[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique?
Ed I forgot to send this to the whole list. I rather like this record, but it is now very difficult to find. You can see the tittles at the link below. Perhaps it can be found second hand. I also like this de Visée recording http://tinyurl.com/apg537 There was a thread about this topic on the French lute list very recently. http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth/message/8993 Carlos Gonzales lute maker wrote a text which accompanies the recording about the Angélique. http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth/message/9018 http://tinyurl.com/5jtkqq Andreas Schlegel seems to be researching this question also Anthony Le 4 mars 09 à 22:30, Rob MacKillop a écrit : There is a very famous Spanish lute/guitar player whose name has embarrasingly disappeared from my brain, who has recorded a CD of angelique music on the glossa label. Moreno! There you are! Rob 2009/3/4 [1]wi...@cs.helsinki.fi Lutenists, if memory serves, I remember someone in the List some years ago claimed that the painting by Laurent de La Hyre could be - or is definitely? - an angelique, lute tuned in seconds - like a diatonic harp. Any opinions or comments? And is there any lutenist, who actually has stringed and tuned his/her lute to the angelique tuning and played the music to that tuning? Any comments of the usefulness and quality of the tuning? And of the quality of the music to that tuning? Cheers, Arto To get on or off this list see list information at [2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. mailto:wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 2. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique?
13c. angelique? The most popular were 15-17 c. JL - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Thursday, March 05, 2009 10:11 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique? Ed I forgot to send this to the whole list. I rather like this record, but it is now very difficult to find. You can see the tittles at the link below. Perhaps it can be found second hand. I also like this de Visée recording http://tinyurl.com/apg537 There was a thread about this topic on the French lute list very recently. http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth/message/8993 Carlos Gonzales lute maker wrote a text which accompanies the recording about the Angélique. http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/Le_luth/message/9018 http://tinyurl.com/5jtkqq Andreas Schlegel seems to be researching this question also Anthony Le 4 mars 09 ŕ 22:30, Rob MacKillop a écrit : There is a very famous Spanish lute/guitar player whose name has embarrasingly disappeared from my brain, who has recorded a CD of angelique music on the glossa label. Moreno! There you are! Rob 2009/3/4 [1]wi...@cs.helsinki.fi Lutenists, if memory serves, I remember someone in the List some years ago claimed that the painting by Laurent de La Hyre could be - or is definitely? - an angelique, lute tuned in seconds - like a diatonic harp. Any opinions or comments? And is there any lutenist, who actually has stringed and tuned his/her lute to the angelique tuning and played the music to that tuning? Any comments of the usefulness and quality of the tuning? And of the quality of the music to that tuning? Cheers, Arto To get on or off this list see list information at [2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. mailto:wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 2. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique?
CD Title: The Loss of the Golden Rose Lute F. Edgar Gilbert, Independent Artist Guild- Panegyrick 1997 Plays an Angelique built by Mark Butler in 1984, Harrogate, after an original by Joachim Tielke, Hamburg, 1704. It's a mixed programme, using an 11 course French lute (also by Mark Butler, after Andreas Berr, 1699) angelique- includes music by Ennemond Denis Gautier, Jaques de Gallot, Claude Emond, Charles Mouton, Francois Couperin, and Christian de Bethune. The Bethune Emond are played rather well on the angelique, ravishing kind of sound. The French lute sounds like there are recording/response issues with the lute and/or the strings, but he seems like a fine performer. No idea on the distribution, currency, or availability of this CD- found it used last year. Dan if memory serves, I remember someone in the List some years ago claimed that the painting by Laurent de La Hyre could be - or is definitely? - an angelique, lute tuned in seconds - like a diatonic harp. Any opinions or comments? And is there any lutenist, who actually has stringed and tuned his/her lute to the angelique tuning and played the music to that tuning? Any comments of the usefulness and quality of the tuning? And of the quality of the music to that tuning? -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique?
There is a very famous Spanish lute/guitar player whose name has embarrasingly disappeared from my brain, who has recorded a CD of angelique music on the glossa label. Moreno! There you are! Rob 2009/3/4 [1]wi...@cs.helsinki.fi Lutenists, if memory serves, I remember someone in the List some years ago claimed that the painting by Laurent de La Hyre could be - or is definitely? - an angelique, lute tuned in seconds - like a diatonic harp. Any opinions or comments? And is there any lutenist, who actually has stringed and tuned his/her lute to the angelique tuning and played the music to that tuning? Any comments of the usefulness and quality of the tuning? And of the quality of the music to that tuning? Cheers, Arto To get on or off this list see list information at [2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. mailto:wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 2. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique?
Rob, I would find this recording interesting. I cannot find it on the Glossa site - can you provide details? Thanks, ed .At 09:30 PM 3/4/2009 +, Rob MacKillop wrote: There is a very famous Spanish lute/guitar player whose name has embarrasingly disappeared from my brain, who has recorded a CD of angelique music on the glossa label. Moreno! There you are! Rob 2009/3/4 [1]wi...@cs.helsinki.fi Lutenists, if memory serves, I remember someone in the List some years ago claimed that the painting by Laurent de La Hyre could be - or is definitely? - an angelique, lute tuned in seconds - like a diatonic harp. Any opinions or comments? And is there any lutenist, who actually has stringed and tuned his/her lute to the angelique tuning and played the music to that tuning? Any comments of the usefulness and quality of the tuning? And of the quality of the music to that tuning? Cheers, Arto To get on or off this list see list information at [2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. mailto:wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 2. 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
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique?
Rob, I found the answer. It is: Glossa GCD920005, Pièce pour Théorboes Françaises by Michel de Bethune, Antoine Forqueray, Jean-Baptiste Lully, Robert de Visee on Theorbo and angelique by Jose Miguel Moreno. It is out of print. ed At 05:50 PM 3/4/2009 -0600, Edward Martin wrote: Rob, I would find this recording interesting. I cannot find it on the Glossa site - can you provide details? Thanks, ed .At 09:30 PM 3/4/2009 +, Rob MacKillop wrote: There is a very famous Spanish lute/guitar player whose name has embarrasingly disappeared from my brain, who has recorded a CD of angelique music on the glossa label. Moreno! There you are! Rob 2009/3/4 [1]wi...@cs.helsinki.fi Lutenists, if memory serves, I remember someone in the List some years ago claimed that the painting by Laurent de La Hyre could be - or is definitely? - an angelique, lute tuned in seconds - like a diatonic harp. Any opinions or comments? And is there any lutenist, who actually has stringed and tuned his/her lute to the angelique tuning and played the music to that tuning? Any comments of the usefulness and quality of the tuning? And of the quality of the music to that tuning? Cheers, Arto To get on or off this list see list information at [2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. mailto:wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 2. 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 No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 8.0.237 / Virus Database: 270.11.7/1982 - Release Date: 03/03/09 16:09:00 Edward Martin 2817 East 2nd Street Duluth, Minnesota 55812 e-mail: e...@gamutstrings.com voice: (218) 728-1202
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre painting an angelique?
I have a copy. The music by Bethune is very good, not on a level with de Visee, but certainly worth hearing. In a word, 'pleasant', and there's nothing wrong with that. Rob 2009/3/5 Edward Martin [1...@gamutstrings.com Rob, I found the answer. It is: Glossa GCD920005, Piece pour Theorboes Franc,aises by Michel de Bethune, Antoine Forqueray, Jean-Baptiste Lully, Robert de Visee on Theorbo and angelique by Jose Miguel Moreno. It is out of print. ed At 05:50 PM 3/4/2009 -0600, Edward Martin wrote: Rob, I would find this recording interesting. I cannot find it on the Glossa site - can you provide details? Thanks, ed .At 09:30 PM 3/4/2009 +, Rob MacKillop wrote: There is a very famous Spanish lute/guitar player whose name has embarrasingly disappeared from my brain, who has recorded a CD of angelique music on the glossa label. Moreno! There you are! Rob 2009/3/4 [1][2]wi...@cs.helsinki.fi Lutenists, if memory serves, I remember someone in the List some years ago claimed that the painting by Laurent de La Hyre could be - or is definitely? - an angelique, lute tuned in seconds - like a diatonic harp. Any opinions or comments? And is there any lutenist, who actually has stringed and tuned his/her lute to the angelique tuning and played the music to that tuning? Any comments of the usefulness and quality of the tuning? And of the quality of the music to that tuning? Cheers, Arto To get on or off this list see list information at [2][3]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. mailto:[4]wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 2. [5]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html Edward Martin 2817 East 2nd Street Duluth, Minnesota 55812 e-mail: [6...@gamutstrings.com voice: (218) 728-1202 No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG - [7]www.avg.com Version: 8.0.237 / Virus Database: 270.11.7/1982 - Release Date: 03/03/09 16:09:00 Edward Martin 2817 East 2nd Street Duluth, Minnesota 55812 e-mail: [8...@gamutstrings.com voice: (218) 728-1202 -- References 1. mailto:e...@gamutstrings.com 2. mailto:wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 3. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html 4. mailto:wi...@cs.helsinki.fi 5. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html 6. mailto:e...@gamutstrings.com 7. http://www.avg.com/ 8. mailto:e...@gamutstrings.com
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
° to the strings index finger position, could be that it is somewhat guitar like, and this tends to be shunned, but lutenists). I just repeat these links here for reference: In front of the bridge: http://www.aquilacorde.com/mouton5.jpg Behind the bridge: http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/Ember/brugghen-1628.gif On the bridge: http://tinyurl.com/ago2rd This is not a criticism of Satoh's position, just to point to the fact that he is really about as far back as you can go. His lute bowl is large which helps the bass, and he often uses a Dutch' lute which benefits from a long bass string length. So there is not much left to do to help the bass for more lowering of tension. Any help, now must come from a change of string type, if not loaded, then say toroidal twine, with only on element of the twine going through the bridge; perhaps if Damian's high torsion strings give a similar result they will do the trick. Of course loading with a wire, could also do that, but demifilé usually result in oval shape holes, and apparently these are not observed on old 11c bridges, and not mentioned in Mace or Burwell. While they might not have been able to notice loading, they could not fail to notice a thread of wire, either within or without. All we can ask is for one of the other hypotheses to be able to pass a suitable string through the smalles bass string lute holes, and on lutes as short as the Charles Mouton lute. Damain may already have done this, or thinks he will be able to do this, with his new strings. I am certainly not going to complain. We should all be happy at having new solutions to our gut bass string problems. Note however that at present on a 68cm lute T. Satoh apparently has 11C at 1,82 diameter, and 2,4Kg (see below), which of course would not pass a historic lute hole. For a 66,5cm lute this diameter would increase; while the tension would actually need to drop to a little under 1,5Kg if we are to get anywhere near the hole size. Regards Anthony PS I hadn't realized that pinkie (a form I don't usually use) is the Dutch equivalent of fingie, borrowed into English. T. Satoh's string set up according to David van Ooijen: Baroque lute 68cm 415Hz (standard tension) For 11 course: 68cm 1)fâ = T40V (3.2kg) 2) dâ = T46V (3.1kg) 3) a = T54 (2.4kg) 4) f = T66 (2.2kg) 5) d = P78 (2.2kg) 6) A = P108(2.4kg)/ octave a = T54 (2.4kg) 7) G = P122 (2.4kg) octave g = T60 (2.3kg) 8) F = P136 (2.4kg) oct. f = T68 (2.4kg) 9) E/Eflat = P/G148 (E2.5/Eflat2.2) oct. e = T74 (2.5kg/ eb 2.2kg) 10) D = P/G162 (2.4kg) oct. d = T80(2.3kg) 11) C = P/G182 (2.4kg) oct. c = T 92 (2.4kg) For 13 course: ± 76cm. 12)Bâ/Bâflat = G176(2.5/2.2kg) oct. B/Bflat T88 (2.5/2.2kg) 13)Aâ = G194 (2.4kg) octave A= T96 (2.3kg) For 13 course French (Dutch) head: 10) ±72cm D = P 154 (2.4kg) oct. d = T 76 (2.4kg) 11) ±77cm C = P 160 (2.4kg) oct. c = T 80 (2.4kg) 12) ±82cm Bâ/Bâflat = P164 (2.5/2.2kg) oct. B/Bflat = T82 (2.5/2.2kg) 13) ±87cm Aâ = P170 (2.4kg) oct. A = T 84(2.35kg) For 14 course French (Dutch) head: 11) ±72cm C = G172 (2.4kg) oct. C = T 86 (2.4kg) 12) ±77cm Bâ/Bâflat = G 175 (2.5/2.2kg) oct. B/Bflat = T 88 (2.5/2.2kg) 13) ±82cm Aâ = G180 (2.4kg) oct. A = T90 (2.4kg) 14) ±87cm Gâ = G190 (2.4kg) oct. G = T96 (2.45kg) T = Treble gut (single twist), TV (varnished) P = Pistoy gut (triple twist), G = Gimp gut (silver or copper wire in gut) Le 1 mars 09 à 02:13, JarosÅaw Lipski a écrit : Anthony, I know these articles very well, but they don't answer some very difficult questions. As I repeatedly say, I am not against this theory. What I am only asking for is to call this hypothesis a hypothesis, taking into account the present state of research. That's all! I don't think it's too much. Some other real possibilities do exist as well, as explained in this thread. regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Sunday, March 01, 2009 12:34 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Le 28 fÄÅ vr. 09 Ä 23:39, alexander a ÄÅ crit : http://www.aquilacorde.com/articles4.htm And you can see Mimmo taking various measurements, explained in the article above at this link : http://www.aquilacorde.com/researches.htm Note that he does not just measure lute bridge holes. The same problems concern Viols. There must be some compensation in handling such instruments, however, in spite of the painstaking work: Just take a peep at the Charles IX Andrea Amati's viola (1570 ca?). Ashmolean Museum, Oxford 2007 http://www.aquilacorde.com/amati5.JPG The 4th hole on the tailpiece of the Amati viol has a diameter of 2.3 mm only against the necessary pure gut of not less than 2.8-3 mm
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Dear Jaroslaw Le 28 févr. 09 à 01:35, Jarosław Lipski a écrit : Dear Anthony, I really didn't want to rehash and old discussion (just wanted to share an interesting picture), but in a way I am beeing forced to reply, by your claims that finaly we found the satisfactory and historicaly correct answer for lute stringing. Not that I am doing it reluctantly - I always like chatting with you, which is very stimulating - however it really seams that at this particular moment declaring victory would be premature.` That is quite the same, here. I must add that I am a linguist, and so perhaps my way of thinking might be a little different from that of a lutenist or a string maker. We are used to reconstructing forms that we know we can never observe, except indirectly through the way these forms fit into the overall patterns and properties of the language. We never throw away an analysis, until we can find a better one, but we are always looking for alternatives. That is what I would like other string makers to do. That is surely how you get progresss in ideas. You have two conflicting hypotheses, the low tension and the loaded (for example), and you confront these with the data. With luck, this makes you look for new data, as each theory puts forward its arguments. Only recently did I notice that the RH position close to the bridge, is not really what you would expect if very low tension strings were the best hypothesis. You must understand that, as a linguist, I take great glee in this sort of argumentation. I would partake in it even if it was quite impossible to use the string type that was hypothesized. Imagine if the strings were loaded with gold leaf, or a deadly poison, and there was no other way of doing it. I would still be interested. I do think Mimmo's present loaded strings happen to work superbly well for French Baroque lute music. Their slenderness solves the intonation problems, about which Rob complained (even when he had fairly low tension strings), Their thin Venice core presnet very low impedance at the bridge and less inharmonicity, and allied with Venice Meanes an excellent singing quality and freedom of sound on all voices: the extraordinary quality of clarity and sustain. Even if they were not historic, I believe this seems to be the sort of sound that French Baroque lutensist were searching for, if we listen to T. Bailes, and J. Lindberg. It seems that this is also the typical characteristic of a good old lute (Rauwolf, etc), and probably what the French were after when searching for the old Biologna lutes. Now I am not saying this is the only way to go. I would not at all like every lutenist to buy old lutes, loaded strings and Burwell or Mace's RH position at the bridge. As we said a little while ago, every lutenist must make his own judgement about what aspects of historic performance, or what tonal string colour, or lute shape thay decide to use. Finally the most important element is having a could musical ear (Jerzy Zak's monitoring feedback theory) which allows the musician to get the best out of any instrument and stringing. The rest is to a certain extent personal choice. I say to a certain extent, because some choices do seem to get closed down when musicians believe they are anachronic (sometimes quite mistakenly, of course). Like yourself, I do not want some sort of dogma closing down choice. I very much enjoyed Ed Martyn's recent recording of Conradi and Kellenr using Dan Larson's gimped strings. I would not at all advise him to change over to loaded because they might be more historically correct. He lives in the same town as Dan Larson and can have his lute tuned perfectly to both of their likings. It would be rediculous to abandon such team work. The same is true for, Satoh, he has made extremely interesting research into low tension stringing, and shown that it can allow a very open sound, providing one adopts a large bodied lute, and thumb as far back as possible on the bass strings, preferably with an extension. Why would he want to close down that research? I am not at all suggesting that. Clearly, most lutenists will discuss stringing with their lutemaker and in mutual agreement will go with that choice, while perhaps mildly tweaking the result as time goes by. In the case of Stephen Gottlieb, had the loaded strings not been ready just in time, I would have gone along with his string choice of Geaorges Stopanni pure gut basses, and I am sure I would have managed, albeit with some problems concerning the thick basses. I certainly do not want to suggest that only one string type made by only one string maker is the way to go. I understand that Damian makes excellent strings, and he is also a lutenist and plays Baroque lute. This is a huge advantage, for someone who wants to restring their lute. You do need advice from
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded and the rest]
Very well put, Stewart ! All these documents from the past are worth our respect and gratefulness indeed, and who are we, more than three hundred years later, to detemnine that this one is reliable and this one is not.. As far as I know, Mersenne, Mace, Praetorius and quite a few more, are the only direct links with the music of this period and the sensitivity of our forebearers we can rely on, if we take care to read the lines and between the lines as well. Thank you to them all for taking pains to testify. Best wishes, Jean-Marie === 27-02-2009 21:50:11 === Dear Daniel, The point about keeping one's lute in bed is all about damp causing damage to the lute. A bed which is constantly used will be as dry a place as you can find for the lute, as long as you avoid the sweat etc between the sheets. Mace presents this gem of advice in an amusing way. Unfortunately the passage is often quoted out of context, laughed at, and misunderstood. People end up thinking that's all he had to say, that he was eccentric, cranky, unreliable, to be treated with caution, etc. Nothing could be more ridiculous. Mace was a player of the lute, viol and theorbo, a composer, an enthusiast, and he certainly knew what he was writing about. He could see that the music he had loved all his life - English music - was going out of fashion, and wanted to preserve as much useful, practical information as he could, for future generations, i.e. for us. We should read the book, and be grateful. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: Daniel Winheld [mailto:dwinh...@comcast.net] Sent: 27 February 2009 16:41 To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. (Descartes last words here) dt Don't walk away, René... Storing lutes in beds. Smashed more theorbi than the airlines. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --- Orange vous informe que cet e-mail a ete controle par l'anti-virus mail. Aucun virus connu a ce jour par nos services n'a ete detecte. = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = jmpoiri...@wanadoo.fr http://poirierjm.free.fr 28-02-2009 N ¶è®ß¶¬+-±ç¥Ëbú+«b¢vÛiÿü0ÁË j»f¢ëayÛ¿Á·?ë^iÙ¢ø§uìa¶i
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
, it must be placed betweene the Rose and the Bridge but nearest [sic!] to the bridge. your hand must lye vppon the belly of the Lute with the little finger onely, which must be as it were glued vnto it. and keepe the Thumbe as much as one can, leaning vpon the Base. It must be before all the rest of the hand, marching as the Captaine of the Fingers. that hand must be riseing in the middle in the forme of an Arche, that you may not smother the Stringes. (Punctuation marks are mine.) This corresponds with the hand shape of Charles Mouton, note the thumb well ahead of the fingers: In front of the bridge: http://www.aquilacorde.com/mouton5.jpg Behind the bridge: http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/Ember/brugghen-1628.gif On the bridge: http://tinyurl.com/ago2rd I am not criticising his position, only showing that even with his mild low tension hypothesis, he needs to maximise all elements that can favour the bass: length of basses (bass extension), size of bowl (Burkholzer), hand shape and position. There does not seem to be much leeway left for lowering the tension further. It has been suggested to me that this could be done by using a stiff HT bass: a stiff string could pass through a 1,5mm hole if it is twisted, and perhaps oiled to help it pass. If it is stiff it should be less slack at low tension. Perhaps the tesnion would be around 1.5KG/Newtons. First it is still not clear that such a tension is playable, secondly, it would not in anyway fulfill the criterion of equal tesnion to touch (Dowland Mace, etc). I don't think you can argue that it depends where you touch the strings. Yes, if the thumb was nearer the bridge than the fingers, but it is the contrary shown in the iconography, with the little finger behind the bridge, as suggested by Mace. Secondly, Meanes and Basses are typically shown as curly and flexible, even when not under tension. That is not so for a stiff HT. http://www.aquilacorde.com/i8.htm I am not arguing against other ways of stringing. On the contrary, I hope that Satoh will continue to develop his low tension style, and that Ed Martin will also continue experimenting with Gimped strings. The question, here, is not what is good or interesting, but about the historical issue, and for the moment, I prefer the loaded hypothesis, which better seems to account for the data. There may be yet another hypothesis remaining to be discovered, but I do thhink for the moment that the loaded hypothesis is the best, although I do not suggest for one moment that other research paths should be abadonned. Best wishes Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 03:08, damian dlugolecki a écrit : Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; alexander voka...@verizon.net; Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 3:23 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Dear Jaroslaw and All If they were neither loaded nor wound than they must have been dyed. This would solve the problem because the coloration differences would be of aestethic nature or maybe manufacture's trade mark. Perhaps, it is more than aesthetic, if we consider what Alexander has to say about his experiments with oil paint. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). It seems possible that loading of soundboards with Borax and salts (Strads. etc), which results in a denser better sounding table, could have originally been used to prevent infestation, but it was then realized it improved the sound (see earlier discussion on this list). http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn10686 The only mention we have of this process
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
How many lutes were mesured for bridge hole's diameter? 10, 20 or 30? I dnot see that we need a complete or even a substantial survey. Any instance where the bridge was conceived as we see it and the diapason holes are significantly smaller than the holes for stoped basses is evidence tht smaller diameter strings were conciously used, if that then obliges the use of strings denser than natural, loading of some sort is indicated, if not overspin, then chemical. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] or soaked ...
