Well as regards the instrument illustrated - I'll set the cat among the
pigeons and suggest that it might be tuned in the same
way as the baroque guitar. It is very interesting that it is a lute-shaped
5-course instrument.
As Martyn has pointed out, the second section of Calvi's "Intavolatura di
chitarra e chitarriglia" has a
number of pieces in Italian tablature.
Calvi says of these 'Le seguente Suonate possono servire anche per la
Chitarriglia, ma sono veramente per la Chitarra" .
Martyn has translated this as 'The following Suonate can also serve for the
Chitarriglia, but they are really for the Guitar" .But he is already
reading his prejudices into what Calvi says by assuming that "chitarra" in
Italian means the same thing as "guitar" in English and that it is
appropriate to translate it in this way. It is untranslatable.
This is the problem with translating things as anyone who has tried will
know. There are many circumstances when it is not possible to find an exact
equivalent for specialist terms. No-one would translate "vihuela" as
"guitar".
The question is "Why should Calvi differentiate between a small and a
standard sized instrument when clearly both were capable of playing exactly
the same music and often did"?
The most important point is that the music in tablature is very different
from anything else in the 5-course repertoire. Not only does it not use
alfabeto; there are no five part chords at all and no suggestion that the
four part ones should be strummed. The repertoire and the style of the
music is also a bit old fashioned.
It seems unlikely that the instrument that Calvi refers to is a 5-course
guitar; more likely to be a 5-course lute.
Foscarini of course also included arrangements of lute music in his great
work - and these are similarly different from what was considered to be the
appropriate style for the 5-course instrument.
As ever
Monica
----- Original Message -----
From: "William Samson" <willsam...@yahoo.co.uk>
To: "Davide Rebuffa" <davide.rebu...@fastwebnet.it>; "Martyn Hodgson"
<hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk>
Cc: <pie...@vantichelen.name>; "Monica Hall" <mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk>;
"Lutelist" <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, January 29, 2013 7:51 AM
Subject: [LUTE] Re: 4 course guitar in Italy
Hi,
[1]http://tinyurl.com/aped6x7 - on my Skydrive again.
Not a 4c instrument this time, but one with 5 courses. Looks like a
small lute, nothing definite can be said about the pegbox shape. No
indication of octave stringing. The painting looks like first half of
the 17th century, but I've no idea who the painter is. The presence of
an archlute suggests Italian, but who knows? - Some musicians travelled
widely and were no doubt intrigued by the instruments they encountered
in other countries. They might even have brought examples home with
them.
The question is - How was it tuned and used?
Answers on a postcard please, . . .
Bill
PS There's a surviving 5c instrument, not unlike this one, shown on
page 91 of "The Lute in Europe 2".
--
References
1. http://tinyurl.com/aped6x7
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