[LUTE] Strozzi
I'm enjoying Paul Beier's new Strozzi disk on Magnatune-- congats to Paul and his colleagues for this cracking disk. http://magnatune.com/artists/albums/beier-bstrozzi/ dt To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] lute songs for bass voice?
Dear Lutenists, I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? Best regards Franz -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
TEST.. On Jan 24, 2011, at 8:45 AM, Franz Mechsner wrote: > Dear Lutenists, > > I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or > vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any > for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed > for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't > there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) > in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > > Best regards > Franz > > > -- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
Just get a lute pitched to your voice, or tune down, top string=370 Hz is a good place to start At 12:45 AM 1/24/2011, you wrote: >Dear Lutenists, > >I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or >vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any >for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed >for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't >there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) >in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > >Best regards >Franz > > >-- > > >To get on or off this list see list information at >http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Lute songs for bass voice?
Dear Franz, You could make a start with Fuenllana. Some of his songs have the bottom line sung by the soloist. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu [mailto:lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu] On Behalf Of Franz Mechsner Sent: 24 January 2011 08:45 To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] lute songs for bass voice? Dear Lutenists, I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? Best regards Franz -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
Dear Franz Like most lute song players, I lug around endless transpositions of much of the repertoire. Transposing down a fourth (which will fit your range nicely) is easy enough, as it basically involves playing the tab a line lower. Beware of the third between courses 3 and 4, and raise the bass line where it falls off your instrument. As a quick alternative you might want to transpose just the bass line and improvise your chords/accompaniment on that. Hey, you've just invented continuo playing! ;-) David On 24 January 2011 09:45, Franz Mechsner wrote: > Dear Lutenists, > > I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or > vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any > for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed > for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't > there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) > in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > > Best regards > Franz > > > -- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html > -- *** David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com www.davidvanooijen.nl ***
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
Dear Franz, There are many songs in the alto range that should fit you comfortably. The 'problem' is that you will be singing at a transposed range (down an octave) thus not matching the lute in the 'usual' way. I really don't mind that, although some people do care. You can also take songs in the soprano range and transpose them down a 4th or 5th and play them with a big lute in E or D (a classical guitar will do the trick for six course music). The 'singing' line for many of the vihuela songs is the tenor line, you could take those songs and transpose them down a 4th or 5th, play them with a big lute and voila! Quick vihuela examples: Milan: Con pavor recordó el moro Narvaez: Y la mi cinta dorada Valderrábano: Fuga a tres, primero grado (for solmisation, bass line) There is also Valderrábano's 'Segundo Libro de motetes y otras cosas para cantar y tañer contrabaxo y en otras partes tenor' [Second book of motets and other things to sing and play the bass and in other instances the tenor]. Hope this helps, Hector On Jan 24, 2011, at 8:45 AM, Franz Mechsner wrote: > Dear Lutenists, > > I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or > vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any > for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed > for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't > there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) > in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > > Best regards > Franz > > > -- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Lute songs for bass voice?
Dear Franz, You have touched on a fundamental problem with renaissance music. So much of it was conceived in terms of polyphony, so singing soprano and alto lines down an octave rarely works well. The frottole collected by Bossinensis and published by Petrucci in 1509 and 1511, for example, are a dead loss when sung down an octave. It's OK to use instruments instead of singers, so a soprano accompanied by a lute and/or a few viols playing the lowest voices will work well. Unfortunately, transposing the cantus down an octave is unsatisfactory, since it obscures the polyphony. That is presumably why Fuenllana did what he did. Rather than transpose the top line down an octave, he gave one of the lines to a singer to sing at the correct pitch, including some songs where the soloist sang the bass line. I think that is the way for a solo bass singer to proceed with polyphonic music. A hundred years later, songs were conceived more as solo songs, and I have in mind English lute songs from 1597 onwards. Although many of them were published so that they could be sung as part-songs with four voices, they are essentially solo songs. We know from Robert Dowland's _Musical Banquet_ (London, 1610), that the songs in that collection were to be sung down an octave by a man, not at the written pitch. Doing that generally works well with other English lute songs too, but that isn't going to help you find repertoire as a bass singer. There is much you can do if you find a friendly soprano, including singing duets such as Dowland's "Flow my teares" or the dialogue "Humor say", but that doesn't answer your question about solo songs for a bass singer. I hope there will be some more specific suggestions forthcoming from Lutenetters to add to Fuenllana's songs. Best wishes, Stewart. -Original Message- From: lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu [mailto:lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu] On Behalf Of Hector Sent: 24 January 2011 09:55 