On Fri, Feb 27, 2009, Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr said: Dana I was quoting Daniel. Sorry, I messed up by leaving the attribution line in. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded? bridge holes]
We do know that Mimmo and others have measured a bunch. More than just a few, but of course not all them. (We don't even have all of them.) What would be real significant would be any old bridges that deviate from this- big holes for big gut strings. THAT would provide fuel for some real lutelist wars- and of course more research, speculation, etc. By the way, do we have at least a couple of old 6-course bridges? I'd love to know the size of the hole for the 6th course fundamental. If it's the same size as 6th course holes from say 1590 - 1620, then we have a real conundrum vis-a-vis the string technology revolution that Mimmo refers to in the late 16th century that allowed the use of bass unisons and the whole new low bass range. Dan How many lutes were mesured for bridge hole's diameter? 10, 20 or 30? I dnot see that we need a complete or even a substantial survey. Any instance where the bridge was conceived as we see it and the diapason holes are significantly smaller than the holes for stoped basses is evidence tht smaller diameter strings were conciously used, if that then obliges the use of strings denser than natural, loading of some sort is indicated, if not overspin, then chemical. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Mimmo told me that he actually checked 70 lutes from which only 50% had original bridges. On the total, 13 were 13 course -lutes (not important here); 13 were 11 course lutes (d minor, of course) ; 3 with 10 course, 1 with 12 courses and short extended neck (like the Gaultier English engraving or like the Satoh's lute); 2 with 7 courses; 2 with 8 courses. Just one was a Liuto attiorbato of 13 courses and another was an archlute. I didn't say that these mesurements mean nothing. I just wanted to show the proportion of the present research to the amount of the lutes that existed in 16-18th c. Besides we have only lutes in museums which mean that their state may or may not be 100% original - they weren't X-rayed yet. The smaller bridge hole just signifies that the string gauge would be smaller. But as mentioned before this can mean some other things as well. As I posted before, incidently I was forced to string my theorbo with guts much thiner than usual. The 14th course is 1.2 mm at the moment (which would go through any historical hole) and the instrument works better than ever. The tension is low, but if you shift the hand towards the bridge (as on paintings) it sounds great. How many people do what the paintings show us - RH close to the bridge TO. Even Mace says: That your little finger, be still fixt under the bridge. That your thumb end lye upon the last bass; I mean the end of your thumb, about three or four inches above the bridge This is really close to the bridge. Than he says: Put the end of your second finger, a very little under the treble string, (about three inches above the bridge). If the tip of the thumb is 4 inches from the bridge and the second finger (index) 3 inches, we end with the hand position similar to Satoh's, but slightly more TO. I tryed to put in practice his remarks, and it seems to work on my low tension theorbo. We have to take into account the possibilitie that the plain gut produced then, could be of different type than modern so the tone would be even better. The last quite important factor is the string action which is often very low now, but didn't need to be so in 17 c. I am not the advocate of any theory. Actually I like loading hypothesis and am whole-heartedly for Mimmo's research, but I still prefer to call this a hypothesis (in spite Mimmo's evidence is strong) until it's scientificly prooved. I hope he will get support for his research! Actually, I really think and I am not alone in this conviction that we need a complete and at least a substantial survey. That's all. There are other string makers whose theorys are strong too.I am just a lute player and have nothing to say about this any more. If you have any doubts please consult them. I just responded to Anthony's emails, but don't claim to be a string expert as none of us is I suppose. Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 28, 2009 7:18 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] How many lutes were mesured for bridge hole's diameter? 10, 20 or 30? I dnot see that we need a complete or even a substantial survey. Any instance where the bridge was conceived as we see it and the diapason holes are significantly smaller than the holes for stoped basses is evidence tht smaller diameter strings were conciously used, if that then obliges the use of strings denser than natural, loading of some sort is indicated, if not overspin, then chemical. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
http://www.aquilacorde.com/articles4.htm On Sat, 28 Feb 2009 22:36:10 +0100 Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl wrote: Mimmo told me that he actually checked 70 lutes from which only 50% had original bridges. On the total, 13 were 13 course -lutes (not important here); 13 were 11 course lutes (d minor, of course) ; 3 with 10 course, 1 with 12 courses and short extended neck (like the Gaultier English engraving or like the Satoh's lute); 2 with 7 courses; 2 with 8 courses. Just one was a Liuto attiorbato of 13 courses and another was an archlute. I didn't say that these mesurements mean nothing. I just wanted to show the proportion of the present research to the amount of the lutes that existed in 16-18th c. Besides we have only lutes in museums which mean that their state may or may not be 100% original - they weren't X-rayed yet. The smaller bridge hole just signifies that the string gauge would be smaller. But as mentioned before this can mean some other things as well. As I posted before, incidently I was forced to string my theorbo with guts much thiner than usual. The 14th course is 1.2 mm at the moment (which would go through any historical hole) and the instrument works better than ever. The tension is low, but if you shift the hand towards the bridge (as on paintings) it sounds great. How many people do what the paintings show us - RH close to the bridge TO. Even Mace says: That your little finger, be still fixt under the bridge. That your thumb end lye upon the last bass; I mean the end of your thumb, about three or four inches above the bridge This is really close to the bridge. Than he says: Put the end of your second finger, a very little under the treble string, (about three inches above the bridge). If the tip of the thumb is 4 inches from the bridge and the second finger (index) 3 inches, we end with the hand position similar to Satoh's, but slightly more TO. I tryed to put in practice his remarks, and it seems to work on my low tension theorbo. We have to take into account the possibilitie that the plain gut produced then, could be of different type than modern so the tone would be even better. The last quite important factor is the string action which is often very low now, but didn't need to be so in 17 c. I am not the advocate of any theory. Actually I like loading hypothesis and am whole-heartedly for Mimmo's research, but I still prefer to call this a hypothesis (in spite Mimmo's evidence is strong) until it's scientificly prooved. I hope he will get support for his research! Actually, I really think and I am not alone in this conviction that we need a complete and at least a substantial survey. That's all. There are other string makers whose theorys are strong too.I am just a lute player and have nothing to say about this any more. If you have any doubts please consult them. I just responded to Anthony's emails, but don't claim to be a string expert as none of us is I suppose. Jaroslaw To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Le 28 févr. 09 à 23:39, alexander a écrit : http://www.aquilacorde.com/articles4.htm And you can see Mimmo taking various measurements, explained in the article above at this link : http://www.aquilacorde.com/researches.htm Note that he does not just measure lute bridge holes. The same problems concern Viols. There must be some compensation in handling such instruments, however, in spite of the painstaking work: Just take a peep at the Charles IX Andrea Amati's viola (1570 ca?). Ashmolean Museum, Oxford 2007 http://www.aquilacorde.com/amati5.JPG The 4th hole on the tailpiece of the Amati viol has a diameter of 2.3 mm only against the necessary pure gut of not less than 2.8-3 mm (according to Mimmo).- If the hole was 2.3 we can suppose that the string was around 2.0 mm. We are either dealing with very very low tension or loading, or some sort of pretensioned stringing. Anthony On Sat, 28 Feb 2009 22:36:10 +0100 JarosÅaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl wrote: Mimmo told me that he actually checked 70 lutes from which only 50% had original bridges. On the total, 13 were 13 course -lutes (not important here); 13 were 11 course lutes (d minor, of course) ; 3 with 10 course, 1 with 12 courses and short extended neck (like the Gaultier English engraving or like the Satoh's lute); 2 with 7 courses; 2 with 8 courses. Just one was a Liuto attiorbato of 13 courses and another was an archlute. I didn't say that these mesurements mean nothing. I just wanted to show the proportion of the present research to the amount of the lutes that existed in 16-18th c. Besides we have only lutes in museums which mean that their state may or may not be 100% original - they weren't X-rayed yet. The smaller bridge hole just signifies that the string gauge would be smaller. But as mentioned before this can mean some other things as well. As I posted before, incidently I was forced to string my theorbo with guts much thiner than usual. The 14th course is 1.2 mm at the moment (which would go through any historical hole) and the instrument works better than ever. The tension is low, but if you shift the hand towards the bridge (as on paintings) it sounds great. How many people do what the paintings show us - RH close to the bridge TO. Even Mace says: That your little finger, be still fixt under the bridge. That your thumb end lye upon the last bass; I mean the end of your thumb, about three or four inches above the bridge This is really close to the bridge. Than he says: Put the end of your second finger, a very little under the treble string, (about three inches above the bridge). If the tip of the thumb is 4 inches from the bridge and the second finger (index) 3 inches, we end with the hand position similar to Satoh's, but slightly more TO. I tryed to put in practice his remarks, and it seems to work on my low tension theorbo. We have to take into account the possibilitie that the plain gut produced then, could be of different type than modern so the tone would be even better. The last quite important factor is the string action which is often very low now, but didn't need to be so in 17 c. I am not the advocate of any theory. Actually I like loading hypothesis and am whole-heartedly for Mimmo's research, but I still prefer to call this a hypothesis (in spite Mimmo's evidence is strong) until it's scientificly prooved. I hope he will get support for his research! Actually, I really think and I am not alone in this conviction that we need a complete and at least a substantial survey. That's all. There are other string makers whose theorys are strong too.I am just a lute player and have nothing to say about this any more. If you have any doubts please consult them. I just responded to Anthony's emails, but don't claim to be a string expert as none of us is I suppose. Jaroslaw To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Anthony, I know these articles very well, but they don't answer some very difficult questions. As I repeatedly say, I am not against this theory. What I am only asking for is to call this hypothesis a hypothesis, taking into account the present state of research. That's all! I don't think it's too much. Some other real possibilities do exist as well, as explained in this thread. Regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Sunday, March 01, 2009 12:34 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Le 28 fĂŠvr. 09 Ă 23:39, alexander a ĂŠcrit : http://www.aquilacorde.com/articles4.htm And you can see Mimmo taking various measurements, explained in the article above at this link : http://www.aquilacorde.com/researches.htm Note that he does not just measure lute bridge holes. The same problems concern Viols. There must be some compensation in handling such instruments, however, in spite of the painstaking work: Just take a peep at the Charles IX Andrea Amati's viola (1570 ca?). Ashmolean Museum, Oxford 2007 http://www.aquilacorde.com/amati5.JPG The 4th hole on the tailpiece of the Amati viol has a diameter of 2.3 mm only against the necessary pure gut of not less than 2.8-3 mm (according to Mimmo).- If the hole was 2.3 we can suppose that the string was around 2.0 mm. We are either dealing with very very low tension or loading, or some sort of pretensioned stringing. Anthony On Sat, 28 Feb 2009 22:36:10 +0100 JarosĹaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl wrote: Mimmo told me that he actually checked 70 lutes from which only 50% had original bridges. On the total, 13 were 13 course -lutes (not important here); 13 were 11 course lutes (d minor, of course) ; 3 with 10 course, 1 with 12 courses and short extended neck (like the Gaultier English engraving or like the Satoh's lute); 2 with 7 courses; 2 with 8 courses. Just one was a Liuto attiorbato of 13 courses and another was an archlute. I didn't say that these mesurements mean nothing. I just wanted to show the proportion of the present research to the amount of the lutes that existed in 16-18th c. Besides we have only lutes in museums which mean that their state may or may not be 100% original - they weren't X-rayed yet. The smaller bridge hole just signifies that the string gauge would be smaller. But as mentioned before this can mean some other things as well. As I posted before, incidently I was forced to string my theorbo with guts much thiner than usual. The 14th course is 1.2 mm at the moment (which would go through any historical hole) and the instrument works better than ever. The tension is low, but if you shift the hand towards the bridge (as on paintings) it sounds great. How many people do what the paintings show us - RH close to the bridge TO. Even Mace says: That your little finger, be still fixt under the bridge. That your thumb end lye upon the last bass; I mean the end of your thumb, about three or four inches above the bridge This is really close to the bridge. Than he says: Put the end of your second finger, a very little under the treble string, (about three inches above the bridge). If the tip of the thumb is 4 inches from the bridge and the second finger (index) 3 inches, we end with the hand position similar to Satoh's, but slightly more TO. I tryed to put in practice his remarks, and it seems to work on my low tension theorbo. We have to take into account the possibilitie that the plain gut produced then, could be of different type than modern so the tone would be even better. The last quite important factor is the string action which is often very low now, but didn't need to be so in 17 c. I am not the advocate of any theory. Actually I like loading hypothesis and am whole-heartedly for Mimmo's research, but I still prefer to call this a hypothesis (in spite Mimmo's evidence is strong) until it's scientificly prooved. I hope he will get support for his research! Actually, I really think and I am not alone in this conviction that we need a complete and at least a substantial survey. That's all. There are other string makers whose theorys are strong too.I am just a lute player and have nothing to say about this any more. If you have any doubts please consult them. I just responded to Anthony's emails, but don't claim to be a string expert as none of us is I suppose. Jaroslaw To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
What do you base your assumption on? JL - Original Message - From: David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Friday, February 27, 2009 6:01 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Mace is not a reliable source, sadly. dt At 06:03 AM 2/26/2009, you wrote: Dear Anthony, I think we had this conversation some time ago, but nothing can be said with certainty in the face of deficient evidence. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). I don't think this is what he really meant. In the chapter you quote Mace explains how to choose the good strings. He advices two types: Minikins and Venice-Catlines as the best ones: (Mace p.65-66) Both (Minikins and Venice-Catlines) which are (generally) at the same price, and the signs of goodness, both the same; which are, first the clearness of the string to the eye, the smoothness, and the stiffness to the finger Then he mentions Lyon strings which are not as good in his opinion: But they are much more inferior strings than the other. The sentence that follows (which you cited) maybe interpreted twofold. Either he continues on commenting Lyons, or he gives the general remark concerning yellowish coloration which may or may not be a sign of rotteness. This is like saying beware of yellowish strings because they might be rotten, but nothing more. We can't jump into the conclusion that the most strings would be rotten if not loaded. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Well, he doesn't say which are commonly loaded but rather commonly dyed. As I say, we had this discussion on differences between the loading and dyeing process, so I won't repeat my arguments (can be checked in the archives), but we really shouldn't use these terms interchangeably, because by dyeing Mace could mean only the process of applying a color to the string (which is the most common meaning of this word). Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). The red color wasn't really a sign of string goodness. The remark you cited, Mace applies to the thick red Venice-Catlines only. But they apparently weren't very popular since he says: but they are hard to come by. Quite contrary to what you wrote, when Mace describes the goodness of colored strings, he says that: the red commonly rotten. Morover he mentions several string colors in common use: There are several sorts of coloured strings, very good; but the best (to my observation) was always the clear blue; the red, commomly rotten; sometimes green, very good. If we claim that the red loading prevented decay process, than why he says the red strings were commonly rotten? It seems to me that the dyeing (coloration) had nothing to do with decay preventing. There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 The answer could be very easy - just because he had only one red bass string at home. But seriously, this prooves nothing yet. Looking at my photo, it is difficult to tell whether the string is loaded or just coloured, unless you take account of the relative thinness. http://tinyurl.com/cyvnyo Yes, absolutely I agree, the gauge of the bass strings and the bridge holes may signify the existence of loading. Italian traditional receipts for loading other popular items may be the other evidence. But we can't say anything more by now. I think historical research should be used to open up new-old possibilities of approaching the music, not to shut down any other personal investigation. It should just help us to refine our choices. Absolutely! However we have to take the evidence as it is. Nevertheless, I agree entirely with you. It would be such a pity if every lutensist adopted exactly the same solutions to all these problems. How much more interesting from the point of view of tone and texture, if players personal research come up with varied solutions
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
