[LUTE] Re: Arpeggio question

[Daniel Winheld]

Rest strokes tended to lock up my wrist way back when I played Classical 
Guitar. In fact, the "Segovia" technique I was schooled in locked up a lot of 
psycho/physical components. It took the Renaissance lute w/ thumb-inside right 
hand approach to unlock most of the physical components. I still wrestle with 
some of the psychological ones to this day- almost 40 years since I put down 
the Classical Guitar.

A certain amount of rest stroke practice combined with the described harp 
technique works quite well for training purposes, and using the rest stroke 
only for certain notes in performance can be fine for expression. Of course, 
the two single top strings of the d-minor lute and any single strung instrument 
are somewhat game changing.

Dan

On May 21, 2012, at 3:01 AM, David Tayler wrote:

>I just use basic harp technique, which is pull, hold, release, but I
>   don't use rest strokes.
>   Rest strokes tend to lock up the wrist. But OK for special effect.
>   dt
> 
>   --
> 
> 
> To get on or off this list see list information at
> http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html

[LUTE] Re: Arpeggio question

[Roland Hayes]

And then there's Hagen! Almost every ascending arpeggio turns around and
descends. Lots of a-m-i a-m-i going down.   r

-Original Message-
From: lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu [mailto:lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu] On
Behalf Of Daniel Winheld
Sent: Thursday, May 17, 2012 12:30 PM
To: Bernd Haegemann
Cc: lute list
Subject: [LUTE] Re: Arpeggio question

Interesting RH problems arise in the "harp" style of one-note-per string
playing so common in chordal tuned lutes playing 18th century music.
(i.e., Weiss, Bach, d-minor lute.)

I have had to do a lot of RH retraining to cope. Background has been
Renaissance lute and much earlier, classical guitar.

Your bottom example illustrates the problem perfectly as far as it goes;
but without the actual music- what note sequences on which strings, fret
positions, tempi, etc. -an actual fingering solution on line here is
impossible. And there is no one formula. Train your i-m-a fingers to not
be locked in closed arpeggio patterns such as one encounters in
Classical Guitar pedagogy (Carcassi et. al.) and learn to change
strings/courses with each alternate finger when ascending or descending,
and also slip-slide that index finger as needed when descending. Much
harder to describe than to show or do.

Here's a try: Rest thumb on 10 or 11 and forget about it. Unglue your
pinky from the soundboard for a few minutes. Now, pluck courses-
ascending- 6, 5, 4, w/ i, m, a. While slowly starting to pluck 4/w a,
reach i down to 3rd course, being ready to pluck that in (slow!) even
tempo after 4- and m & a fingers have already planted on courses 1 and
2. 

That's one practice pattern. Also- maybe more important- do it with just
i-m, in three moves. (Or just four courses in two moves.) That is just
ascending. Do it in reverse to descend. For a 4 note descension, one can
also let i slip-slide from the 3rd note to the 4th. Sometimes I will
slide the index finger, controlled & in tempo, over more strings. 

Next step, bring the thumb into play. It can do the ascending motion by
going the opposite way of the index finger- a controlled,
string-by-string "strum", and seamless transition to i, m, a for last
three notes/strings. Suggested practice piece- the 1st movement, Prelude
of the C major suite by Conradi. For this, put the little finger back
down casually on the soundboard when it feels right. Or not, if you can
maintain hand position, control tone, and keep from accumulating tension
in wrist and forearm. Mine touches down frequently, comes up a lot.
Especially on the 13 course lute.

Also, study the early Baroque Italian masters- Kapsberger, Piccinini,
et. al. Lute, archlute, theorbo. Very interesting arpeggio patterns. If
you have significant Classical Guitar training in your background, you
will need to learn to de-emphasize use of the 3rd finger. And then learn
how to put it back in, when appropriate & necessary. 


On May 17, 2012, at 6:08 AM, Bernd Haegemann wrote:

>   as it seems this didn't reach the list..
>    Original-Nachricht 
> 
>   Betreff: Arpeggio question
>   Datum: Thu, 17 May 2012 11:17:09 +0200
>   Von: Bernd Haegemann [1]
>   Kopie (CC): lute-cs.dartmouth.edu List [2],
>   baroque Lutelist [3]
> 
> Dear all,
> 
> sometimes we find in baroque lute music chains of chords, notated 
> evenly as it seems and with the mark "arpeggio" or "arp".
> Now, if the chain looked like this (with n being the number of notes 
> in the chord)
> 
> 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
> 
> or
> 
> 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5
> 
> one would think of some arpeggio scheme to use it in such a passage.
> 
> But what the number of notes in the chords looks like this
> 
> 
> 5 5 5 5 5 5 3 3 3 2 3 3 4 6 6 5 4 4 4
> 
> or so?
> 
> What would you do?
> Thank you for your hints!
> 
> best regards
> Bernd
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>   --
> 
> References
> 
>   1. mailto:b...@symbol4.de
>   2. mailto:lute@cs.dartmouth.edu
>   3. mailto:baroque-l...@cs.dartmouth.edu
> 
> 
> To get on or off this list see list information at 
> http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html

[LUTE] Re: Arpeggio question

[Daniel Winheld]

Interesting RH problems arise in the "harp" style of one-note-per string 
playing so common in chordal tuned lutes playing 18th century music. (i.e., 
Weiss, Bach, d-minor lute.)