To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice? Dear Franz, There are many songs in the alto range that should fit you comfortably. The 'problem' is that you will be singing at a transposed range (down an octave) thus not matching the lute in the 'usual' way. I really don't mind that, although some people do care. You can also take songs in the soprano range and transpose them down a 4th or 5th and play them with a big lute in E or D (a classical guitar will do the trick for six course music). The 'singing' line for many of the vihuela songs is the tenor line, you could take those songs and transpose them down a 4th or 5th, play them with a big lute and voila! Quick vihuela examples: Milan: Con pavor recordó el moro Narvaez: Y la mi cinta dorada Valderrábano: Fuga a tres, primero grado (for solmisation, bass line) There is also Valderrábano's 'Segundo Libro de motetes y otras cosas para cantar y tañer contrabaxo y en otras partes tenor' [Second book of motets and other things to sing and play the bass and in other instances the tenor]. Hope this helps, Hector On Jan 24, 2011, at 8:45 AM, Franz Mechsner wrote: > Dear Lutenists, > > I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or > vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any > for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed > for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't > there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) > in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > > Best regards > Franz > > > -- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
Hello Franz: It seems as though you have a friend in Vincenzo Galilei, who thought the bass voice extracted from polyphony should stand well enough to perform intabulations while singing the bass line. There are a few intabulations in this format found in the original publication of Il Fronimo, some of which I've performed with a bass singer. Best wishes, Ron Andrico (who is unfreezing water pipes - it's minus 18F here) www.mignarda.com > Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2011 08:45:23 + > To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu > From: franz.mechs...@northumbria.ac.uk > Subject: [LUTE] lute songs for bass voice? > > Dear Lutenists, > > I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or > vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any > for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed > for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't > there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) > in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > > Best regards > Franz > > > -- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Sale of music / lute books
January 2011 Dear friends of the lute and its music. Albert Reyerman is selling some music/lute books from his private library. A recent listing is available at http://tree-edition.magix.net/public/ The members of the German Lute Society have got this message already some weeks ago. Thats why some books are already sold. Be quick with ordering if you are interested in a certain book. The listing is updated permanently. All prices in Euro. - Albert Reyerman Finkenberg 89 23558 Lübeck albertreyer...@kabelmail.de www.Tree-Edition.com -- TREE EDITION Albert Reyerman Finkenberg 89 23558 Luebeck Germany albertreyer...@kabelmail.de www.Tree-Edition.com ++49(0)451 899 78 48 More music books available at http://tree-edition.magix.net/public/ To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
Dear Franz One really good song for bass voice can be found in the Stainer and Bell "Songs from Manuscript Sources" volume 1. It is "Most men do love the Spanish wine". I recorded it some years ago, and both the singer and I really enjoyed ourselves! At the same time, we also recorded the first song in that volume., Parson's "In youthly years", with a bass lute and the singer an octave down. It sounded fine. Moving into the C17th, of course there are loads of English dialogues for soprano and bass, with a simple, usually unfigured continuo line. Stewart and Hector point to Fuellana and Valderabano vihuela songs which work well. Slightly off topic here, very often the singing part in vihuela songs is included in the tablature. So if you try to to a song like Valderabano's "Con que la lavare" or Corten espadas afilados" (vocal line being the tenor part), with a soprano, you will be playing in parallel octaves with the singer, which sounds very odd! Best wishes Martin On 24/01/2011 08:45, "Franz Mechsner" wrote: >Dear Lutenists, > >I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or >vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any >for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed >for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't >there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) >in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > >Best regards >Franz > > >-- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] A new idea for us
To all: To those who may be interested, we are trying a new idea - for us at least. Responding to requests from our audiences, we have just posted a few singles of pieces that we frequently perform live but have not been included on our CDs. These include our arrangements of 'Sicut cervus' and 'Sitivit anima mea' by Palestrina, and 'Ave verum corpus' by William Byrd. These tracks can be previewed and/or downloaded on our CDBaby page http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/Mignarda. Also found on this site is a single of our arrangement of 'Come away death' from Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, set to an old tune. Best wishes, Ron & Donna -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
Franz, Since you're doing this for your own enjoyment, you could always find tunes in an alto register and sing falsetto. I'm not being cheeky; this was probably done. Just how comfortable you'll feel exploring your stratosphere is another matter. Chris Christopher Wilke Lutenist, Guitarist and Composer www.christopherwilke.com --- On Mon, 1/24/11, Franz Mechsner wrote: > From: Franz Mechsner > Subject: [LUTE] lute songs for bass voice? > To: "lute-cs.dartmouth.edu" > Date: Monday, January 24, 2011, 3:45 AM > Dear Lutenists, > > I would love to sing some of the > beautiful Renaissance lute (or > vihuela) songs by myself (in private of > course...), but cannot find any > for bass voice. Is it that songs were > exclusively or mainly composed > for higher pitches of voice? If it was > for an ideal of beauty - weren't > there male amateurs who liked to sing as > well (as good as they could) > in these times? Could you point me to > some suitable sources? > > Best regards > Franz > > > -- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html >
[LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice?