When you read the sources, you read the whole source--every word--then decide how reliable the source is. In the case of Mace, fact and fancy are sprinkled together. I mean there is some fun stuff in there of course, like the word for when the peg spins out of control (frapping). Then there is the question of whether your source is mainstream; and Mace can be pretty eccentric. I'd like to believe it, it's fun to believe it, but I don't consider him a reliable source. Then there is the additional matter of geography. That's not to say that what he says isn't true, it may be, it may not, it just is not reliable. And even if Mace were an expert--which he may have been--there is nothing to say that he is knowledgeable about strings in Italy. Who knows what the export grade was. If it was like wine, well, tante cose! Suppose he had written a cookbook that included a recipe for two headed boar, and wrote a chapter on Italian spices. Would later chefs take it seriously? (Descartes last words here) dt At 01:42 AM 2/27/2009, you wrote: What do you base your assumption on? JL - Original Message - From: David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Friday, February 27, 2009 6:01 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Mace is not a reliable source, sadly. dt At 06:03 AM 2/26/2009, you wrote: Dear Anthony, I think we had this conversation some time ago, but nothing can be said with certainty in the face of deficient evidence. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). I don't think this is what he really meant. In the chapter you quote Mace explains how to choose the good strings. He advices two types: Minikins and Venice-Catlines as the best ones: (Mace p.65-66) Both (Minikins and Venice-Catlines) which are (generally) at the same price, and the signs of goodness, both the same; which are, first the clearness of the string to the eye, the smoothness, and the stiffness to the finger Then he mentions Lyon strings which are not as good in his opinion: But they are much more inferior strings than the other. The sentence that follows (which you cited) maybe interpreted twofold. Either he continues on commenting Lyons, or he gives the general remark concerning yellowish coloration which may or may not be a sign of rotteness. This is like saying beware of yellowish strings because they might be rotten, but nothing more. We can't jump into the conclusion that the most strings would be rotten if not loaded. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Well, he doesn't say which are commonly loaded but rather commonly dyed. As I say, we had this discussion on differences between the loading and dyeing process, so I won't repeat my arguments (can be checked in the archives), but we really shouldn't use these terms interchangeably, because by dyeing Mace could mean only the process of applying a color to the string (which is the most common meaning of this word). Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). The red color wasn't really a sign of string goodness. The remark you cited, Mace applies to the thick red Venice-Catlines only. But they apparently weren't very popular since he says: but they are hard to come by. Quite contrary to what you wrote, when Mace describes the goodness of colored strings, he says that: the red commonly rotten. Morover he mentions several string colors in common use: There are several sorts of coloured strings, very good; but the best (to my observation) was always the clear blue; the red, commomly rotten; sometimes green, very good. If we claim that the red loading prevented decay process, than why he says the red strings were commonly rotten? It seems to me that the dyeing (coloration) had nothing to do with decay preventing. There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 The answer could be very easy - just
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Martin will also continue experimenting with Gimped strings. The question, here, is not what is good or interesting, but about the historical issue, and for the moment, I prefer the loaded hypothesis, which better seems to account for the data. There may be yet another hypothesis remaining to be discovered, but I do thhink for the moment that the loaded hypothesis is the best, although I do not suggest for one moment that other research paths should be abadonned. Best wishes Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 03:08, damian dlugolecki a écrit : Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; alexander voka...@verizon.net; Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 3:23 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Dear Jaroslaw and All If they were neither loaded nor wound than they must have been dyed. This would solve the problem because the coloration differences would be of aestethic nature or maybe manufacture's trade mark. Perhaps, it is more than aesthetic, if we consider what Alexander has to say about his experiments with oil paint. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). It seems possible that loading of soundboards with Borax and salts (Strads. etc), which results in a denser better sounding table, could have originally been used to prevent infestation, but it was then realized it improved the sound (see earlier discussion on this list). http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn10686 The only mention we have of this process from the time, does not come form lutemakers, but from Bernard Palissy, who spent much of his life trying to pierce the secrets of guilds to which he did not belong, '' salts improve the voice of all sorts of musical instruments. In any case, it is not because Barbieri did not find evidence of loading when researching Rome string makers that no such loading took place. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 That looks quite like how my 7c lute was when I just had one loaded string on 7-D (except of course my string was red-brown). A pure gut 7c bass string should be so much thicker (according to Gamut D-7, 60mm, for 2.6Kg at 440Hz, gives 1.80mm) However, with a painting we are never quite so sure that the artist is not just sketching-in the strings. Nevertheless, there is such detail here, just see the frets, for example; so why would the painter have just sketched the bass string? Looking at my photo, it is difficult to tell whether the string is loaded or just coloured, unless you take account of the relative thinness. http://tinyurl.com/cyvnyo Caravaggio with slightly different colours: http://tinyurl.com/cbsjac I don't think Mimmo's research is a just for historical correctness (for its own sake
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
...@gmail.com; Mathias Rösel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 3:08 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH --- On Mon, 23/2/09, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: From: Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Monday, 23 February, 2009, 2:23 PM David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com schrieb: On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David No, RH, of course. It will reduce poisoning by 50%! But seriously I wonder if densifying a gut string with mercury, which is easily composed with organic materials, means that afterwards the string still is poisonous. And, no, I'm not willing to try it. -- Mathias To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Do you suggest he was so potty that he wasn't able to discern red from yellow, blue or green color of the strings he used to buy (because this is what we are talking about, not the whole book as such)? Besides we are not discussing the scientific matters, but rather looking for some evidence which is aparently lacking. His testimony of the things he saw and experienced are of some value for us if taken with caution. JL - Original Message - From: David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Friday, February 27, 2009 11:20 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] When you read the sources, you read the whole source--every word--then decide how reliable the source is. In the case of Mace, fact and fancy are sprinkled together. I mean there is some fun stuff in there of course, like the word for when the peg spins out of control (frapping). Then there is the question of whether your source is mainstream; and Mace can be pretty eccentric. I'd like to believe it, it's fun to believe it, but I don't consider him a reliable source. Then there is the additional matter of geography. That's not to say that what he says isn't true, it may be, it may not, it just is not reliable. And even if Mace were an expert--which he may have been--there is nothing to say that he is knowledgeable about strings in Italy. Who knows what the export grade was. If it was like wine, well, tante cose! Suppose he had written a cookbook that included a recipe for two headed boar, and wrote a chapter on Italian spices. Would later chefs take it seriously? (Descartes last words here) dt At 01:42 AM 2/27/2009, you wrote: What do you base your assumption on? JL - Original Message - From: David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Friday, February 27, 2009 6:01 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Mace is not a reliable source, sadly. dt At 06:03 AM 2/26/2009, you wrote: Dear Anthony, I think we had this conversation some time ago, but nothing can be said with certainty in the face of deficient evidence. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). I don't think this is what he really meant. In the chapter you quote Mace explains how to choose the good strings. He advices two types: Minikins and Venice-Catlines as the best ones: (Mace p.65-66) Both (Minikins and Venice-Catlines) which are (generally) at the same price, and the signs of goodness, both the same; which are, first the clearness of the string to the eye, the smoothness, and the stiffness to the finger Then he mentions Lyon strings which are not as good in his opinion: But they are much more inferior strings than the other. The sentence that follows (which you cited) maybe interpreted twofold. Either he continues on commenting Lyons, or he gives the general remark concerning yellowish coloration which may or may not be a sign of rotteness. This is like saying beware of yellowish strings because they might be rotten, but nothing more. We can't jump into the conclusion that the most strings would be rotten if not loaded. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Well, he doesn't say which are commonly loaded but rather commonly dyed. As I say, we had this discussion on differences between the loading and dyeing process, so I won't repeat my arguments (can be checked in the archives), but we really shouldn't use these terms interchangeably, because by dyeing Mace could mean only the process of applying a color to the string (which is the most common meaning of this word). Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). The red color wasn't really a sign of string goodness. The remark you cited, Mace applies to the thick red Venice-Catlines only. But they apparently weren't very popular since he says: but they are hard to come by. Quite contrary to what you wrote, when Mace describes the goodness of colored strings, he says that: the red commonly rotten. Morover he mentions several string colors in common use: There are several sorts of coloured strings, very
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. MH --- On Fri, 27/2/09, David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net wrote: From: David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Friday, 27 February, 2009, 10:20 AM When you read the sources, you read the whole source--every word--then decide how reliable the source is. In the case of Mace, fact and fancy are sprinkled together. I mean there is some fun stuff in there of course, like the word for when the peg spins out of control (frapping). Then there is the question of whether your source is mainstream; and Mace can be pretty eccentric. I'd like to believe it, it's fun to believe it, but I don't consider him a reliable source. Then there is the additional matter of geography. That's not to say that what he says isn't true, it may be, it may not, it just is not reliable. And even if Mace were an expert--which he may have been--there is nothing to say that he is knowledgeable about strings in Italy. Who knows what the export grade was. If it was like wine, well, tante cose! Suppose he had written a cookbook that included a recipe for two headed boar, and wrote a chapter on Italian spices. Would later chefs take it seriously? (Descartes last words here) dt At 01:42 AM 2/27/2009, you wrote: What do you base your assumption on? JL - Original Message - From: David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Friday, February 27, 2009 6:01 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Mace is not a reliable source, sadly. dt At 06:03 AM 2/26/2009, you wrote: Dear Anthony, I think we had this conversation some time ago, but nothing can be said with certainty in the face of deficient evidence. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). I don't think this is what he really meant. In the chapter you quote Mace explains how to choose the good strings. He advices two types: Minikins and Venice-Catlines as the best ones: (Mace p.65-66) Both (Minikins and Venice-Catlines) which are (generally) at the same price, and the signs of goodness, both the same; which are, first the clearness of the string to the eye, the smoothness, and the stiffness to the finger Then he mentions Lyon strings which are not as good in his opinion: But they are much more inferior strings than the other. The sentence that follows (which you cited) maybe interpreted twofold. Either he continues on commenting Lyons, or he gives the general remark concerning yellowish coloration which may or may not be a sign of rotteness. This is like saying beware of yellowish strings because they might be rotten, but nothing more. We can't jump into the conclusion that the most strings would be rotten if not loaded. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Well, he doesn't say which are commonly loaded but rather commonly dyed. As I say, we had this discussion on differences between the loading and dyeing process, so I won't repeat my arguments (can be checked in the archives), but we really shouldn't use these terms interchangeably, because by dyeing Mace could mean only the process of applying a color to the string (which is the most common meaning of this word). Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). The red color wasn't really a sign of string goodness. The remark you cited, Mace applies to the thick red Venice-Catlines only. But they apparently weren't very popular since he says: but they are hard to come by. Quite contrary to what you wrote, when Mace describes the goodness of colored strings, he says that: the red commonly rotten. Morover he mentions several string colors in common use: There are several sorts of coloured strings, very good; but the best (to my observation) was always the clear blue; the red, commomly rotten; sometimes green, very good. If we claim that the red loading prevented decay process, than why he says the red strings were commonly rotten? It seems to me that the dyeing (coloration) had nothing to do with decay
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. (Descartes last words here) dt Don't walk away, René... Storing lutes in beds. Smashed more theorbi than the airlines. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Suppose he had written a cookbook that included a recipe for two headed boar, and wrote a chapter on Italian spices. Would later chefs take it seriously? actually, three are quite a few modern cooks who are working with surviving recipies from the time of the Romans and later who would have been interested, especially in the spices. Jaded feasters were commonly served mostrosities such as swans-a-swimming and cockatrices; a two-headed boar would have been a tame sight. Apparantly, there is no evidence that thomas Mace traveled, to Italy or anywhere (Mathew Spring, _The Lute in Britain_), and, yes, there can be a difference in quality of product between differnt markets for it. But, consider that lute strings will not find a huge local market anywhere, most of them would have been marketed away from where they were produced; and production locale was most likely to have been chosen for proximity to a fleshe market to ensure fresh and conveniant raw materials. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
in the iconography, where the thumb is always well ahead of the index, when near the bridge: Burwell, Ch. 6, p. 16, last paragraph: For the right hand, it must be placed betweene the Rose and the Bridge but nearest [sic!] to the bridge. your hand must lye vppon the belly of the Lute with the little finger onely, which must be as it were glued vnto it. and keepe the Thumbe as much as one can, leaning vpon the Base. It must be before all the rest of the hand, marching as the Captaine of the Fingers. that hand must be riseing in the middle in the forme of an Arche, that you may not smother the Stringes. (Punctuation marks are mine.) This corresponds with the hand shape of Charles Mouton, note the thumb well ahead of the fingers: In front of the bridge: http://www.aquilacorde.com/mouton5.jpg Behind the bridge: http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/Ember/brugghen-1628.gif On the bridge: http://tinyurl.com/ago2rd I am not criticising his position, only showing that even with his mild low tension hypothesis, he needs to maximise all elements that can favour the bass: length of basses (bass extension), size of bowl (Burkholzer), hand shape and position. There does not seem to be much leeway left for lowering the tension further. It has been suggested to me that this could be done by using a stiff HT bass: a stiff string could pass through a 1,5mm hole if it is twisted, and perhaps oiled to help it pass. If it is stiff it should be less slack at low tension. Perhaps the tesnion would be around 1.5KG/Newtons. First it is still not clear that such a tension is playable, secondly, it would not in anyway fulfill the criterion of equal tesnion to touch (Dowland Mace, etc). I don't think you can argue that it depends where you touch the strings. Yes, if the thumb was nearer the bridge than the fingers, but it is the contrary shown in the iconography, with the little finger behind the bridge, as suggested by Mace. Secondly, Meanes and Basses are typically shown as curly and flexible, even when not under tension. That is not so for a stiff HT. http://www.aquilacorde.com/i8.htm I am not arguing against other ways of stringing. On the contrary, I hope that Satoh will continue to develop his low tension style, and that Ed Martin will also continue experimenting with Gimped strings. The question, here, is not what is good or interesting, but about the historical issue, and for the moment, I prefer the loaded hypothesis, which better seems to account for the data. There may be yet another hypothesis remaining to be discovered, but I do thhink for the moment that the loaded hypothesis is the best, although I do not suggest for one moment that other research paths should be abadonned. Best wishes Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 03:08, damian dlugolecki a écrit : Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; alexander voka...@verizon.net; Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 3:23 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Dear Jaroslaw and All If they were neither loaded nor wound than they must have been dyed. This would solve the problem because the coloration differences would be of aestethic nature or maybe manufacture's trade mark. Perhaps, it is more than aesthetic, if we consider what Alexander has to say about his experiments with oil paint. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). It seems possible that loading of soundboards with Borax and salts (Strads. etc), which results in a denser better sounding table, could have originally been used to prevent infestation, but it was then realized it improved the sound (see earlier
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] or soaked ...
What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. (Descartes last words here) dt Don't walk away, René... Storing lutes in beds. Smashed more theorbi than the airlines. Daniel Actually this point goes very well together with the observations he makes on the rotten strings. It seems he must have had a very damp environment (except in bed), and so preferred to break his lute by bedding it between the sheets, rather than letting it rot. I only wonder why he didn't strore the strings with it. Arthur Ness, said the following: The most popular instrument in colonial Boston was the cittern. More popular than the flute or harpsichord. These figures are derived from tax reports. Household possessions were inventoried and taxed. In any event, these reports often state that the cittern was stored with the linens! Now I understand why. In those days Boston was surrounded by water, and the humidity is even today horrendous in the summer. (The Back Bay was filled in during the 19th century, and several hills were leveled to provide the land fill.) AN Regards Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 17:40, Daniel Winheld a écrit : What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. (Descartes last words here) dt Don't walk away, René... Storing lutes in beds. Smashed more theorbi than the airlines. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] or soaked ...
