 7 course lute with a low D 7th. It was this flexible thinking on the part of vihuelists that fooled eary musicologists into believing that every vihuelist had to own 7 vihuelas to cover every tone in the scale. Of course, one could get the same impression from any number of 16th and 17th century lute songbooks that put the singer's first note reference almost anywhere on the fingerboard (Willeart, the Verdelot madrigals intabutated for voice and lute, for example). But it's interesting that Galilei proposed a short string to actually go higher- how the hell did he propose to fret such a string? Not to mention avoiding the existing frets. (Look forward to you exploring this one.) Another unasked question- how did he feel about his kid Mike fooling around with (gasp!) 10 course lutes? I never knew about the McClintock translation- is that available? I would love a copy. (As well as translations of Capirola and Piccinini) Dan __________________________________________________________________
From: "Martin Shepherd" <mar...@luteshop.co.uk> To: "Lute List" <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu> Sent: Friday, August 19, 2011 12:49:47 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: [Le_luth] Dedillo Well, this has really opened something up for me. I've just been reading Carol McClintock's translation of Galilei's Fronimo, and amongst the many fascinating things he says (of which more anon) is that there's no point having all those extra bass courses on the lute because they sound too weak and in any case you can do everything you want on a 6c lute. That much is fairly widely known. But he goes on to say that if you really want to intabulate pieces which go slightly outside the range you should do it by adding an extra course in the treble, tuned a fourth higher than the original top string, which now becomes the second course (so we now have a high "c" string). I don't know exactly how he physically managed this, but he talks about adding an extra little bridge so the new top string is a bit shorter than the others. I'm just about go on a trip so don't have the time to explore all this right now, but I'm intrigued that it seems the vihuelistas may actually have done this. Best wishes, Martin On 19/08/2011 06:06, dwinh...@comcast.net wrote: > Quite right, Ed, about the 7 course vihuela and how it is misunderstood > today. I plead guilty to tuning- and using- my own 7 course Chambure > copy as a part-time stealth 7 course "lute". What I understand from > reading Ward& Bermudo is that the 7th course is considered to be a > nominal high "c" string, (for a g vihuela) in order to make the higher > voices of motets, masses, etc. playable within reasonable areas of the > fingerboard- just like a having a 5 string cello for Bach's 6th cello > suite. In practical terms, of course, (the laws of physics being what > they are, despite what Republican's would like them to be) a 7 course > vihuela of say 59 cm. sl would actually be set up as a small "D" > instrument, whose scale allows the high "g" string- but it would be > nominally a "G" instrument with a high "c" string. All I would have to > do on mine would be to lower the 4th course from f to e to come up with > the correct intervals- then I would be good to go, playing all the > voices from the vocal scores. The other tuning in Bermudo is a > theoretical proposal of 4ths and 5ths that sounds cool but, like other > things, would be thankless wishful thinking; what with the laws of > physics being what they are; vis-a-vis the breaking point of gut and > the integrity of bridges to soundboard connections. > Dedillo? Tried it, don't like it; I'm with Fuenllana on that one. I > still await a convincing performance. > Dan > __________________________________________________________________ > > From: "Edward Martin"<e...@gamutstrings.com> > To: "Martin Shepherd"<mar...@luteshop.co.uk>, "Lute List" > <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu> > Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2011 9:30:30 PM > Subject: [LUTE] Re: [Le_luth] Dedillo > Thanks for posting this, Martin! Ralph Maier certainly gives us > something to contemplate. > Many of us play the vihuela, but very few, if any, play the dedillo > stroke. I have dabbled a bit with it, but not made a serious study > of it, and Maier makes a great case for making another attempt. He > is obviously using bright synthetic strings, and if he used gut, I > am certain that the tone emitted from the back side nail would be > sweeter; it seems too harsh on synthetics, in my opinion. But, he > wrote a great paper, and provides us with incentive to do better. > That is one thing that in our modern