>However, I think we differ over the harpsichord's ability to >play 'long-sustained'.
I was having this discussion with my wife the other day (she plays keyboards rather better than I can), so I went to the harpsichord and tried it to check. Just like on a piano, if you hold a key down, the damper remains out of contact with the string, which sustains longer than it would if you released the key immediately. Not as long as on the piano of course, but there's a difference between staccatissimo and simple separation. Maybe the term should be "short-sustained". As regards "detached" fingering, it's interesting that the term "détaché" when applied to bowing of a string instrument does not imply a silence between the notes. It merely means that you change bow direction for each note, making a fresh start, rather than slurring two or more together. The on-the-string bowing with a silence between notes is called "martelé". "Staccato" means separating notes with a silence while staying on the string but not changing the direction of the bow. Then of course there's all the off-the-string stuff. "Staccato" in Italian means "separated". It does not mean "short". Playing NSP with a fresh start to each note but not necessarily a clearly audible silence can sound very pleasant, at least to my ears, and of course you need to be able to do the staccatissimo in the first place to do it reliably because the timing has to be phenomenally precise. The "look mummy, no legato" (or dripping tap) way of playing just sounds like a technical exercise. To do a good détaché it helps to have a good martelé to begin with. I would argue that the martelé was the "basic stroke" just like the staccato is the basic way of playing NSP. C To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