On Fri, Feb 27, 2009, Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr said: What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. Storing lutes in beds. Smashed more theorbi than the airlines. I fail to see how this makes Mace unreliable. I people followed that practice he is proven, only if not can he be proven unreliable; and if not, then, how did those instruments get smashed? (I assume you have the statistics, funny, havent seen any post-mortem rolls for theorbos in england) It seems he must have had a very damp environment (except in bed), the RH of bedding depends a great deal on the sleeping habits of its occupants, especially if, during particularly cold weather, they found hats insufficiant and ducked heads under the blankets for self-=preservation (as I have found necessary these severeal months past). As Arthur has noted, the citterns of Boston were oft-times stored with linens. I would think perhaps that a nice cedar blanket chest would serve for lute-sized instruments. River estuarys are commonly swampy in places, Boston would not have been alone in colonial towns in having a 'damp' season; the caribian islands as well. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
I don't see that the Roman analogy is a direct analogy; in the case of Apicius it is a tangled tale in a late source, with an overabundance of fish sauce. Varenne's 17th century cookbook is interesting because it is so different from those from other countries. There are many issues with Mace, but the main one in regard to the strings is that he was eccentric and far removed from the source. And I'm not saying the information isn't true, I'm just saying it isn't reliable. Elevating Mace to the level of reliable, first hand witnesses is just fitting the the facts to the theory. Even if Mace was the Samuel Pepys of the lute--which he is not--he still would be far removed from the Continent, which makes him a secondary source For example, the fact that he tuned in single reentrant for the theorbo, is that a personal quirk, or reflective of English practice, or one of several variant tunings, or reflective of a widespread Continental practice, or one of several widespread Continental tunings? Well, we just can't say--the information is interesting, but there is no evaluative context. From a compositional point of view, the narrative of the defence of English music seems to me to show that he was not really familiar with the major composers of his time. The lack of sales for his book is ascribed to the waning of the lute's popularity, but I think it is far more reasonable to assume that his book was a dud for any number of reasons, the central one presumably that much of the material was dated. I think it is pretty safe to say that the important figures in music were also for the most part unaware of Mace and his work. New evidence may come to light to rebut this, but he seems pretty far off the radar. Contrast Mace's writing with that of the eclectic Pepys: We walked to church with him, and then I left them without staying the sermon and straight home by water, and there find, as I expected, [1]Mr. Hill, and [2]Andrews, and one slovenly and ugly fellow, [3]Seignor Pedro, who sings Italian songs to the [4]theorbo most neatly, and they spent the whole evening in singing the best piece of musique counted of all hands in the world, made by [5]Seignor Charissimi, the famous master in Rome. Interesting that it was OK to skip out before the sermon. I think the issue here is not whether one can defend any source for music style--one can, of course, I think it is important whether there IS a difference, or whether they all get lumped together. And then, of course, people can disagree. And we will. dt Suppose he had written a cookbook that included a recipe for two headed boar, and wrote a chapter on Italian spices. Would later chefs take it seriously? actually, three are quite a few modern cooks who are working with surviving recipies from the time of the Romans and later who would have been interested, especially in the spices. Jaded feasters were commonly served mostrosities such as swans-a-swimming and cockatrices; a two-headed boar would have been a tame sight. Apparantly, there is no evidence that thomas Mace traveled, to Italy or anywhere (Mathew Spring, _The Lute in Britain_), and, yes, there can be a difference in quality of product between differnt markets for it. But, consider that lute strings will not find a huge local market anywhere, most of them would have been marketed away from where they were produced; and production locale was most likely to have been chosen for proximity to a fleshe market to ensure fresh and conveniant raw materials. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at [6]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. http://www.pepysdiary.com/p/7165.php 2. http://www.pepysdiary.com/p/7673.php 3. http://www.pepysdiary.com/p/7730.php 4. http://www.pepysdiary.com/p/457.php 5. http://www.pepysdiary.com/p/7731.php 6. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] or soaked ...
Dana I was quoting Daniel. These were his words: What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. Storing lutes in beds. Smashed more theorbi than the airlines. Mine were ones saying how consistent Mace was, and the quoting Arthur Ness, in favour of this. Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 19:15, dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us a écrit : On Fri, Feb 27, 2009, Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr said: What precise parts of Mace's work do you find not 'reliable'. Storing lutes in beds. Smashed more theorbi than the airlines. I fail to see how this makes Mace unreliable. I people followed that practice he is proven, only if not can he be proven unreliable; and if not, then, how did those instruments get smashed? (I assume you have the statistics, funny, havent seen any post-mortem rolls for theorbos in england) It seems he must have had a very damp environment (except in bed), the RH of bedding depends a great deal on the sleeping habits of its occupants, especially if, during particularly cold weather, they found hats insufficiant and ducked heads under the blankets for self-=preservation (as I have found necessary these severeal months past). As Arthur has noted, the citterns of Boston were oft-times stored with linens. I would think perhaps that a nice cedar blanket chest would serve for lute-sized instruments. River estuarys are commonly swampy in places, Boston would not have been alone in colonial towns in having a 'damp' season; the caribian islands as well. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
and toroidal pretensioned stringing (I'll leave the second aside for the moment). There is a combination of factors to account for: even with his low tension stringing, Satoh's string diameters are too thick to pass through the small historic bridge holes. He prefers extended Dutch lutes to increase the string length with large bowls to reinforce the bass, showing that it is difficult to obtain a good bass even with the moderate low tension that he uses. Furthermore, he has to play near the bridge, not just for the top strings, but above all for the basses, as his basses are so slack. He therefore adopts an RH swallo'w nest shape with his thumb level with his index finger, as far back as it can go. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~lsa/old/Cleveland2006/TSatohConcert.html Not at all the shape suggested by Burwell, or shown in the iconography, where the thumb is always well ahead of the index, when near the bridge: Burwell, Ch. 6, p. 16, last paragraph: For the right hand, it must be placed betweene the Rose and the Bridge but nearest [sic!] to the bridge. your hand must lye vppon the belly of the Lute with the little finger onely, which must be as it were glued vnto it. and keepe the Thumbe as much as one can, leaning vpon the Base. It must be before all the rest of the hand, marching as the Captaine of the Fingers. that hand must be riseing in the middle in the forme of an Arche, that you may not smother the Stringes. (Punctuation marks are mine.) This corresponds with the hand shape of Charles Mouton, note the thumb well ahead of the fingers: In front of the bridge: http://www.aquilacorde.com/mouton5.jpg Behind the bridge: http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/Ember/brugghen-1628.gif On the bridge: http://tinyurl.com/ago2rd I am not criticising his position, only showing that even with his mild low tension hypothesis, he needs to maximise all elements that can favour the bass: length of basses (bass extension), size of bowl (Burkholzer), hand shape and position. There does not seem to be much leeway left for lowering the tension further. It has been suggested to me that this could be done by using a stiff HT bass: a stiff string could pass through a 1,5mm hole if it is twisted, and perhaps oiled to help it pass. If it is stiff it should be less slack at low tension. Perhaps the tesnion would be around 1.5KG/Newtons. First it is still not clear that such a tension is playable, secondly, it would not in anyway fulfill the criterion of equal tesnion to touch (Dowland Mace, etc). I don't think you can argue that it depends where you touch the strings. Yes, if the thumb was nearer the bridge than the fingers, but it is the contrary shown in the iconography, with the little finger behind the bridge, as suggested by Mace. Secondly, Meanes and Basses are typically shown as curly and flexible, even when not under tension. That is not so for a stiff HT. http://www.aquilacorde.com/i8.htm I am not arguing against other ways of stringing. On the contrary, I hope that Satoh will continue to develop his low tension style, and that Ed Martin will also continue experimenting with Gimped strings. The question, here, is not what is good or interesting, but about the historical issue, and for the moment, I prefer the loaded hypothesis, which better seems to account for the data. There may be yet another hypothesis remaining to be discovered, but I do thhink for the moment that the loaded hypothesis is the best, although I do not suggest for one moment that other research paths should be abadonned. Best wishes Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 03:08, damian dlugolecki a écrit : Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; alexander voka...@verizon.net; Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 3:23 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Dear Jaroslaw and All If they were neither loaded nor wound than they must have been dyed. This would solve the problem because the coloration differences would
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
, as suggested by Mace. Secondly, Meanes and Basses are typically shown as curly and flexible, even when not under tension. That is not so for a stiff HT. http://www.aquilacorde.com/i8.htm I am not arguing against other ways of stringing. On the contrary, I hope that Satoh will continue to develop his low tension style, and that Ed Martin will also continue experimenting with Gimped strings. The question, here, is not what is good or interesting, but about the historical issue, and for the moment, I prefer the loaded hypothesis, which better seems to account for the data. There may be yet another hypothesis remaining to be discovered, but I do thhink for the moment that the loaded hypothesis is the best, although I do not suggest for one moment that other research paths should be abadonned. Best wishes Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 03:08, damian dlugolecki a écrit : Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; alexander voka...@verizon.net; Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 3:23 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Dear Jaroslaw and All If they were neither loaded nor wound than they must have been dyed. This would solve the problem because the coloration differences would be of aestethic nature or maybe manufacture's trade mark. Perhaps, it is more than aesthetic, if we consider what Alexander has to say about his experiments with oil paint. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). It seems possible that loading of soundboards with Borax and salts (Strads. etc), which results in a denser better sounding table, could have originally been used to prevent infestation, but it was then realized it improved the sound (see earlier discussion on this list). http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn10686 The only mention we have of this process from the time, does not come form lutemakers, but from Bernard Palissy, who spent much of his life trying to pierce the secrets of guilds to which he did not belong, '' salts improve the voice of all sorts of musical instruments. In any case, it is not because Barbieri did not find evidence of loading when researching Rome string makers that no such loading took place. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 That looks quite like how my 7c lute was when I just had one loaded string on 7-D (except of course my string was red-brown). A pure gut 7c bass string should be so much thicker (according to Gamut D-7, 60mm, for 2.6Kg at 440Hz, gives 1.80mm) However, with a painting we are never quite so sure that the artist is not just sketching-in the strings. Nevertheless, there is such detail here, just see the frets, for example; so why would the painter have just sketched the bass string? Looking at my photo, it is difficult to tell whether the string is loaded or just
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
On Feb 27, 2009, at 11:54 AM, Anthony Hind wrote: How do you account for small lutes like the Vienna Frey, without the loading theory? Lute in A? In G at high pitch? Big honkin' monster soprano lute in D? -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
I've heard and played a number of lutes strung all in gut that sound just fine. Where you start to get the clunky sound is on the low C on a ten course. I'm just going to assume that their strings were say, 20 percent better than ours. That would more than make gut stringing practical. Did they have other types of strings that we don't know about? It's intriguing, we need an old set of strings--maybe there were some on that Pirate ship where they found the Dulcian, after years of saying the Dulcian did not exist. dt At 12:52 PM 2/27/2009, you wrote: On Feb 27, 2009, at 11:54 AM, Anthony Hind wrote: How do you account for small lutes like the Vienna Frey, without the loading theory? Lute in A? In G at high pitch? Big honkin' monster soprano lute in D? -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
On Feb 27, 2009, at 12:50 PM, Stewart McCoy wrote: People end up thinking that's all he had to say, that he was eccentric, cranky, unreliable, to be treated with caution, etc. Nothing could be more ridiculous. Mace was a player of the lute, viol and theorbo, a composer, an enthusiast, and he certainly knew what he was writing about. He could see that the music he had loved all his life - English music - was going out of fashion, and wanted to preserve as much useful, practical information as he could, for future generations, i.e. for us. None of that is inconsistent with being a crank. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Dear Anthony, I really didn't want to rehash the old discussion (just wanted to share an interesting picture), but in a way I am beeing forced to reply, by your claims that finaly we found the satisfactory and historicaly correct answer for lute stringing. Not that I am doing it reluctantly - I always like chatting with you, which is very stimulating - however it really seams that at this particular moment declaring victory would be a little bit premature. Personally, I am not particularly interested in the colour question, but I see that many people would like to touch and see the original loaded strings, and wont believe they existed unless they actually see one; and thus the facination with paintings which are somehow felt to be the next best thing. If we ignore paintings and scorn excentric Mace, than what evidence are we left with? Some old Italian recepies for treating a leather with some metal salts and the mesurements made on some old lutes in museums. Recepies are fine, but do you have any manuscript saying that the strings were commonly treated by loading, not dyeing? No. How many lutes were mesured for bridge hole's diameter? 10, 20 or 30? What percentage of all lutes that were build beetwen 16 - 18 century does it constitute? Something like 0,001% ? Is this really irrefutable evidence? I agree, there is a problem with string gauges for short lutes and some small bridge holes, but sometimes the solution can occure very easy and unexpected. For example, recently it happend that I ran out of some long, thick gut strings for my theorbo and didn't have enough time to order the new ones. So I just mooved all the courses by one towards bass and added a thiner 8c and 1c. The effect was surprising. My instrument sounded better with very fine projection, easy to play, no buzzing, clear tone (not so dull as with thick ones). And I didn't need to change my RH technique - just as usual TO. Frankly speeking I haven't changed them since then just because I like it very much! I am also sure that all my strings would fit any bridge holes of the same dimention old theorbos. This doesn't proove anything yet, but as I say, we can't outrule any possibilities. Meanwhile I'd like to study as much evidence as possible. Including paintings and potty Mace! I think Stuart is absolutely right saying: Mace was a player of the lute, viol and theorbo, a composer, an enthusiast, and he certainly knew what he was writing about. He could see that the music he had loved all his life - English music - was going out of fashion, and wanted to preserve as much useful, practical information as he could, for future generations, i.e. for us. We should read the book, and be grateful. Mace was trying to instruct a lute amateur in choosing the best strings. We don't know meanings of some terms he uses, but his description is very clear. If we don't understand something we can't claim he was insane. As for loaded strings, I'll say again, it can be a good solution, but mainly for musical reasons at the moment. If we have all the research done and the results will confirm the string loading hypothesis than we can enjoy them for two reasons. But, even without any further findings Mimmo does the great job for us. Musicians need the choice, diversity. The whole discussion reminds me of the yachting world. In the beginning of XX century most of the yachts were of traditional construction - wooden hulls and masts, cotton sails and elegant narrow silhouettes guaranting good seaworthiness. Later, fiberglass boatbuilding became a standard with wider and wider decks, bigger cockpits and shallower shapes that don't guaranty the same level of safety as the old ones, but are much faster. Obviously the masts and sails are synthetic as well. Is this the end of yachting? No. Yachting is better than ever, and it is so, because of enormous diversity of constructions and equipment at our disposal. Relating it to our lute world, I'd say, the bigger diversity of strings we have the better. Just look how many people use Mimmo's nylgut strings (knowing they aren't historical - so what?). I hope Mimmo will find some other interesting materials even better for making perfect lute strings. And it's great we already have the loaded strings. However to claim they are historical we still have to wait, as David Tayler rightly posted: But to know what strings they used, we need to do some basic research. We have to measure every hole in every lute bridge, allowing for all the changes that might have been made. That gives us one data set--and will of course tell us a HUGE piece of information on reentrant stringing. Second, we need to do a chemical analysis of any pieces of original strings, with some layer X-rays. Until we do that, we are just guessing. Guessing is good, but it would be nice to get some basic data like we have on paper watermarks, paint composition and so on. Also, if we do the basic research
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Martin will also continue experimenting with Gimped strings. The question, here, is not what is good or interesting, but about the historical issue, and for the moment, I prefer the loaded hypothesis, which better seems to account for the data. There may be yet another hypothesis remaining to be discovered, but I do thhink for the moment that the loaded hypothesis is the best, although I do not suggest for one moment that other research paths should be abadonned. Best wishes Anthony Le 27 févr. 09 à 03:08, damian dlugolecki a écrit : Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; alexander voka...@verizon.net; Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 3:23 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Dear Jaroslaw and All If they were neither loaded nor wound than they must have been dyed. This would solve the problem because the coloration differences would be of aestethic nature or maybe manufacture's trade mark. Perhaps, it is more than aesthetic, if we consider what Alexander has to say about his experiments with oil paint. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). It seems possible that loading of soundboards with Borax and salts (Strads. etc), which results in a denser better sounding table, could have originally been used to prevent infestation, but it was then realized it improved the sound (see earlier discussion on this list). http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn10686 The only mention we have of this process from the time, does not come form lutemakers, but from Bernard Palissy, who spent much of his life trying to pierce the secrets of guilds to which he did not belong, '' salts improve the voice of all sorts of musical instruments. In any case, it is not because Barbieri did not find evidence of loading when researching Rome string makers that no such loading took place. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 That looks quite like how my 7c lute was when I just had one loaded string on 7-D (except of course my string was red-brown). A pure gut 7c bass string should be so much thicker (according to Gamut D-7, 60mm, for 2.6Kg at 440Hz, gives 1.80mm) However, with a painting we are never quite so sure that the artist is not just sketching-in the strings. Nevertheless, there is such detail here, just see the frets, for example; so why would the painter have just sketched the bass string? Looking at my photo, it is difficult to tell whether the string is loaded or just coloured, unless you take account of the relative thinness. http://tinyurl.com/cyvnyo Caravaggio with slightly different colours: http://tinyurl.com/cbsjac I don't think Mimmo's research is a just for historical correctness (for its own sake), but to resolve the problems
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