times, we have almost ignored: > dedillo. > There is another thing we have ignored, which is the 7-course > vihuela. Ward and Bermudo discuss this at length, and they make the > case for there having been the"ordinary" vihuela in 6 courses, with > our standard renaissance tuning; the other is the 7-course vihuela, > in which entirely different tuning systems were employed. Ward > provides us with many names of vihuelistas who performed 7-course > vihuela, but other than Bermudo's examples, there is no existing > music for those tunings. Bermudo states that all the great > vihuelistas also played 7-course vihuela. > In particular, Bermudo states this instrument was used primarily for > doing intabulations. Yes, some modern players in our times do have > 7-course vihuelas, but I have thus far found nobody in our times > using the 7-course vihuela as an instrument which utilizes it's > initial purpose, which is to use various tunings to devise > intabulations. All the ones, to my knowledge, use it as having an > extra bass course, similar to the lute. This was not the intent of > such an instrument. > We have come a long way in our understanding of the vihuela, but we > have a long journey ahead of us...... > ed > At 02:50 PM 8/18/2011, Martin Shepherd wrote: > > I can't resist passing this on - fascinating stuff. > > M > > -------- Original Message -------- > > > > Subject: [Le_luth] Dedillo > > Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 14:08:41 +0200 > > From: Sauvage Valery [1]<sauvag...@orange.fr> > > Reply-To: [2]le_l...@yahoogroupes.fr > > To: [3]<le_l...@yahoogroupes.fr> > > > > > > Bonjour, > > Un ami m'a fait part de cette page `a propos de technique de main > > droite > > concernant la vihuela, que certains pourraient trouver > interessante... > > [4]http://www.ralphmaier.com/index_files/Page318.htm > > (en faisant defiler il y a quelques videos de demonstrations) > > Bonne rentree `a tous... > > Val. > > __._,_.___ > > [5]Repondre `a expediteur | [6]Repondre `a groupe | [7]Repondre en > mode > > Web | [8]Nouvelle discussion > > [9]Toute la discussion (1) > > Activites recentes: > > > > [10]Aller sur votre groupe > > [11]Yahoo! Groupes > > Passer A : [12]Texte seulement, [13]RA(c)sumA(c) du jour o > > [14]Desinscription o [15]Conditions d'utilisation > > . > > > > [stime=1313669394] > > > > __,_._,___ > > > > -- > > > >References > > > > 1. mailto:sauvag...@orange.fr > > 2. mailto:le_l...@yahoogroupes.fr > > 3. mailto:le_l...@yahoogroupes.fr > > 4. http://www.ralphmaier.com/index_files/Page318.htm > > 5. mailto:sauvag...@orange.fr?subject=Re%A0%3A%20Dedillo > > 6. mailto:le_l...@yahoogroupes.fr?subject=Re%A0%3A%20Dedillo > > 7. > > > http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth/post;_ylc=X3oDMTJyb2Qwajd1BF9T > Azk3NDkwNDY4BGdycElkAzE2MTg5MzE0BGdycHNwSWQDMjEyMzgwMTYxNARtc2dJZAMxMzM > 1MgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNycGx5BHN0aW1lAzEzMTM2NjkzOTQ-?act=reply&messageNum= > 13352 > > 8. > > > http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth/post;_ylc=X3oDMTJmZTg1MWoyBF9T > Azk3NDkwNDY4BGdycElkAzE2MTg5MzE0BGdycHNwSWQDMjEyMzgwMTYxNARzZWMDZnRyBHN > sawNudHBjBHN0aW1lAzEzMTM2NjkzOTQ- > > 9. > > > http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth/message/13352;_ylc=X3oDMTM3aGJ > tZjBqBF9TAzk3NDkwNDY4BGdycElkAzE2MTg5MzE0BGdycHNwSWQDMjEyMzgwMTYxNARtc2 > dJZAMxMzM1MgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawN2dHBjBHN0aW1lAzEzMTM2NjkzOTQEdHBjSWQDMTMzN > TI- > > 10. > > > http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth;_ylc=X3oDMTJmM2VoNG03BF9TAzk3N > DkwNDY4BGdycElkAzE2MTg5MzE0BGdycHNwSWQDMjEyMzgwMTYxNARzZWMDdnRsBHNsawN2 > Z2hwBHN0aW1lAzEzMTM2NjkzOTQ- > > 11. > > > http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/;_ylc=X3oDMTJlaWZmczVhBF9TAzk3NDkwNDY4BGdycE > lkAzE2MTg5MzE0BGdycHNwSWQDMjEyMzgwMTYxNARzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNnZnAEc3RpbWUDM > TMxMzY2OTM5NA-- > > 12. > > > mailto:le_luth-traditio...@yahoogroupes.fr?subject=Changer%20le%20forma > t%20:%20Traditionnel > > 13. > > > mailto:le_luth-dig...@yahoogroupes.fr?subject=Messages%20du%20groupe%20 > :+R%C3%A9sum%C3%A9 > > 14. > mailto:le_luth-desabonnem...@yahoogroupes.fr?subject=D%E9sinscription > > 15. http://fr.docs.yahoo.com/info/utos.html > > > > > >To get on or off this list see list information at > >http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html > Edward Martin > 2817 East 2nd Street > Duluth, Minnesota 55812 > e-mail: e...@gamutstrings.com > voice: (218) 728-1202 > http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1660298871&ref=name > http://www.myspace.com/edslute > http://magnatune.com/artists/edward_martin > > -- > --