I do that all the time - it's great fun! Edward C. Yong ky...@pacific.net.sg On 24 Jan 2011, at 10:07 PM, Christopher Wilke wrote: Franz, Since you're doing this for your own enjoyment, you could always find tunes in an alto register and sing falsetto. I'm not being cheeky; this was probably done. Just how comfortable you'll feel exploring your stratosphere is another matter. Chris Christopher Wilke Lutenist, Guitarist and Composer www.christopherwilke.com To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Strozzi
I agree, it is a lovely recording, and I also love the music itself! At 02:06 AM 1/24/2011, David Tayler wrote: >I'm enjoying Paul Beier's new Strozzi disk on Magnatune-- >congats to Paul and his colleagues for this cracking disk. >http://magnatune.com/artists/albums/beier-bstrozzi/ > >dt > > > >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
[LUTE] Re: Lute songs for bass voice?
If you analyze several hundred English lute songs, and compare the voice leading with several hundred English madrigals, you will see that the lute songs are written so that the top part can almost always be performed down an octave--it is a different kind of counterpoint. The counterpoint falls into several categories, depending on whether the other parts, if present, sound--and whether the bass crosses with the voice, parallel fourths change to fifths, and so on. The Italian and Spanish repertory is differently constructed, and the French is more often than not similar to the English by 1605 or so. dt You have touched on a fundamental problem with renaissance music. So much of it was conceived in terms of polyphony, so singing soprano and alto lines down an octave rarely works well. The frottole collected by Bossinensis and published by Petrucci in 1509 and 1511, for example, are a dead loss when sung down an octave. It's OK to use instruments instead of singers, so a soprano accompanied by a lute and/or a few viols playing the lowest voices will work well. Unfortunately, transposing the cantus down an octave is unsatisfactory, since it obscures the polyphony. That is presumably why Fuenllana did what he did. Rather than transpose the top line down an octave, he gave one of the lines to a singer to sing at the correct pitch, including some songs where the soloist sang the bass line. I think that is the way for a solo bass singer to proceed with polyphonic music. A hundred years later, songs were conceived more as solo songs, and I have in mind English lute songs from 1597 onwards. Although many of them were published so that they could be sung as part-songs with four voices, they are essentially solo songs. We know from Robert Dowland's _Musical Banquet_ (London, 1610), that the songs in that collection were to be sung down an octave by a man, not at the written pitch. Doing that generally works well with other English lute songs too, but that isn't going to help you find repertoire as a bass singer. There is much you can do if you find a friendly soprano, including singing duets such as Dowland's "Flow my teares" or the dialogue "Humor say", but that doesn't answer your question about solo songs for a bass singer. I hope there will be some more specific suggestions forthcoming from Lutenetters to add to Fuenllana's songs. Best wishes, Stewart. -Original Message- From: lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu [mailto:lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu] On Behalf Of Hector Sent: 24 January 2011 09:55 To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: lute songs for bass voice? Dear Franz, There are many songs in the alto range that should fit you comfortably. The 'problem' is that you will be singing at a transposed range (down an octave) thus not matching the lute in the 'usual' way. I really don't mind that, although some people do care. You can also take songs in the soprano range and transpose them down a 4th or 5th and play them with a big lute in E or D (a classical guitar will do the trick for six course music). The 'singing' line for many of the vihuela songs is the tenor line, you could take those songs and transpose them down a 4th or 5th, play them with a big lute and voila! Quick vihuela examples: Milan: Con pavor recordó el moro Narvaez: Y la mi cinta dorada Valderrábano: Fuga a tres, primero grado (for solmisation, bass line) There is also Valderrábano's 'Segundo Libro de motetes y otras cosas para cantar y tañer contrabaxo y en otras partes tenor' [Second book of motets and other things to sing and play the bass and in other instances the tenor]. Hope this helps, Hector On Jan 24, 2011, at 8:45 AM, Franz Mechsner wrote: > Dear Lutenists, > > I would love to sing some of the beautiful Renaissance lute (or > vihuela) songs by myself (in private of course...), but cannot find any > for bass voice. Is it that songs were exclusively or mainly composed > for higher pitches of voice? If it was for an ideal of beauty - weren't > there male amateurs who liked to sing as well (as good as they could) > in these times? Could you point me to some suitable sources? > > Best regards > Franz > > > -- > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