It isn't black and white. Paintings hold value; they are the postcards from the past. Mace has some good information, it just can't be taken at face value: the sense of the matter is elusive; that is its charm. To take everything as real, the storied accounts, the catfish of Bosch playing the lute, where does this lead? Should all the harps be made with a corner chipped, and every lute have a broken string and a riff in the staves? Similarly, can we ignore the piece of music in the Laurent de La Hyre that is so carefully drawn that we can play from the gif of the painting hundreds of years later? It's just not yar to never trim the sails. dt Dear Anthony, I really didn't want to rehash the old discussion (just wanted to share an interesting picture), but in a way I am beeing forced to reply, by your claims that finaly we found the satisfactory and historicaly correct answer for lute stringing. Not that I am doing it reluctantly - I always like chatting with you, which is very stimulating - however it really seams that at this particular moment declaring victory would be a little bit premature. Personally, I am not particularly interested in the colour question, but I see that many people would like to touch and see the original loaded strings, and wont believe they existed unless they actually see one; and thus the facination with paintings which are somehow felt to be the next best thing. If we ignore paintings and scorn excentric Mace, than what evidence are we left with? Some old Italian recepies for treating a leather with some metal salts and the mesurements made on some old lutes in museums. Recepies are fine, but do you have any manuscript saying that the strings were commonly treated by loading, not dyeing? No. How many lutes were mesured for bridge hole's diameter? 10, 20 or 30? What percentage of all lutes that were build beetwen 16 - 18 century does it constitute? Something like 0,001% ? Is this really irrefutable evidence? I agree, there is a problem with string gauges for short lutes and some small bridge holes, but sometimes the solution can occure very easy and unexpected. For example, recently it happend that I ran out of some long, thick gut strings for my theorbo and didn't have enough time to order the new ones. So I just mooved all the courses by one towards bass and added a thiner 8c and 1c. The effect was surprising. My instrument sounded better with very fine projection, easy to play, no buzzing, clear tone (not so dull as with thick ones). And I didn't need to change my RH technique - just as usual TO. Frankly speeking I haven't changed them since then just because I like it very much! I am also sure that all my strings would fit any bridge holes of the same dimention old theorbos. This doesn't proove anything yet, but as I say, we can't outrule any possibilities. Meanwhile I'd like to study as much evidence as possible. Including paintings and potty Mace! I think Stuart is absolutely right saying: Mace was a player of the lute, viol and theorbo, a composer, an enthusiast, and he certainly knew what he was writing about. He could see that the music he had loved all his life - English music - was going out of fashion, and wanted to preserve as much useful, practical information as he could, for future generations, i.e. for us. We should read the book, and be grateful. Mace was trying to instruct a lute amateur in choosing the best strings. We don't know meanings of some terms he uses, but his description is very clear. If we don't understand something we can't claim he was insane. As for loaded strings, I'll say again, it can be a good solution, but mainly for musical reasons at the moment. If we have all the research done and the results will confirm the string loading hypothesis than we can enjoy them for two reasons. But, even without any further findings Mimmo does the great job for us. Musicians need the choice, diversity. The whole discussion reminds me of the yachting world. In the beginning of XX century most of the yachts were of traditional construction - wooden hulls and masts, cotton sails and elegant narrow silhouettes guaranting good seaworthiness. Later, fiberglass boatbuilding became a standard with wider and wider decks, bigger cockpits and shallower shapes that don't guaranty the same level of safety as the old ones, but are much faster. Obviously the masts and sails are synthetic as well. Is this the end of yachting? No. Yachting is better than ever, and it is so, because of enormous diversity of constructions and equipment at our disposal. Relating it to our lute world, I'd say, the bigger diversity of strings we have the better. Just look how many people use Mimmo's nylgut strings (knowing they aren't historical - so what?). I hope Mimmo will find some other interesting materials even better for making perfect lute strings. And it's great we already have the loaded strings. However to claim
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Dear Anthony, I think we had this conversation some time ago, but nothing can be said with certainty in the face of deficient evidence. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). I don't think this is what he really meant. In the chapter you quote Mace explains how to choose the good strings. He advices two types: Minikins and Venice-Catlines as the best ones: (Mace p.65-66) Both (Minikins and Venice-Catlines) which are (generally) at the same price, and the signs of goodness, both the same; which are, first the clearness of the string to the eye, the smoothness, and the stiffness to the finger Then he mentions Lyon strings which are not as good in his opinion: But they are much more inferior strings than the other. The sentence that follows (which you cited) maybe interpreted twofold. Either he continues on commenting Lyons, or he gives the general remark concerning yellowish coloration which may or may not be a sign of rotteness. This is like saying beware of yellowish strings because they might be rotten, but nothing more. We can't jump into the conclusion that the most strings would be rotten if not loaded. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Well, he doesn't say which are commonly loaded but rather commonly dyed. As I say, we had this discussion on differences between the loading and dyeing process, so I won't repeat my arguments (can be checked in the archives), but we really shouldn't use these terms interchangeably, because by dyeing Mace could mean only the process of applying a color to the string (which is the most common meaning of this word). Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). The red color wasn't really a sign of string goodness. The remark you cited, Mace applies to the thick red Venice-Catlines only. But they apparently weren't very popular since he says: but they are hard to come by. Quite contrary to what you wrote, when Mace describes the goodness of colored strings, he says that: the red commonly rotten. Morover he mentions several string colors in common use: There are several sorts of coloured strings, very good; but the best (to my observation) was always the clear blue; the red, commomly rotten; sometimes green, very good. If we claim that the red loading prevented decay process, than why he says the red strings were commonly rotten? It seems to me that the dyeing (coloration) had nothing to do with decay preventing. There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 The answer could be very easy - just because he had only one red bass string at home. But seriously, this prooves nothing yet. Looking at my photo, it is difficult to tell whether the string is loaded or just coloured, unless you take account of the relative thinness. http://tinyurl.com/cyvnyo Yes, absolutely I agree, the gauge of the bass strings and the bridge holes may signify the existence of loading. Italian traditional receipts for loading other popular items may be the other evidence. But we can't say anything more by now. I think historical research should be used to open up new-old possibilities of approaching the music, not to shut down any other personal investigation. It should just help us to refine our choices. Absolutely! However we have to take the evidence as it is. Nevertheless, I agree entirely with you. It would be such a pity if every lutensist adopted exactly the same solutions to all these problems. How much more interesting from the point of view of tone and texture, if players personal research come up with varied solutions. That Ed Martin with Dan Larson refine the Gimped solution to basses, while Satoh and others develop their low tension hypothesis, will, I hope, result in less standardization, not more. Even if Gimped strings were not around at that time (French Baroque), and low tension strings do not actually
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Dear Jaroslaw I will begin by the end: I have to stress here, that I am not against loaded strings even if it may sound paradoxicaly. I admire Mimmo's great contribution in finding the best strings for a modern lute player. I use his strings very often and will advice them to other musicians as well. The only difference between our attitude is the reason for doing so. Assuming that if one day it definitely occurs that from historical point of view there is no such a thing as loaded strings ,will you take them off your lute and throw away? I won't, because if I choose something it means that I like it best! What I am trying to say is that in strugling to be HIP one can forget the most important thing, namely the Music. This is our obligation as early musicians to search the truth about the past. As somebody posted recently the theorbo is made of dreams I would add so is the Music. And will use any means to attain this including strings. I love pure gut on my renaissance lute, it's feeling and tone, but am open much more to experiment with the baroque lute stringing (as Miguel Serdoura, Nigel North and many others do). I entirely agree with you, and I don't think our attitude is all that different. if I was so pleased to be able to use Mimmo's loaded strings (as I did say below) it was to solve a modern problem that also happens to have been an ancient one, just because the properties of gut have not changed. I like the homogenous sound of all gut at least up to French Baroque lute music. In this respect, Mimmo's loaded strings came as such a relief, I really did not want to use wirewounds, because I don't like the break in sound as you move across the voices, and I don't like the silver shimmer. This may or may not be a historical preference, but even the brightness from Gimped strings does bother me, but I would have used them rather than resort to wirewounds, even though these have made progress (see the Aquila DE type, a fall-out from Mimmo's loaded string research, I believe). Probably the most important aims in Mimmo's historic research is trying to rediscover the tonal qualities that early string treatments may have given to gut strings, not bringing back the exact replica of an early string (as some seem to regret when mentioning lead oxide loadeds). Some of these qualities can also be transferred to synthetic strings so that the palette of choices for the lutenist, HIP or not, becomes much greater. I believe it must be up to the lutenist (and perhaps his audience) just exactly what string choices, hand positions, etc are best for them. I don't believe in historical correctness per se, as I made it quite clear, here: http://www.mail-archive.com/lute@cs.dartmouth.edu/msg27987.html I also recognize that HIP strings, HIP hand position (according to the iconography) are nothing without a thorough knowledge of the grammar of rhetoric (if we are talking of French Baroque music) and above all a good ear, or rather to quote Jerzy Zak, a player needs a good ear and a complex musical inteligence which guides him how to get the most from his instrument (when he picks up another instrument he may find that another method or place to place his fingers is better). An instantanous feed-back is a pre condition As to the colour question, it is fairly secondary. Although, everyone would like to be able to see and hold old loaded string, and so paintings seem somehow better than indirect arguments from small bass string holes (with simmultaneous short string lengths), but of course the latter are much more convincing. And in short, as I have said several times before, if loaded strings were not historic, how grateful would Charles Mouton have been to throw away the massive bass strings, which he would have grudgingly had to use on his short Baroque lute, at least as grateful as I was to Mimmo not to have had to use wirewounds; but Charles would not even have had those to fall-back on. As to the question of red being good or bad, Mace is ambiguous. He mentions the quality of Red pistoys, but presumably red may not have been a good sign in all types of gut. Some plain gut is reddish, and this may be what he is referring to. Loading would definitely conserve strings better, they absorb less humidity, as you can observe when using Mimmo's loaded strings. Dyeing and loading, are a different concept to us, but colouring leather is both loading and dyeing, and to the observer who does not know which process has been used, it is difficult to distinguish the two. For example, I am not sure why Mimmo's loaded strings are now reddish and not brownish. It could be a difference in loading or in dyeing, or both. I entirely agree with your conclusion: Well, our possition is very strange, because the Old Ones never played early music (they always played something new), so in
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; alexander voka...@verizon.net; Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 3:23 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?] Dear Jaroslaw and All If they were neither loaded nor wound than they must have been dyed. This would solve the problem because the coloration differences would be of aestethic nature or maybe manufacture's trade mark. Perhaps, it is more than aesthetic, if we consider what Alexander has to say about his experiments with oil paint. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). It seems possible that loading of soundboards with Borax and salts (Strads. etc), which results in a denser better sounding table, could have originally been used to prevent infestation, but it was then realized it improved the sound (see earlier discussion on this list). http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn10686 The only mention we have of this process from the time, does not come form lutemakers, but from Bernard Palissy, who spent much of his life trying to pierce the secrets of guilds to which he did not belong, '' salts improve the voice of all sorts of musical instruments. In any case, it is not because Barbieri did not find evidence of loading when researching Rome string makers that no such loading took place. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 That looks quite like how my 7c lute was when I just had one loaded string on 7-D (except of course my string was red-brown). A pure gut 7c bass string should be so much thicker (according to Gamut D-7, 60mm, for 2.6Kg at 440Hz, gives 1.80mm) However, with a painting we are never quite so sure that the artist is not just sketching-in the strings. Nevertheless, there is such detail here, just see the frets, for example; so why would the painter have just sketched the bass string? Looking at my photo, it is difficult to tell whether the string is loaded or just coloured, unless you take account of the relative thinness. http://tinyurl.com/cyvnyo Caravaggio with slightly different colours: http://tinyurl.com/cbsjac I don't think Mimmo's research is a just for historical correctness (for its own sake), but to resolve the problems (ancient and modern) inherent in using gut for each voice (Trebles, Meanes, Basses) by specific chemical treatment, twisting, twining and loading techniques, so as to obtain a homogenous passage accross the voices, to avoid the inharmonicity of thicker Meane strings and lower octaves, and to resolve the contradictiory need for short trebles and very long basses (either by loading, or by using extensions for the basses, or a combination of the two). And this is what I am after. I want to learn from Old Ones as much as possible, but than I'd like
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Hear, hear! The loaded string is still a hypothesis, a working one, but hypothesis. Sometimes in detriment of the others, forgotten or neglected. alexander On Thu, 26 Feb 2009 18:08:43 -0800 damian dlugolecki dam...@teleport.com wrote: Dear Anthony, You seem to be intent on finding evidence to support a historical premise for 'loaded' strings. You rely heavily on a color theory that supposes that reddish strings indicate loaded strings. Since you are not privy to the stringmakers craft other than what you have gathered from Mimmo, you can't be blamed for being ignorant of the fact that this reddish brown color is the natural color for strings that have been made with minimal chemical exposure, that is to say, only mild soaps and of course soda ash. I would venture to add that, notwithstanding all the commentary about color, the majority of the historical strings were a reddish brown color. In a fourchette or production run you might have a variance in color from pale ochre to burnt umbre. I hope this information helps you in your research. Cordially, Damian To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre [loaded?]
Mace is not a reliable source, sadly. dt At 06:03 AM 2/26/2009, you wrote: Dear Anthony, I think we had this conversation some time ago, but nothing can be said with certainty in the face of deficient evidence. However, I wonder whether mild loading could not also have been used on other strings than basses, just to help conservation. Mace tells us about rotten strings: I have sometimes seen strings of a yellowish colour, very good; yet, but seldom; for that colour is a general sign of rottenness, or of the decay of the string. This must have been common problem. Perhaps a mild loading could help conserve strings (admittedly, Mace does also say that red strings are often rotten). I don't think this is what he really meant. In the chapter you quote Mace explains how to choose the good strings. He advices two types: Minikins and Venice-Catlines as the best ones: (Mace p.65-66) Both (Minikins and Venice-Catlines) which are (generally) at the same price, and the signs of goodness, both the same; which are, first the clearness of the string to the eye, the smoothness, and the stiffness to the finger Then he mentions Lyon strings which are not as good in his opinion: But they are much more inferior strings than the other. The sentence that follows (which you cited) maybe interpreted twofold. Either he continues on commenting Lyons, or he gives the general remark concerning yellowish coloration which may or may not be a sign of rotteness. This is like saying beware of yellowish strings because they might be rotten, but nothing more. We can't jump into the conclusion that the most strings would be rotten if not loaded. Again Mace mentions There is another sort of strings, which they call Pistoy basses, which I conceive are none other than thick Venice- Catlins, which are commonly dyed, with a deep dark red colour. So perhaps, if loaded basses existed they would have been from Pistoia, Bologne, etc, and not Rome. Well, he doesn't say which are commonly loaded but rather commonly dyed. As I say, we had this discussion on differences between the loading and dyeing process, so I won't repeat my arguments (can be checked in the archives), but we really shouldn't use these terms interchangeably, because by dyeing Mace could mean only the process of applying a color to the string (which is the most common meaning of this word). Perhaps, also if loaded strings were often red, and at the same time of high repute, other makers of lesser strings, might have also dyed theirs red. to cash in on their prestige (i agree, I am just adding to the speculation). The red color wasn't really a sign of string goodness. The remark you cited, Mace applies to the thick red Venice-Catlines only. But they apparently weren't very popular since he says: but they are hard to come by. Quite contrary to what you wrote, when Mace describes the goodness of colored strings, he says that: the red commonly rotten. Morover he mentions several string colors in common use: There are several sorts of coloured strings, very good; but the best (to my observation) was always the clear blue; the red, commomly rotten; sometimes green, very good. If we claim that the red loading prevented decay process, than why he says the red strings were commonly rotten? It seems to me that the dyeing (coloration) had nothing to do with decay preventing. There are however, some more convincing examples that do look like loading. On the same Art site, I saw another Caravaggio painting including a lute with just one red string, and it was the 7th. Now this might well be a loaded 7c-D. http://www.caravaggio.rai.it/eng/opere.swf?currentImage=3 The answer could be very easy - just because he had only one red bass string at home. But seriously, this prooves nothing yet. Looking at my photo, it is difficult to tell whether the string is loaded or just coloured, unless you take account of the relative thinness. http://tinyurl.com/cyvnyo Yes, absolutely I agree, the gauge of the bass strings and the bridge holes may signify the existence of loading. Italian traditional receipts for loading other popular items may be the other evidence. But we can't say anything more by now. I think historical research should be used to open up new-old possibilities of approaching the music, not to shut down any other personal investigation. It should just help us to refine our choices. Absolutely! However we have to take the evidence as it is. Nevertheless, I agree entirely with you. It would be such a pity if every lutensist adopted exactly the same solutions to all these problems. How much more interesting from the point of view of tone and texture, if players personal research come up with varied solutions. That Ed Martin with Dan Larson refine the Gimped solution to basses, while Satoh and others develop their low tension hypothesis, will, I hope, result in less standardization, not more. Even if Gimped strings were not around at that time
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
The bocal is flared slightly at the end, so it could hold a reed, but it looks more like a bass recorder. The bass and the two smaller ones form a continuo group that was popular in France--a sort of portable organ. There is a fairly extensive literatature for three recorder continuo. But it is impossible to tell because the instrument is hidden. There are two very beautifully drawn scribe marks around the top, but these marks could be on any wind instrument. If it is a recorder, the windway is to the back, but that is not unusual. dt At 02:36 PM 2/22/2009, you wrote: The basoon first appeared about 1650. But obviously it could be a bass or tenor as well. Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Sunday, February 22, 2009 8:07 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre On Sat, Feb 21, 2009, Jaros³aw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: Dear Dana, The reproduction doesn't show that detail particularly well because that area is very dark, but as far as I can remember it from the museum, the book stands on the table covered with some black fabric, and leaning against the basoon Perhaps a bit early to be called bassoon, and looks more to me like a shalm; extended tenor or bass to judge from the crook. Wonder what the shalm was braced with (I use x-legged dowels). Its clues like this that make possible replicas of the furniture in everyday use which is only preserved iconographically :-) -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I didn't read this article also. But there is in German a big encyclopedia by Johann Georg Krünitz from the end of the 18th century. It was written from 1773-1858 and it can be accessed online ( http://www.kruenitz1.uni-trier.de/ ). It is called Oekonomische Encyklopädie oder allgemeines System der Staats- Stadt- Haus- und Landwirthschaft (something like economical encyclopedia or common system of the economy of state - , city-, house- and agri-culture). He describes the making of strings very detailed (the complete article has more than 7000 words). The article may be very late indeed, but anyway interesting. The colouring of strings is mentioned: Man färbt die Saiten auch blau und roth; blau, indem man sie durch eine kalte Brühe von Lackmus mit Potasche, roth, indem man sie durch den Auszug der türkischen Schminklappen und Potasche durchzieht. Strings are colored in blue and red; blue, by drawing them through a cold broth of litmus with potash; red, be drawing them through the digestion of Turkish (?) paint cloth (?) and Potash. I didn't find there any hint on the loading of strings, but mentions that some of the strings had been overspun with a false silver wire. But there is also said, that the makers of musical strings are very cagey about the process of making ... Best regards Markus Monica Hall schrieb: I just wondered - do we know how readily available loaded strings were or how widely they were used? There was an article in the Galpin Society Journal 2006 about Roman and Neapolitan gut strings by Patrizio Barbieri and apparently he suggests that there is no historical evidence for loaded strings and that colouring them may have been a way of hiding blemishes. I haven't actually read the whole article yet - only a summary. I wondered whether anyone else had? Monica - Original Message - From: alexander voka...@verizon.net To: Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk Cc: hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk; Lutelist lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 6:56 PM Subject: Re: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre People nowadays are much more conscious of the environmental toxins. Plus... Imagine Aquila sells lead and-or mercury loaded strings. The lawyers will swarm around lute players like sharks with offers of service. The evidence of loaded strings is based squarely on Mimmo Peruffo's research. His conclusions were made on the basis of paintings (showing smooth surface = non wound strings with a variant of red color ) and instrument string-hole measurements. One point being argued, however, was whether some of lute strings, and possibly loaded basses, were made of silk rather then gut. That discussion was held in FoRMHI, and basically died with the demise of the Fellowship itself. From the point of leeching the metals out, silk binds more closely with lead and mercury salts (as well as tin salts, customarily used to apply all the fancy colors to silk garbs), and might be much safer as loaded strings, as well. alexander On Tue, 24 Feb 2009 17:41:33 + Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk wrote: I wouldn't claim to be an expert, but according to my medical dictionary mercury poisoning was common in some trades in the past - in particular in the preparation of felt used in hats. That is where the expression mad as a hatter comes from. This may be a silly question because I have been following this thread very closely but is there any evidence that strings were loaded with mercury or anything else apart from the fact that some works of art show the lower courses differently coloured? Monica - Original Message - From: Martyn Hodgson hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com; Mathias Rösel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 3:08 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH --- On Mon, 23/2/09, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: From: Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Monday, 23 February, 2009, 2:23 PM David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com schrieb: On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
