You know what they say, French letters are definitely an English
phenomenon, while English overcoats could not be more French, women are
from Mars while men are from Venus -- language has a way to localize
things semantically rather than geographically. This reminds me that in
Baroque Italy the "arciliuto francese" referred to the "vieil ton"
tuning -- during the heigh days of the Dm tuning French school: a subtle
insult to the Gallots and Gautiers? Probably not even. Just a
convenient way to pin-point an instrument within a specific
sub-culture. As Saussure might have said, it is enough to be different.
The fado relies (or relied...) on two types of guitars, call one English
and be done. Another option would be that the mechanical parts involved
in the tuning were manufactured in England, not impossible, clock-work
mechanisms were very much high-tech and England had the edge on the
market for precision tooling (18th/29th century). This would support
Martyn'point that the best guitars came from England, at least the best
mechanical parts of the guitar... ("regular" guitars only became
mechanized later would be my point)
Now for the tricky question, where is the lute used prominently in Cuban
music (cf. the Buena Vista club) really from? They do call it a lute you
know... I am not sure there is actually anything clearly similar in all
of Spanish-speaking America. And they are mechanized.
Alain
On 2/1/2013 1:27 AM, Martyn Hodgson wrote:
Dear Stuart,
What did your Portugese friends say when faced with things like the
following:
" two Portugese manuscript collections (P-La, 54-XII-177 and
54-X-371-5) from around 1800 contain 'Escala de Guitarra Ingles' and
'Receuil D'Ariettas choisies avec accompagnement de Guitarre
Anglaise'
respectively.
The important book by Antonio da Silva Leite (Estudio de
Guitarra,...
Oporto 1796) contains much useful information about how the
Portugese
took to the instrument. He says the best guitars came from England,
the best builder being 'Mr Simpson' and he goes onto say ..' and in
this city of Oporto there is Luis Cardoso Soares Sevilhano who today
loses little in comparison with Simpson'."
But, like you, I can well understand their nationalisatic reluctance to
recognise that the wonderful soulful fado music has much to do with
England......
regards,
Martyn
--- On Fri, 1/2/13, WALSH STUART <s.wa...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
From: WALSH STUART <s.wa...@ntlworld.com>
Subject: [LUTE] Re: The English Guitar
To: al...@signtracks.com
Cc: "Gary R. Boye" <boy...@appstate.edu>, "'Lute List'"
<lute@cs.dartmouth.edu>
Date: Friday, 1 February, 2013, 9:16
On 01/02/2013 05:40, Alain wrote:
> I think the English guitar is the instrument that has survived in
Portugal as one of the fundamental ingredient of traditional fado...
Alain,
I'd recommend that don't you suggest that idea to Portuguese people -
they get very touchy about it! There were some very heated exchanges on
the old cittern list many years ago.
Portuguese people (obviously not all of them) see their 'guitarra'
(looks very like an English guitar but with fancier watch-key tuners)
as something completely independent of the English guitar.
Amongst all the other things that can come into play in discussing
instruments, nationalistic ones can come in too. Reluctantly I have to
say that the section in 'The Lute in Europe 2' is, for me anyway, far
too heavily nationalistic.
But I'm not Portuguese. But if I was, and if I thought that fado was
part of my identity and culture and that the guitarra is the essence of
fado, then I might not want the origins of the guitarra to be the
English guitar.
Stuart
> Anyways, I really just want to congratulate Gary on his phenomenal
work,
> Alain
>
>
>
> On 1/31/2013 5:07 AM, Gary R. Boye wrote:
>> Dear Bill,
>>
>> I think I can (briefly) answer your questions:
>>
>> There is a HUGE amount of music that survives for this instrument.
If you check my web page for the 18th century and do a CTRL-F for
"english guitar" there are at least 274 publications:
>>
>> [1]http://applications.library.appstate.edu/music/lute/C18/1700.html
>>
>> More of these sources now labeled "guitar" are probably for this
instrument as well.
>>
>> The quality? It varies . . . it is an amateur instrument and much of
the music is just an arrangement of a melody--a single line at the end
of a publication really for piano and voice. But I must admit that the
piece Rob played and his playing was disarmingly effective; hearing one
of these instruments always makes me want to play one . . .
>>
>> There is a nice sonata by J.C. Bach:
>>
>> J.C. Bach c1775
>> Bach, Johann Christian. A sonata for the guitar with an
accompaniment for a violin (London, [England]: Longman, Lukey, and Co.)
[BUC]
>> English guitar and violin in staff notation
>>
>> The second question is easy: to my knowledge, this instrument was
NEVER called the "English guitar" in the 18th century. Always "guittar"
or even "guitar" with various other spellings/other names in German and
French.
>>
>> Gary
>>
>> On 1/31/2013 5:00 AM, William Samson wrote:
>>> (Semi) serious question. What music was composed for this
instrument
>>> outside Scotland? - Is it any good? (- the music from outside
Scotland,
>>> that is).
>>>
>>> Second question - What did they call this instrument back in
the day?
>>> Specifically, was it ever called "The English Guitar"?
>>>
>>> Bill
>>> From: Rob MacKillop <[2]robmackil...@gmail.com>
>>> To: Lute <[3]lute@cs.dartmouth.edu>
>>> Sent: Thursday, 31 January 2013, 8:50
>>> Subject: [LUTE] The English Guitar
>>> I'm no fascist, so if you want to discuss the so-called
English
>>> Guitar,
>>> I suggest you do so here, not in the thread of my video
performance
>>> (which everyone except Martyn seems to have seen). I only
ever said
>>> don't use my video thread to discuss the wider issues of the
guittar.
>>> My reason for creating a separate thread is that it makes it
easier
>>> for
>>> me to avoid. The reason for avoiding the discussion is that
there are
>>> a
>>> few regulars here who cannot discuss anything without killing
the
>>> subject for anyone who has a love for it.
>>> So, what is an English Guitar?
>>> Rob (exits stage left...)
>>> --
>>> To get on or off this list see list information at
>>> [1][4]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
>>>
>>> --
>>>
>>> References
>>>
>>> 1. [5]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
>>>
>>
>
>
>
>
--
References
1. http://applications.library.appstate.edu/music/lute/C18/1700.html
2. http://us.mc817.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=robmackil...@gmail.com
3. http://us.mc817.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=lute@cs.dartmouth.edu
4. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
5. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
