Jürgen: Absolutely hit the nail on the head. It’s all about the sound and people have different hand anatomy and physiology. Iconography and fingering is an important starting point but if it doesn’t fit your hand (and nail growth) it shouldn’t stop you from playing the music you want. Have seen and heard fantastic 6 course performances thumb under, but also thumb out with pi on runs. Ronn McF has one of the best right hands in the business and plays with great speed and tone color variation playing thumb under on his 10 course. Best baroque lute concert I heard last year saw the right thumb sneaking under the index when they crossed. Brilliant West Coast baroque band led by an archlute playing thumb under. I’ve also heard awful thumb under 6 course playing and painfully poor baroque lute thumb out playing.
What’s more important than thumb position? Hitting both courses cleanly with good tone and volume control, strong weak alternation in the appropriate music whether pi or im, playing “rest stroke” on baroque instruments as default and as a rare special effect on earlier instruments, bringing out dance rhythms and polyphony when present, using ornamentation and improvisation, savoring the sound of low tension gut strings. If you need to play Renaissance music thumb out, have at it. If you have a short thumb and can’t get it out comfortably, focus on sound production and playing musically and all is well. I’ve been given that advice in lessons and masterclasses by numerous teachers. I have both a short thumb and a wrist injured by decades of doing vascular and microsurgery and the full thumb out of my classical guitar days is painful and prevents my fingers from getting a decent sound. i won’t let that stop me from enjoying all my instruments, from my 4 course Renai! ssance guitar to my 13 course German theorbo. Danny > On Mar 12, 2019, at 2:50 AM, Jurgen Frenz > <eye-and-ear-cont...@protonmail.com> wrote: > > Having acquired an 8c lute in late December makes the subject incredible > relevant to me. I hope nobody is offended when I put down some personal > practical observations without referring to historic evidence. > The entire hand position needs to be different, I think. (1) As it is > possible to play p-i lines on all courses doing so with m-i ends for me > somewhere on the middle F string - the inside of the hand would just mute the > high g string because of the pinky that is planted on the sound board with my > European average hand. (2) Playing distinctive bass lines on the 7th and 8th > course while playing m-i on the upper courses forces (I believe) the hand to > turn more like 45 degrees or so towards the strings and not any longer > "almost parallel" as is practical for earlier music. > The challenge to me is to produce a "gentle" sound and finger nails are a > more urgent matter than playing on a 6c lute thumb out. From what people say > here I conclude that this is quite a personal matter, individuals have > different nail growth and sound ideals. > Or would you just lift the pinky? I don't think so because it is the GPS > sensor for string geography. > > On the images in Jean-Marie's links I find it surprising that the hand is > actually almost at 90 degrees to the strings, quite like classical guitar > players but the hand is placed at the corner of the bridge, miles away from > the rosette. Once again, placing the hand there would automatically turn the > hand around even further. > > Best regards > Jürgen > > > ---------------------------------- > “There is a voice that doesn’t use words. Listen.” > > Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rumi > To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