During my days of historical re-enactments, we were warned of the dangers of lead poisoning. Most of us used pewter tankards and plates. It was a big no-no to polish them as this exposed more lead into the food and drink. The drinking technique was to put both lips into the liquid, thus avoiding direct contact from the pewter with the mouth. Sometimes we gave demonstrations of making lead musket-balls, but only a few at a time and handling was kept to the bare minimum. They would be passed around for on-lookers to examine who would then wash their hands. Some of us had genuine musket-balls from the period, usually kept in a pouch and only handled with gloves. But we digress... Ron (UK) -Original Message- From: Jaroslaw Lipski [mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 6:45 PM To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre In general lead intoxication occurs after swallowing or inhalation of even small amounts of this element, however there are reports of ocupational intoxication as well: The major source of lead is occupational exposure from jobs dealing with lead and lead-based components; there is a high prevalence of lead toxicity in the population exposed to such activities. Occupational exposure of workers is seen in the manufacturing of lead batteries and cables, as well as rubber and plastic products. Soldering and foundry work, such as casting, forging, and grinding activities, are also associated with occupational exposures. Construction workers involved in painting or paint stripping, plumbing, welding, and cutting are also exposed to lead. So not only inhaling or swallowing is toxic but touching, rubbing, grinding activities as well. Even if we don't believe in skin penetration by small particules we still have a chance to rub our nose or touch unconciously our lips after some session of playing. If you have any doubts just read this: http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/410113-overview Best Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Alexander Batov alexander.ba...@vihuelademano.com To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 5:35 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre As compared to modern day's levels of mercury contamination in the air (in particular in such big places like London where hundreds of thousands, if not more, of strip lights and 'new generation' light bulbs are getting replaced and simply chucked off in skips daily!) the effect from the mercury / lead loaded strings would simply count next to nothing. By the way, I'm not a toxicologist :) So no responsibilities accepted ... AB Martyn Hodgson wrote: Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Wednesday 25 February 2009, Ron Fletcher rattled on the keyboard: During my days of historical re-enactments, we were warned of the dangers of lead poisoning. Most of us used pewter tankards and plates. It was a big no-no to polish them as this exposed more lead into the food and drink. The drinking technique was to put both lips into the liquid, thus avoiding direct contact from the pewter with the mouth. Sometimes we gave demonstrations of making lead musket-balls, but only a few at a time and handling was kept to the bare minimum. They would be passed around for on-lookers to examine who would then wash their hands. Some of us had genuine musket-balls from the period, usually kept in a pouch and only handled with gloves. But we digress... Ron (UK) And you still remember your re-enactments ;-) Conclusion: we should ask Mimmo to make historical red strings because they cannot be that bad compared with environmental air pollution. (and perhaps blue ones too, if we have to believe Thomas Mace.) Such strings are only for the luteplayers who have guts. taco To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Here are closeups of the strings and the bocal cap http://voicesofmusic.org//images/bocal.jpg http://voicesofmusic.org//images/strings.jpg Robert is right, the cap is a tad slender. It does look more shawmy than recordery. The overall look does however remind me a bit of the Verona Collection which we just looked at--and played. Those recorders sound much better than the modern copies. I heartily recommend this article http://www.recorderhomepage.net/families.html There are two bevels on the cap. A very small one at the top, and another ones extending down to the double engraving rings near the top. However, something about the shape says reed, but there really is not much to see. The music is playable, as well. Perhaps someone can put the music in Fronimo? dt It is most likely a larger size shawm. Bass and larger 16th C recorders usually had a removable cap, often with a brass band on the end, similar to the ones on the fontanelle (the pepper-pot covering the little finger key). You would see this even if the instrument were turned so that the window was facing away from you. The edge between the side and the top of the cap was typically beveled. You don't see any of this in the painting. Also, the instrument in the painting is a bit slender looking for a recorder of that size, but not for a shawm. Compare the painting with the Praetorius woodcuts. (Without getting into the theorbo debate, the woodcuts correlate pretty well with surviving instruments for the woodwinds.) ...Bob I'd guess a great bass recorder, especially since there are other recorders in the pictures. It's not a bassoon or dulcian. Those have a U-shaped structure, and this looks like a single bore instrument. FWIW, the only extended tenor shawms I've seen (one of them in our loud band) use a slightly bent bocal, not the bassoon-like one in the picture, and the top of the instrument is not nearly as broad, but there could be other designs I'm not aware of. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I don't use a strap, but I like the way the buttons look :) dt At 10:51 AM 2/23/2009, you wrote: I like the idea of the tapes a lot better than buttons. If the lutes were tied to buttons, we would have a lot of old museum lutes with scratches on their backs. But I suppose if the old players routinely wore the same clothes we see in the paintings, there would have been scratches on the backs of the instruments - almost all of the baroque clothes have rows of buttons down the front. Contrastlingly Vermeer and some of the other Dutch painters show a lot of women holding lutes, dressed in slippery satin-type skirts, no tapes or buttons in view. Another topic for a lot more reasearch Nancy At 12:21 AM 2/22/2009, Martyn Hodgson wrote: The 'white spot' will be a small ivory button round which the holding gut or tape is looped. Incidentally, there's some doubt that the gut (or tape) fastened round a coat button: a contemporary engraving shows thin tapes (or ribbons) coming from the coat buttons (or cld be from inside the coat ie maybe round the player's back) and leading to the ivory button. A picture is in the archives MH --- On Sat, 21/2/09, JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl wrote: From: JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Saturday, 21 February, 2009, 10:00 PM BTW, am I right that the gut is fixed with some glue near the neck (white spot)? JL - Original Message - From: Stewart McCoy lu...@tiscali.co.uk To: Lute Net lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 10:14 PM Subject: [LUTE] Laurent de La Hyre Dear Jaroslav, You hook the gut on to one of the buttons of your coat to stabilise the lute while you are holding it. I seem to remember Mersenne mentioning it. See also Robert Spencer's article on the theorbo in Early Music. It is likely that Mouton is holding his lute this way in the famous picture of him. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: Jaros^3aw Lipski [[1] mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: 21 February 2009 18:06 To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Oh, I've forgot 2 other interesting details. The frets are double (except last 2), made of a thin gut with knots on the treble side. Both theorbo and the lute on the table has a folded double piece of gut going in the middle of the back (longside). It starts from the end pin (which is visible on the theorbo) and ends on the white spot (glue?) close to the place where the body meets the neck. There is a loop attached to the long gut - maybe some sort of the system for keeping the instrument while playing. I don't think it served for hanging the instrument on the wall. They wouldn't waist such a long piece of gut for this purpose. I hang it with a very short piece of used string attached to the peg box. Best Jaroslaw -- To get on or off this list see list information at [2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- -- Nancy Carlin Associates P.O. Box 6499 Concord, CA 94524 USA phone 925/686-5800 fax 925/680-2582 web site - [3]www.nancycarlinassociates.com Administrator THE LUTE SOCIETY OF AMERICA web site - [4]http://LuteSocietyofAmerica.org -- References 1. mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl 2. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html 3. http://www.nancycarlinassociates.com/ 4. http://lutesocietyofamerica.org/
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Hello! I seem to have lost (read deleted) the link to this picture and can't seem to get back to it. Could someone volunteer to repost the web address? Thanks and regards, Leonard Williams On 2/25/09 2:39 PM, David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net wrote: Here are closeups of the strings and the bocal cap http://voicesofmusic.org//images/bocal.jpg http://voicesofmusic.org//images/strings.jpg Robert is right, the cap is a tad slender. It does look more shawmy than recordery. The overall look does however remind me a bit of the Verona Collection which we just looked at--and played. Those recorders sound much better than the modern copies. I heartily recommend this article http://www.recorderhomepage.net/families.html There are two bevels on the cap. A very small one at the top, and another ones extending down to the double engraving rings near the top. However, something about the shape says reed, but there really is not much to see. The music is playable, as well. Perhaps someone can put the music in Fronimo? dt It is most likely a larger size shawm. Bass and larger 16th C recorders usually had a removable cap, often with a brass band on the end, similar to the ones on the fontanelle (the pepper-pot covering the little finger key). You would see this even if the instrument were turned so that the window was facing away from you. The edge between the side and the top of the cap was typically beveled. You don't see any of this in the painting. Also, the instrument in the painting is a bit slender looking for a recorder of that size, but not for a shawm. Compare the painting with the Praetorius woodcuts. (Without getting into the theorbo debate, the woodcuts correlate pretty well with surviving instruments for the woodwinds.) ...Bob I'd guess a great bass recorder, especially since there are other recorders in the pictures. It's not a bassoon or dulcian. Those have a U-shaped structure, and this looks like a single bore instrument. FWIW, the only extended tenor shawms I've seen (one of them in our loud band) use a slightly bent bocal, not the bassoon-like one in the picture, and the top of the instrument is not nearly as broad, but there could be other designs I'm not aware of. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Here you are http://tinyurl.com/conmfc regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Leonard Williams arc...@verizon.net To: Lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 10:23 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Hello! I seem to have lost (read deleted) the link to this picture and can't seem to get back to it. Could someone volunteer to repost the web address? Thanks and regards, Leonard Williams On 2/25/09 2:39 PM, David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net wrote: Here are closeups of the strings and the bocal cap http://voicesofmusic.org//images/bocal.jpg http://voicesofmusic.org//images/strings.jpg Robert is right, the cap is a tad slender. It does look more shawmy than recordery. The overall look does however remind me a bit of the Verona Collection which we just looked at--and played. Those recorders sound much better than the modern copies. I heartily recommend this article http://www.recorderhomepage.net/families.html There are two bevels on the cap. A very small one at the top, and another ones extending down to the double engraving rings near the top. However, something about the shape says reed, but there really is not much to see. The music is playable, as well. Perhaps someone can put the music in Fronimo? dt It is most likely a larger size shawm. Bass and larger 16th C recorders usually had a removable cap, often with a brass band on the end, similar to the ones on the fontanelle (the pepper-pot covering the little finger key). You would see this even if the instrument were turned so that the window was facing away from you. The edge between the side and the top of the cap was typically beveled. You don't see any of this in the painting. Also, the instrument in the painting is a bit slender looking for a recorder of that size, but not for a shawm. Compare the painting with the Praetorius woodcuts. (Without getting into the theorbo debate, the woodcuts correlate pretty well with surviving instruments for the woodwinds.) ...Bob I'd guess a great bass recorder, especially since there are other recorders in the pictures. It's not a bassoon or dulcian. Those have a U-shaped structure, and this looks like a single bore instrument. FWIW, the only extended tenor shawms I've seen (one of them in our loud band) use a slightly bent bocal, not the bassoon-like one in the picture, and the top of the instrument is not nearly as broad, but there could be other designs I'm not aware of. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Wed, Feb 25, 2009, David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net said: The bocal is flared slightly at the end, so it could hold a reed, but it looks more like a bass recorder. A labium on the front of the instrument would tell us for certain, but this is obscured. by the music. I would expect Bass and quart bass recorders to use chanelling rather than a crook, too easy to lose a crook, and you already need a seperate piece to cover the block and form the windway. The crook is more natural to a shalm, and the very large head coupled to an alto/tenorish length puts me in mind of a shalm. The bass and the two smaller ones form a continuo group that was popular in France--a sort of portable organ. yes, but is that music in that genre? The smaller recorders could just as easily be pitch pipes, quiet things for practice, or something left by an absent playing partner. If it is a recorder, the windway is to the back, but that is not unusual. for larger recorders it is the norm, only on small instruments can one bring the lips to a beak while fingering the tone holes. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Wed, Feb 25, 2009, dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us said: On Wed, Feb 25, 2009, David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net said: The bocal is flared slightly at the end, so it could hold a reed, but it looks more like a bass recorder. A labium on the front of the instrument would tell us for certain, but this is obscured. by the music. after a fresh look at the painting (thanks for posting the link) I am certain this is not a recorder, enough of the head is shown that a labium would be visible if there, even if it was a great bass instrument (which it doesnt have room to be). -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
It really seems that the crook ends with the reed. I know that you exclued the basoon, but can we be sure if the rest of the instrument is not visible? Please have a look at Andrew Watts's early basoon: http://www.earlymusica.permutation.com/about_Andrew_Watts.htm .Here the crook looks longer, however on the picture we see it at the angle, thus looking shorter. They were in use as early as 1650. The shawm doesn't seem to fit the whole set of these instruments. But I don't insist. Just a thought :-) Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us To: lute-cs.dartmouth.edu lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 11:42 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre On Wed, Feb 25, 2009, David Tayler vidan...@sbcglobal.net said: The bocal is flared slightly at the end, so it could hold a reed, but it looks more like a bass recorder. A labium on the front of the instrument would tell us for certain, but this is obscured. by the music. I would expect Bass and quart bass recorders to use chanelling rather than a crook, too easy to lose a crook, and you already need a seperate piece to cover the block and form the windway. The crook is more natural to a shalm, and the very large head coupled to an alto/tenorish length puts me in mind of a shalm. The bass and the two smaller ones form a continuo group that was popular in France--a sort of portable organ. yes, but is that music in that genre? The smaller recorders could just as easily be pitch pipes, quiet things for practice, or something left by an absent playing partner. If it is a recorder, the windway is to the back, but that is not unusual. for larger recorders it is the norm, only on small instruments can one bring the lips to a beak while fingering the tone holes. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Wed, Feb 25, 2009, Jaros³aw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: It really seems that the crook ends with the reed. I know that you exclued the basoon, but can we be sure if the rest of the instrument is not visible? dulcians preceeded and overlapped the bassoon, dulcians are usually made from one or more pieces not intended to disasemble; bassoons are often jointed. The upper end of the one you posted has a brass cap surounding the ends of both ascending and descending bores, this is unusual, more commonly the descending bore is shorter. The laurent instrument's end shows one central bore, tapered to take the thread-lapped bocal. Praetorius is relevant here. The shawm doesn't seem to fit the whole set of these instruments. neither does a Dulcian or Bassoon, but a wind player is plausibly familiar with all of them. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH --- On Mon, 23/2/09, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: From: Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Monday, 23 February, 2009, 2:23 PM David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com schrieb: On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David No, RH, of course. It will reduce poisoning by 50%! But seriously I wonder if densifying a gut string with mercury, which is easily composed with organic materials, means that afterwards the string still is poisonous. And, no, I'm not willing to try it. -- Mathias To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
As compared to modern day's levels of mercury contamination in the air (in particular in such big places like London where hundreds of thousands, if not more, of strip lights and 'new generation' light bulbs are getting replaced and simply chucked off in skips daily!) the effect from the mercury / lead loaded strings would simply count next to nothing. By the way, I'm not a toxicologist :) So no responsibilities accepted ... AB Martyn Hodgson wrote: Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Tue, Feb 24, 2009, Alexander Batov alexander.ba...@vihuelademano.com said: As compared to modern day's levels of mercury contamination in the air NB, Mercury is a cumulative poison, it builds up in the body and is not eliminated. About 1 oz absorbed kills - about what used to fill a lab-grade thermometer. I too wonder about these 'wondeful' new 'green' bulbs. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I wouldn't claim to be an expert, but according to my medical dictionary mercury poisoning was common in some trades in the past - in particular in the preparation of felt used in hats. That is where the expression mad as a hatter comes from. This may be a silly question because I have been following this thread very closely but is there any evidence that strings were loaded with mercury or anything else apart from the fact that some works of art show the lower courses differently coloured? Monica - Original Message - From: Martyn Hodgson hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com; Mathias Rösel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 3:08 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH --- On Mon, 23/2/09, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: From: Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Monday, 23 February, 2009, 2:23 PM David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com schrieb: On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David No, RH, of course. It will reduce poisoning by 50%! But seriously I wonder if densifying a gut string with mercury, which is easily composed with organic materials, means that afterwards the string still is poisonous. And, no, I'm not willing to try it. -- Mathias To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
In general lead intoxication occurs after swallowing or inhalation of even small amounts of this element, however there are reports of ocupational intoxication as well: The major source of lead is occupational exposure from jobs dealing with lead and lead-based components; there is a high prevalence of lead toxicity in the population exposed to such activities. Occupational exposure of workers is seen in the manufacturing of lead batteries and cables, as well as rubber and plastic products. Soldering and foundry work, such as casting, forging, and grinding activities, are also associated with occupational exposures. Construction workers involved in painting or paint stripping, plumbing, welding, and cutting are also exposed to lead. So not only inhaling or swallowing is toxic but touching, rubbing, grinding activities as well. Even if we don't believe in skin penetration by small particules we still have a chance to rub our nose or touch unconciously our lips after some session of playing. If you have any doubts just read this: http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/410113-overview Best Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Alexander Batov alexander.ba...@vihuelademano.com To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 5:35 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre As compared to modern day's levels of mercury contamination in the air (in particular in such big places like London where hundreds of thousands, if not more, of strip lights and 'new generation' light bulbs are getting replaced and simply chucked off in skips daily!) the effect from the mercury / lead loaded strings would simply count next to nothing. By the way, I'm not a toxicologist :) So no responsibilities accepted ... AB Martyn Hodgson wrote: Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