I have had to do a lot of RH retraining to cope. Background has been 
Renaissance lute and much earlier, classical guitar.

Your bottom example illustrates the problem perfectly as far as it goes; but 
without the actual music- what note sequences on which strings, fret positions, 
tempi, etc. -an actual fingering solution on line here is impossible. And there 
is no one formula. Train your i-m-a fingers to not be locked in closed arpeggio 
patterns such as one encounters in Classical Guitar pedagogy (Carcassi et. al.) 
and learn to change strings/courses with each alternate finger when ascending 
or descending, and also slip-slide that index finger as needed when descending. 
Much harder to describe than to show or do.

Here's a try: Rest thumb on 10 or 11 and forget about it. Unglue your pinky 
from the soundboard for a few minutes. Now, pluck courses- ascending- 6, 5, 4, 
w/ i, m, a. While slowly starting to pluck 4/w a, reach i down to 3rd course, 
being ready to pluck that in (slow!) even tempo after 4- and m & a fingers have 
already planted on courses 1 and 2. 

That's one practice pattern. Also- maybe more important- do it with just i-m, 
in three moves. (Or just four courses in two moves.) That is just ascending. Do 
it in reverse to descend. For a 4 note descension, one can also let i 
slip-slide from the 3rd note to the 4th. Sometimes I will slide the index 
finger, controlled & in tempo, over more strings. 

Next step, bring the thumb into play. It can do the ascending motion by going 
the opposite way of the index finger- a controlled, string-by-string "strum", 
and seamless transition to i, m, a for last three notes/strings. Suggested 
practice piece- the 1st movement, Prelude of the C major suite by Conradi. For 
this, put the little finger back down casually on the soundboard when it feels 
right. Or not, if you can maintain hand position, control tone, and keep from 
accumulating tension in wrist and forearm. Mine touches down frequently, comes 
up a lot. Especially on the 13 course lute.

Also, study the early Baroque Italian masters- Kapsberger, Piccinini, et. al. 
Lute, archlute, theorbo. Very interesting arpeggio patterns. If you have 
significant Classical Guitar training in your background, you will need to 
learn to de-emphasize use of the 3rd finger. And then learn how to put it back 
in, when appropriate & necessary. 


On May 17, 2012, at 6:08 AM, Bernd Haegemann wrote:

>   as it seems this didn't reach the list..
>    Original-Nachricht 
> 
>   Betreff: Arpeggio question
>   Datum: Thu, 17 May 2012 11:17:09 +0200
>   Von: Bernd Haegemann [1]
>   Kopie (CC): lute-cs.dartmouth.edu List [2],
>   baroque Lutelist [3]
> 
> Dear all,
> 
> sometimes we find in baroque lute music chains of chords, notated evenly
> as it seems and with the mark "arpeggio" or "arp".
> Now, if the chain looked like this (with n being the number of notes in
> the chord)
> 
> 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
> 
> or
> 
> 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5
> 
> one would think of some arpeggio scheme to use it in such a passage.
> 
> But what the number of notes in the chords looks like this
> 
> 
> 5 5 5 5 5 5 3 3 3 2 3 3 4 6 6 5 4 4 4
> 
> or so?
> 
> What would you do?
> Thank you for your hints!
> 
> best regards
> Bernd
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>   --
> 
> References
> 
>   1. mailto:b...@symbol4.de
>   2. mailto:lute@cs.dartmouth.edu
>   3. mailto:baroque-l...@cs.dartmouth.edu
> 
> 
> To get on or off this list see list information at
> http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html

[LUTE] Re: Arpeggio question

[Bernd Haegemann]

   as it seems this didn't reach the list..
    Original-Nachricht 

   Betreff: Arpeggio question
   Datum: Thu, 17 May 2012 11:17:09 +0200
   Von: Bernd Haegemann [1]
   Kopie (CC): lute-cs.dartmouth.edu List [2],
   baroque Lutelist [3]

Dear all,

sometimes we find in baroque lute music chains of chords, notated evenly
as it seems and with the mark "arpeggio" or "arp".
Now, if the chain looked like this (with n being the number of notes in
the chord)

4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4

or

5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5

one would think of some arpeggio scheme to use it in such a passage.

But what the number of notes in the chords looks like this


5 5 5 5 5 5 3 3 3 2 3 3 4 6 6 5 4 4 4

or so?

What would you do?
Thank you for your hints!

best regards
Bernd





   --

References

   1. mailto:b...@symbol4.de
   2. mailto:lute@cs.dartmouth.edu
   3. mailto:baroque-l...@cs.dartmouth.edu


To get on or off this list see list information at
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html