People nowadays are much more conscious of the environmental toxins. Plus... Imagine Aquila sells lead and-or mercury loaded strings. The lawyers will swarm around lute players like sharks with offers of service. The evidence of loaded strings is based squarely on Mimmo Peruffo's research. His conclusions were made on the basis of paintings (showing smooth surface = non wound strings with a variant of red color ) and instrument string-hole measurements. One point being argued, however, was whether some of lute strings, and possibly loaded basses, were made of silk rather then gut. That discussion was held in FoRMHI, and basically died with the demise of the Fellowship itself. From the point of leeching the metals out, silk binds more closely with lead and mercury salts (as well as tin salts, customarily used to apply all the fancy colors to silk garbs), and might be much safer as loaded strings, as well. alexander On Tue, 24 Feb 2009 17:41:33 + Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk wrote: I wouldn't claim to be an expert, but according to my medical dictionary mercury poisoning was common in some trades in the past - in particular in the preparation of felt used in hats. That is where the expression mad as a hatter comes from. This may be a silly question because I have been following this thread very closely but is there any evidence that strings were loaded with mercury or anything else apart from the fact that some works of art show the lower courses differently coloured? Monica - Original Message - From: Martyn Hodgson hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com; Mathias Rösel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 3:08 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH --- On Mon, 23/2/09, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: From: Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Monday, 23 February, 2009, 2:23 PM David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com schrieb: On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David No, RH, of course. It will reduce poisoning by 50%! But seriously I wonder if densifying a gut string with mercury, which is easily composed with organic materials, means that afterwards the string still is poisonous. And, no, I'm not willing to try it. -- Mathias To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Tue, Feb 24, 2009, alexander voka...@verizon.net said: People nowadays are much more conscious of the environmental toxins. with considerable reason. Plumber comes from the use of lead pipes to convey water in Roman times, but it didnt stop with the romans; lead supply mains are not common, but some are still in regular use; and it was commonplace 50 years ago for the economy of their use to be sufficient excuse for misguided fools to deny solid evidence that lead poisening was a serious health issue. Mercury gets into the ocean food chain, Swordfish are peculiarly prone to it, and swordfish 'steak' is one of my favorite foods :-(. The element Mercury has a number of risks, including a very low vapor point. Mercury compounds are of course each different, it will take toxicologist to know how dangerous each loading agent is; including how prone they are to break down or combine. I can fully understand if a researcher (eg Mimo) has strong reservations about working with Mercury to compound such agents. From the point of leeching the metals out, silk binds more closely Good to know that, I recall dyes for silk being more difficult to bind than dyes for cotton. I wouldn't claim to be an expert, but according to my medical dictionary mercury poisoning was common in some trades in the past - in particular in the preparation of felt used in hats. is there any evidence that strings were loaded with mercury or anything else apart from the fact that some works of art show the lower courses differently coloured? Mimo hought it worth trying out, and experiments today support the plausibility of it. Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. We barely know who the players all were, and we arent doing a good job of tracking todays cases of toxic poisoning; why should we expect to be able to do so with historical cases? But we do have some instances, Mozart and Beethoven for example. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Tue, Feb 24, 2009, Jaroslaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: In general lead intoxication occurs after swallowing or inhalation of even small amounts of this element Lead is still commonly used in some municipal water supply systems, pipes and couplings as well as solder; it remains controversial, but the evidence I have read suggests it is a practice we dont need to continue. there are reports of ocupational intoxication as well: Organ pipes made of lead and lead alloy are an issue. My company made its workers wear gloves and wash hands frequently; we also painted those pipes, not just to make them atractive. the effect from the mercury / lead loaded strings would simply count next to nothing. I have built models and wargamed with lead-alloy castings; even tho painted, ones fingers do get grey... Its an avoidable risk. We have enough environment exposure that is not avoidable (eg, nearby neighbor is repainting...) -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Well, FoRMHI is reborn now so hopefully the discussion will carry on. What I wonder is how the idea of coloured strings (meaning loaded, in the context of this discussion) resides with the fact that occasionally they do show up among the mid-range strings too (not to say on the the first and second courses, as in L'homme au Luth / /by Rubens!) where, strictly speaking, there is no such 'necessity'? Did you actually try to load your silk strings? AB alexander wrote: People nowadays are much more conscious of the environmental toxins. Plus... Imagine Aquila sells lead and-or mercury loaded strings. The lawyers will swarm around lute players like sharks with offers of service. The evidence of loaded strings is based squarely on Mimmo Peruffo's research. His conclusions were made on the basis of paintings (showing smooth surface = non wound strings with a variant of red color ) and instrument string-hole measurements. One point being argued, however, was whether some of lute strings, and possibly loaded basses, were made of silk rather then gut. That discussion was held in FoRMHI, and basically died with the demise of the Fellowship itself. From the point of leeching the metals out, silk binds more closely with lead and mercury salts (as well as tin salts, customarily used to apply all the fancy colors to silk garbs), and might be much safer as loaded strings, as well. alexander To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I just wondered - do we know how readily available loaded strings were or how widely they were used? There was an article in the Galpin Society Journal 2006 about Roman and Neapolitan gut strings by Patrizio Barbieri and apparently he suggests that there is no historical evidence for loaded strings and that colouring them may have been a way of hiding blemishes. I haven't actually read the whole article yet - only a summary. I wondered whether anyone else had? Monica - Original Message - From: alexander voka...@verizon.net To: Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk Cc: hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk; Lutelist lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 6:56 PM Subject: Re: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre People nowadays are much more conscious of the environmental toxins. Plus... Imagine Aquila sells lead and-or mercury loaded strings. The lawyers will swarm around lute players like sharks with offers of service. The evidence of loaded strings is based squarely on Mimmo Peruffo's research. His conclusions were made on the basis of paintings (showing smooth surface = non wound strings with a variant of red color ) and instrument string-hole measurements. One point being argued, however, was whether some of lute strings, and possibly loaded basses, were made of silk rather then gut. That discussion was held in FoRMHI, and basically died with the demise of the Fellowship itself. From the point of leeching the metals out, silk binds more closely with lead and mercury salts (as well as tin salts, customarily used to apply all the fancy colors to silk garbs), and might be much safer as loaded strings, as well. alexander On Tue, 24 Feb 2009 17:41:33 + Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk wrote: I wouldn't claim to be an expert, but according to my medical dictionary mercury poisoning was common in some trades in the past - in particular in the preparation of felt used in hats. That is where the expression mad as a hatter comes from. This may be a silly question because I have been following this thread very closely but is there any evidence that strings were loaded with mercury or anything else apart from the fact that some works of art show the lower courses differently coloured? Monica - Original Message - From: Martyn Hodgson hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com; Mathias Rösel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 3:08 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it were a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should be able to inform us MH --- On Mon, 23/2/09, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: From: Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Monday, 23 February, 2009, 2:23 PM David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com schrieb: On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Roesel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David No, RH, of course. It will reduce poisoning by 50%! But seriously I wonder if densifying a gut string with mercury, which is easily composed with organic materials, means that afterwards the string still is poisonous. And, no, I'm not willing to try it. -- Mathias To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I was curious about that article too but I haven't read it either. He also mentions silk stings, isn't he? Hiding blemishes ... well, this sounds just like one more speculation to me. Black would certainly hide blemishes best than red, so what? AB Monica Hall wrote: I just wondered - do we know how readily available loaded strings were or how widely they were used? There was an article in the Galpin Society Journal 2006 about Roman and Neapolitan gut strings by Patrizio Barbieri and apparently he suggests that there is no historical evidence for loaded strings and that colouring them may have been a way of hiding blemishes. I haven't actually read the whole article yet - only a summary. I wondered whether anyone else had? Monica To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Absolutely. Even now use two copper powder loaded silk strings on treble gamba and one on eight course lute. All of them are made with mixture of agar-agar and sea salt. (I usually make a small number of strings, therefore using gelatin or hide glue at needed temperatures i would have to dispose of the mix every time. Agar stands repeated close to boil without loosing its' qualities.) I did try some historical techniques involving lye and salts, and such, and long periods of time, but they would be befitting to a full scale production more then anything else. As far as midrange strings with color, i did have a few experimental strings very much liked by gamba and lute players, which were painted with oil paint (linseed). They had amazingly good sound, but for the world of it, i did not know what to think of them. They certainly sound better then just linseed (+ other drying oils) cured ones, plus have a very smooth surface. I did arrive to such a need somehow, but can not claim that it could be an accepted practice in the past. alexander On Tue, 24 Feb 2009 20:07:32 + Alexander Batov alexander.ba...@vihuelademano.com wrote: Well, FoRMHI is reborn now so hopefully the discussion will carry on. What I wonder is how the idea of coloured strings (meaning loaded, in the context of this discussion) resides with the fact that occasionally they do show up among the mid-range strings too (not to say on the the first and second courses, as in L'homme au Luth / /by Rubens!) where, strictly speaking, there is no such 'necessity'? Did you actually try to load your silk strings? AB To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
JarosBaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl schrieb: There is a difference in using some dangerous metals for ordinary items and musical strings. With former your contact is limited (like a mirror - you rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. M To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Rösel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David -- *** David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com www.davidvanooijen.nl *** To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
JarosBaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl schrieb: There is a difference in using some dangerous metals for ordinary items and musical strings. With former your contact is limited (like a mirror - you rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. Matheus Then perhaps only your left hand would drop off! Ron (UK) To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
, or the fact that we can not hope to have his touch and musical ear, but it can be one element in coming closer to understanding the music of the period; Best wishes Anthony Best wishes Jaroslaw So if they dyed leather and silk with mercury, they would probably not have worried lead or mercury on gut. Until very recently people used lead paint, even for babies high chairs, and also lead pipes for drinking water. They also put mercury on the backs of mirrors. Look how we have used asbestos, even when we knew how dangerous it was. I even have some oil-bath caps and transformers on my amps (I am ashamed to say), although, I know it could be dangerous (pyrolene), but I foolishly like the sound. I don't know whether any lutensists had symptoms of saturnism? The other basses are neither brown nor red. Maybe it's a matter of light, but they really look like copper wounds. Lead tri oxide or lead-dioxide could perhaps give such a colour? http://www.aquilacorde.com/pigmenti.JPG Compare with the theorbo strings http://tinyurl.com/conmfc Mine are browner, or more purple, It is true http://tinyurl.com/burdjo Perhaps, we may discover they did have early wirewounds, but if so, the overall coppery colour would indicate complete wire wounds, not demifilé, and there are absolutely no mention even in Playford of that. The colour of the full-wire wound is not quite as in the de La Hyre painting above, but copper does vary in colour. http://www.aquilacorde.com/close.JPG But it is a painting, so perhaps the colour is not completely accurate. It is true that my loaded (see above) are red-brown, or purpley-brown. If really loading not dyeing was involved maybe they had some local recepies giving in the end this color? Well there are those questions concerning the thickness of the 5c and 6c strings, which Mimmo thinks does point to loading, if the painting is accurate. 6c being the same thickness as the 5c, if I remember, when it should be thicker, could imply a densified (loaded, or wound) string. There is one other thing, I think it is possible to load directly with an Oxide, but the result is less heavy. The resulting string might be x 1,5 more heavy than pure gut (I don't quite remember), and not the desired x2. The result however, could be much brighter, I imagine, like dyed leather. However, there is no way any final conclusions can be made, just very interesting hypotheses. Best wishes Anthony Regards Jaroslaw Special loaded? We know nothing about white loading. However, Mimmo has told me of one possibility, lead carbonate is a white and very dense insoluble powder, which was largely employed in the past under the name Biacca, or Basic lead carbonate. It was the only white insoluble pigment of the past. The density is arround 7,0. http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonato_di_piombo Another problem for the pure gut hypothesis, according to Mimmo, is that sulfur treatment, which make strings whiter, seems not to have been in use on gut strings, before mid 17th c. Such thickness of gut string, Mimmo tells me should be brownish. So perhaps lead carbonate is the answer. Place maker? Possible, however people that like this sort of things usualy make more than one - like the dots on the neck's side. Plain thicker gut? Could be, although this wouldn't be my choice as mentioned before. Artistic implication? This one I rather exclude. The allegory is made by juxtaposing some objects, however it doesn't mean they wouldn't be painted faithfully. For example La Hyre juxtaposed the singing bird sitting on the back of the chair symbolising the free music and the theorbo player as a (probably a rossignol) symbol of the learned music. However both are painted faithfuly I believe. In general La Hyre was very acurate in portrait- painting so it would be rather strange if he made an exception and didn't pay any attention to the details this time. Yes, when I looked in bigger magnification, I was also struck by the details, as also pointed out by Dana. So my guess is, it could be some kind of a temporary substitute. That or possibly lead carbonate because as Mimmo seems to think, plain gut would possibly not have been white. Thank you, Jaroslaw, for this very interesting example. Regards Anthony Regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 4:49 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
David van Ooijen davidvanooi...@gmail.com schrieb: On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM, Mathias Rösel mathias.roe...@t-online.de wrote: rarely touch it). With later providing you play a lot, the skin contact is enormous. You might consider playing with nails, then. On both hands? David No, RH, of course. It will reduce poisoning by 50%! But seriously I wonder if densifying a gut string with mercury, which is easily composed with organic materials, means that afterwards the string still is poisonous. And, no, I'm not willing to try it. -- Mathias To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I like the idea of the tapes a lot better than buttons. If the lutes were tied to buttons, we would have a lot of old museum lutes with scratches on their backs. But I suppose if the old players routinely wore the same clothes we see in the paintings, there would have been scratches on the backs of the instruments - almost all of the baroque clothes have rows of buttons down the front. Contrastlingly Vermeer and some of the other Dutch painters show a lot of women holding lutes, dressed in slippery satin-type skirts, no tapes or buttons in view. Another topic for a lot more reasearch Nancy At 12:21 AM 2/22/2009, Martyn Hodgson wrote: The 'white spot' will be a small ivory button round which the holding gut or tape is looped. Incidentally, there's some doubt that the gut (or tape) fastened round a coat button: a contemporary engraving shows thin tapes (or ribbons) coming from the coat buttons (or cld be from inside the coat ie maybe round the player's back) and leading to the ivory button. A picture is in the archives MH --- On Sat, 21/2/09, JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl wrote: From: JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Saturday, 21 February, 2009, 10:00 PM BTW, am I right that the gut is fixed with some glue near the neck (white spot)? JL - Original Message - From: Stewart McCoy lu...@tiscali.co.uk To: Lute Net lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 10:14 PM Subject: [LUTE] Laurent de La Hyre Dear Jaroslav, You hook the gut on to one of the buttons of your coat to stabilise the lute while you are holding it. I seem to remember Mersenne mentioning it. See also Robert Spencer's article on the theorbo in Early Music. It is likely that Mouton is holding his lute this way in the famous picture of him. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: Jaros^3aw Lipski [[1] mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: 21 February 2009 18:06 To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Oh, I've forgot 2 other interesting details. The frets are double (except last 2), made of a thin gut with knots on the treble side. Both theorbo and the lute on the table has a folded double piece of gut going in the middle of the back (longside). It starts from the end pin (which is visible on the theorbo) and ends on the white spot (glue?) close to the place where the body meets the neck. There is a loop attached to the long gut - maybe some sort of the system for keeping the instrument while playing. I don't think it served for hanging the instrument on the wall. They wouldn't waist such a long piece of gut for this purpose. I hang it with a very short piece of used string attached to the peg box. Best Jaroslaw -- To get on or off this list see list information at [2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- -- Nancy Carlin Associates P.O. Box 6499 Concord, CA 94524 USA phone 925/686-5800 fax 925/680-2582 web site - [3]www.nancycarlinassociates.com Administrator THE LUTE SOCIETY OF AMERICA web site - [4]http://LuteSocietyofAmerica.org -- References 1. mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl 2. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html 3. http://www.nancycarlinassociates.com/ 4. http://lutesocietyofamerica.org/
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
The 'white spot' will be a small ivory button round which the holding gut or tape is looped. Incidentally, there's some doubt that the gut (or tape) fastened round a coat button: a contemporary engraving shows thin tapes (or ribbons) coming from the coat buttons (or cld be from inside the coat ie maybe round the player's back) and leading to the ivory button. A picture is in the archives MH --- On Sat, 21/2/09, JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl wrote: From: JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Saturday, 21 February, 2009, 10:00 PM BTW, am I right that the gut is fixed with some glue near the neck (white spot)? JL - Original Message - From: Stewart McCoy lu...@tiscali.co.uk To: Lute Net lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 10:14 PM Subject: [LUTE] Laurent de La Hyre Dear Jaroslav, You hook the gut on to one of the buttons of your coat to stabilise the lute while you are holding it. I seem to remember Mersenne mentioning it. See also Robert Spencer's article on the theorbo in Early Music. It is likely that Mouton is holding his lute this way in the famous picture of him. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: Jaros^3aw Lipski [mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: 21 February 2009 18:06 To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Oh, I've forgot 2 other interesting details. The frets are double (except last 2), made of a thin gut with knots on the treble side. Both theorbo and the lute on the table has a folded double piece of gut going in the middle of the back (longside). It starts from the end pin (which is visible on the theorbo) and ends on the white spot (glue?) close to the place where the body meets the neck. There is a loop attached to the long gut - maybe some sort of the system for keeping the instrument while playing. I don't think it served for hanging the instrument on the wall. They wouldn't waist such a long piece of gut for this purpose. I hang it with a very short piece of used string attached to the peg box. Best Jaroslaw -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Dear Martyn, Yes, I agree it should be an ivory button. I thought of something else because the spot seems to be quite big (bigger than usualy buttons are) and it is placed further from the neck than normaly (my Haycock lute has a button about 2 mm from the neck). Also the loop seems to be too big to be fastened to a coat button. The other option is that some other strap or ribbon was to go around players back and than attached to the loop itself (not the strap button). Regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Martyn Hodgson hodgsonmar...@yahoo.co.uk To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu; Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl Sent: Sunday, February 22, 2009 9:21 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre The 'white spot' will be a small ivory button round which the holding gut or tape is looped. Incidentally, there's some doubt that the gut (or tape) fastened round a coat button: a contemporary engraving shows thin tapes (or ribbons) coming from the coat buttons (or cld be from inside the coat ie maybe round the player's back) and leading to the ivory button. A picture is in the archives MH --- On Sat, 21/2/09, JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl wrote: From: JarosAAaw Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Saturday, 21 February, 2009, 10:00 PM BTW, am I right that the gut is fixed with some glue near the neck (white spot)? JL - Original Message - From: Stewart McCoy lu...@tiscali.co.uk To: Lute Net lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 10:14 PM Subject: [LUTE] Laurent de La Hyre Dear Jaroslav, You hook the gut on to one of the buttons of your coat to stabilise the lute while you are holding it. I seem to remember Mersenne mentioning it. See also Robert Spencer's article on the theorbo in Early Music. It is likely that Mouton is holding his lute this way in the famous picture of him. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: Jaros^3aw Lipski [mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: 21 February 2009 18:06 To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Oh, I've forgot 2 other interesting details. The frets are double (except last 2), made of a thin gut with knots on the treble side. Both theorbo and the lute on the table has a folded double piece of gut going in the middle of the back (longside). It starts from the end pin (which is visible on the theorbo) and ends on the white spot (glue?) close to the place where the body meets the neck. There is a loop attached to the long gut - maybe some sort of the system for keeping the instrument while playing. I don't think it served for hanging the instrument on the wall. They wouldn't waist such a long piece of gut for this purpose. I hang it with a very short piece of used string attached to the peg box. Best Jaroslaw -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Dear Anthony, I thought that lead is poisness, isn't it? Didn't they know about it? The other basses are neither brown nor red. Maybe it's a matter of light, but they really look like copper wounds. If really loading not dyeing was involved maybe they had some local recepies giving in the end this color? Regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu; alexander voka...@verizon.net Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 10:06 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Dear Jaroslaw Le 21 févr. 09 à 20:51, Jarosław Lipski a écrit : Dear Anthony, Nice to talk to you again. I agree, there are several possibilities and some of them very probable. Aesthetic/loaded? Maybe aesthetic, but why only one string? I don't exclued loading however personaly I wouldn't use a plain gut in between two loaded strings. This not a transition like a Venice string. Besides Venice is a good transition between treble and bass, but not in the middle of basses! That was what I was thinking, but Alexnder points out that it is the first string to go OFF the neck, it is almost twice as long as the six courses ON, so to produce an octave lower then the 4th string, it has to be about the same diameter as the 4th. I agree that the plain gut would perhaps be brighter than the adjacent loaded strings, but a move from the off the neck quality would perhaps bring a tonal break anyway. Still I do tend to agree with you. Demifile? I agree - too early. Well, at least as far as our knoledge is correct. It would also bring a tonal break, as my Gimped string in between the Venice and the loaded basses showed me. Special loaded? We know nothing about white loading. However, Mimmo has told me of one possibility, lead carbonate is a white and very dense insoluble powder, which was largely employed in the past under the name Biacca, or Basic lead carbonate. It was the only white insoluble pigment of the past. The density is arround 7,0. http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonato_di_piombo Another problem for the pure gut hypothesis, according to Mimmo, is that sulfur treatment, which make strings whiter, seems not to have been in use on gut strings, before mid 17th c. Such thickness of gut string, Mimmo tells me should be brownish. So perhaps lead carbonate is the answer. Place maker? Possible, however people that like this sort of things usualy make more than one - like the dots on the neck's side. Plain thicker gut? Could be, although this wouldn't be my choice as mentioned before. Artistic implication? This one I rather exclude. The allegory is made by juxtaposing some objects, however it doesn't mean they wouldn't be painted faithfully. For example La Hyre juxtaposed the singing bird sitting on the back of the chair symbolising the free music and the theorbo player as a (probably a rossignol) symbol of the learned music. However both are painted faithfuly I believe. In general La Hyre was very acurate in portrait-painting so it would be rather strange if he made an exception and didn't pay any attention to the details this time. Yes, when I looked in bigger magnification, I was also struck by the details, as also pointed out by Dana. So my guess is, it could be some kind of a temporary substitute. That or possibly lead carbonate because as Mimmo seems to think, plain gut would possibly not have been white. Thank you, Jaroslaw, for this very interesting example. Regards Anthony Regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 4:49 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico Lana 1597-1646): http://www.aquilacorde.com/valeriani1.JPG red basses: they suggest a loading treatment http://www.aquilacorde.com/b.jpg but your example is sort of in between, interpretable either way? unless there is a technical reason (string length) which would preclude loading? Demi-filé? However, if the date is 1649, it seems unlikely that the white string could have been silver wound demi-filé, because of the early date. Mimmo's example is from 1770: Zophany, 1770 ca. The Sharp family: see the white basses http://www.aquilacorde.com/zophany.jpg If for a specific purpose, why substitute for 7c and not also for 6c? I think your suggestion that 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Exactly the point. Had a discussion with Mimmo concerning this, the color you see on the painting is the red lead oxide. The darker slightly brownish red - mercury oxide. Both are much easier to combine with gut or silk (and heavier by much, making for smaller diameters). As a matter of fact many historical silk or gut weighed articles (like G. Washington's american flag, or leather articles from before 19th century) were chemically weighed with lead and mercury oxides and salts. Some of the the mercury salts produce quite transparent weighed gut, by the way. This was Mimmo's dilemma, of course. Copper has to be loaded with a spoon, literally, it does not bind chemically, whereas both lead and mercury are very willing with organics... With what we know now of both mercury and lead, anyone here would be willing to use historically accurate strings?.. alexander On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 18:52:45 + dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us wrote: On Sun, Feb 22, 2009, Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: Dear Anthony, I thought that lead is poisness, isn't it? Didn't they know about it? No, well, some had clues, but noone knew as we do today. This is an era when mercury amalgams were used to plate with silver and gold; driing off the mercury using heat; shortening the life of everyone downwind. Lead compounds were used to sweeten certain wines, leading perhaps to the deafness of Bhetoven an perhaps to the death of Mozart. Things that killed slowly were hard to prove as cause of death. Consider that many of the cosmetics in use were also deadly, probably many of the tinctures ground by painters. Water used by the brewers on the London Bridge was drawn from the river thames itself... -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
So, we aren't HIP anymore, are we? At least I don't fancy.. :-( Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: alexander voka...@verizon.net To: dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us Cc: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Sunday, February 22, 2009 8:15 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Exactly the point. Had a discussion with Mimmo concerning this, the color you see on the painting is the red lead oxide. The darker slightly brownish red - mercury oxide. Both are much easier to combine with gut or silk (and heavier by much, making for smaller diameters). As a matter of fact many historical silk or gut weighed articles (like G. Washington's american flag, or leather articles from before 19th century) were chemically weighed with lead and mercury oxides and salts. Some of the the mercury salts produce quite transparent weighed gut, by the way. This was Mimmo's dilemma, of course. Copper has to be loaded with a spoon, literally, it does not bind chemically, whereas both lead and mercury are very willing with organics... With what we know now of both mercury and lead, anyone here would be willing to use historically accurate strings?.. alexander On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 18:52:45 + dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us wrote: On Sun, Feb 22, 2009, Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: Dear Anthony, I thought that lead is poisness, isn't it? Didn't they know about it? No, well, some had clues, but noone knew as we do today. This is an era when mercury amalgams were used to plate with silver and gold; driing off the mercury using heat; shortening the life of everyone downwind. Lead compounds were used to sweeten certain wines, leading perhaps to the deafness of Bhetoven an perhaps to the death of Mozart. Things that killed slowly were hard to prove as cause of death. Consider that many of the cosmetics in use were also deadly, probably many of the tinctures ground by painters. Water used by the brewers on the London Bridge was drawn from the river thames itself... -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
...@wp.pl; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 4:49 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico Lana 1597-1646): http://www.aquilacorde.com/valeriani1.JPG red basses: they suggest a loading treatment http://www.aquilacorde.com/b.jpg but your example is sort of in between, interpretable either way? unless there is a technical reason (string length) which would preclude loading? Demi-filé? However, if the date is 1649, it seems unlikely that the white string could have been silver wound demi-filé, because of the early date. Mimmo's example is from 1770: Zophany, 1770 ca. The Sharp family: see the white basses http://www.aquilacorde.com/zophany.jpg If for a specific purpose, why substitute for 7c and not also for 6c? I think your suggestion that 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original proper (loaded?) string had broken 3/ 7th string was made of some kind of substitute which the player consciously preferred to have on that course. are quite plausible (both possibilities); but if (3) and 7c was a preferred substitute, why was it not also preferred for 6c, which remains red (loaded?), unless 7c were a special type of loaded (but I might be missing something here about the reentrant tuning). Indeed, on my new 11c lute, Stephen Gottlieb did not put the full complement of loaded basses (from 6 to 11), instead he stopped at 8c, and substituted for the smaller basses : a Gimped on 7c and a pure Venice on 6c (probably just because he already had them), but also because he said they would be more frequently stopped down. Place marker? The gimped string, while good, did break the smooth transition of the voices, but proved quite useful while I was learning to use the basses, as a sort of place marker: I could both see and hear where I was. Although, I would not actually like to suggest a similar place marker role for the white string in this painting. I agree it is most likely a temporary substitute (as mine in fact were also), just possibly there for its preferred quality, if it was a special loaded string. Loaded? Could this white string have been a loaded one? Notice, that my Venice 6c was yellowish, but it looks quite white in contrast to the redder basses, and this is a painting, so the difference could be exaggerated: http://tinyurl.com/burdjo Could the 7c of this painting be the canary-yellow lead oxide MP mentions, if it was there for a specific purpose (Mimmo doesn't mention any white coloured loading)? I suppose it is more likely to be plain gut, but that is also usually yellowish, unless bleached. Some artistic implication? Although, the instrument could perhaps be an artist's prop, for which the strings could have been chosen for some particlular artistic effect, somehow part of its allegoric message. The white string runs through the heart of the rose. The index (trigger finger) is on this. If so, I have no idea what the implication for the artist might be. However, a painting with a primary allegorical message, could be a little less safe in terms of the data it gives us for an actual playing set-up, than say, the protrait of a particular lutenist (even if this might also have some allegorical undertones). Just my uninformed musings regards Anthony [1]http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/god4/ho_50.189.htm# or [2]http://tinyurl.com/conmfc . I wouldn't like however focus on toyness theme, which is very interesting btw, in spite we don't possess enough data to solve it now. What drew my attention when I saw it however (which is unfortunately not so visible on reproductions) were some small details. The whole painting is quite big 105.7 x 144.1 cm with fast colors and sharp contours so there can't be any ambiguity about it. Apart from slightly strange, flat bottom end, what makes one wonder is the stringing. The string color is very consistent from the bridge to the peg box (even the loose ends inside the peg box are of the same color so it can't be accidental). When you enter the hall and see the picture you have an impression that the theorbo is strung with copper wounds. Well, I am not suggesting it really was, but the tone color of the bass strings resembles copper quite a lot. There is another surprise: strings 1-5 look like ordinary gut, then 6th is copper-like, 7th (here, here) almost white (!) resembling silver wound, and 8-13 again copper color. Okay, so let's assume
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
The basoon first appeared about 1650. But obviously it could be a bass or tenor as well. Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Sunday, February 22, 2009 8:07 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre On Sat, Feb 21, 2009, Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: Dear Dana, The reproduction doesn't show that detail particularly well because that area is very dark, but as far as I can remember it from the museum, the book stands on the table covered with some black fabric, and leaning against the basoon Perhaps a bit early to be called bassoon, and looks more to me like a shalm; extended tenor or bass to judge from the crook. Wonder what the shalm was braced with (I use x-legged dowels). Its clues like this that make possible replicas of the furniture in everyday use which is only preserved iconographically :-) -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
SOT Remember mercury was used in ancient times as a cure for syphillis? :-) I've never heard of it really being a true remedy though! Cheers! Lex van Sante Op 22 feb 2009, om 20:15 heeft alexander het volgende geschreven: Exactly the point. Had a discussion with Mimmo concerning this, the color you see on the painting is the red lead oxide. The darker slightly brownish red - mercury oxide. Both are much easier to combine with gut or silk (and heavier by much, making for smaller diameters). As a matter of fact many historical silk or gut weighed articles (like G. Washington's american flag, or leather articles from before 19th century) were chemically weighed with lead and mercury oxides and salts. Some of the the mercury salts produce quite transparent weighed gut, by the way. This was Mimmo's dilemma, of course. Copper has to be loaded with a spoon, literally, it does not bind chemically, whereas both lead and mercury are very willing with organics... With what we know now of both mercury and lead, anyone here would be willing to use historically accurate strings?.. alexander On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 18:52:45 + dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us wrote: On Sun, Feb 22, 2009, Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: Dear Anthony, I thought that lead is poisness, isn't it? Didn't they know about it? No, well, some had clues, but noone knew as we do today. This is an era when mercury amalgams were used to plate with silver and gold; driing off the mercury using heat; shortening the life of everyone downwind. Lead compounds were used to sweeten certain wines, leading perhaps to the deafness of Bhetoven an perhaps to the death of Mozart. Things that killed slowly were hard to prove as cause of death. Consider that many of the cosmetics in use were also deadly, probably many of the tinctures ground by painters. Water used by the brewers on the London Bridge was drawn from the river thames itself... -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I'd guess a great bass recorder, especially since there are other recorders in the pictures. It's not a bassoon or dulcian. Those have a U-shaped structure, and this looks like a single bore instrument. FWIW, the only extended tenor shawms I've seen (one of them in our loud band) use a slightly bent bocal, not the bassoon-like one in the picture, and the top of the instrument is not nearly as broad, but there could be other designs I'm not aware of. Guy -Original Message- From: Jaroslaw Lipski [mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: Sunday, February 22, 2009 2:37 PM To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre The basoon first appeared about 1650. But obviously it could be a bass or tenor as well. Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Sunday, February 22, 2009 8:07 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre On Sat, Feb 21, 2009, Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl said: Dear Dana, The reproduction doesn't show that detail particularly well because that area is very dark, but as far as I can remember it from the museum, the book stands on the table covered with some black fabric, and leaning against the basoon Perhaps a bit early to be called bassoon, and looks more to me like a shalm; extended tenor or bass to judge from the crook. Wonder what the shalm was braced with (I use x-legged dowels). Its clues like this that make possible replicas of the furniture in everyday use which is only preserved iconographically :-) -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
faithfuly I believe. In general La Hyre was very acurate in portrait- painting so it would be rather strange if he made an exception and didn't pay any attention to the details this time. Yes, when I looked in bigger magnification, I was also struck by the details, as also pointed out by Dana. So my guess is, it could be some kind of a temporary substitute. That or possibly lead carbonate because as Mimmo seems to think, plain gut would possibly not have been white. Thank you, Jaroslaw, for this very interesting example. Regards Anthony Regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 4:49 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico Lana 1597-1646): http://www.aquilacorde.com/valeriani1.JPG red basses: they suggest a loading treatment http://www.aquilacorde.com/b.jpg but your example is sort of in between, interpretable either way? unless there is a technical reason (string length) which would preclude loading? Demi-filé? However, if the date is 1649, it seems unlikely that the white string could have been silver wound demi-filé, because of the early date. Mimmo's example is from 1770: Zophany, 1770 ca. The Sharp family: see the white basses http://www.aquilacorde.com/zophany.jpg If for a specific purpose, why substitute for 7c and not also for 6c? I think your suggestion that 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original proper (loaded?) string had broken 3/ 7th string was made of some kind of substitute which the player consciously preferred to have on that course. are quite plausible (both possibilities); but if (3) and 7c was a preferred substitute, why was it not also preferred for 6c, which remains red (loaded?), unless 7c were a special type of loaded (but I might be missing something here about the reentrant tuning). Indeed, on my new 11c lute, Stephen Gottlieb did not put the full complement of loaded basses (from 6 to 11), instead he stopped at 8c, and substituted for the smaller basses : a Gimped on 7c and a pure Venice on 6c (probably just because he already had them), but also because he said they would be more frequently stopped down. Place marker? The gimped string, while good, did break the smooth transition of the voices, but proved quite useful while I was learning to use the basses, as a sort of place marker: I could both see and hear where I was. Although, I would not actually like to suggest a similar place marker role for the white string in this painting. I agree it is most likely a temporary substitute (as mine in fact were also), just possibly there for its preferred quality, if it was a special loaded string. Loaded? Could this white string have been a loaded one? Notice, that my Venice 6c was yellowish, but it looks quite white in contrast to the redder basses, and this is a painting, so the difference could be exaggerated: http://tinyurl.com/burdjo Could the 7c of this painting be the canary-yellow lead oxide MP mentions, if it was there for a specific purpose (Mimmo doesn't mention any white coloured loading)? I suppose it is more likely to be plain gut, but that is also usually yellowish, unless bleached. Some artistic implication? Although, the instrument could perhaps be an artist's prop, for which the strings could have been chosen for some particlular artistic effect, somehow part of its allegoric message. The white string runs through the heart of the rose. The index (trigger finger) is on this. If so, I have no idea what the implication for the artist might be. However, a painting with a primary allegorical message, could be a little less safe in terms of the data it gives us for an actual playing set-up, than say, the protrait of a particular lutenist (even if this might also have some allegorical undertones). Just my uninformed musings regards Anthony [1]http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/god4/ho_50.189.htm# or [2]http://tinyurl.com/conmfc . I wouldn't like however focus on toyness theme, which is very interesting btw, in spite we don't possess enough data to solve it now. What drew my attention when I saw it however (which is unfortunately not so visible on reproductions) were some small details. The whole painting is quite big 105.7 x144.1 cm with fast colors and sharp contours so there can't be any ambiguity about it. Apart from slightly strange, flat bottom end
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
It is most likely a larger size shawm. Bass and larger 16th C recorders usually had a removable cap, often with a brass band on the end, similar to the ones on the fontanelle (the pepper-pot covering the little finger key). You would see this even if the instrument were turned so that the window was facing away from you. The edge between the side and the top of the cap was typically beveled. You don't see any of this in the painting. Also, the instrument in the painting is a bit slender looking for a recorder of that size, but not for a shawm. Compare the painting with the Praetorius woodcuts. (Without getting into the theorbo debate, the woodcuts correlate pretty well with surviving instruments for the woodwinds.) ...Bob I'd guess a great bass recorder, especially since there are other recorders in the pictures. It's not a bassoon or dulcian. Those have a U-shaped structure, and this looks like a single bore instrument. FWIW, the only extended tenor shawms I've seen (one of them in our loud band) use a slightly bent bocal, not the bassoon-like one in the picture, and the top of the instrument is not nearly as broad, but there could be other designs I'm not aware of. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico Lana 1597-1646): http://www.aquilacorde.com/valeriani1.JPG red basses: they suggest a loading treatment http://www.aquilacorde.com/b.jpg but your example is sort of in between, interpretable either way? unless there is a technical reason (string length) which would preclude loading? Demi-filé? However, if the date is 1649, it seems unlikely that the white string could have been silver wound demi-filé, because of the early date. Mimmo's example is from 1770: Zophany, 1770 ca. The Sharp family: see the white basses http://www.aquilacorde.com/zophany.jpg If for a specific purpose, why substitute for 7c and not also for 6c? I think your suggestion that 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original proper (loaded?) string had broken 3/ 7th string was made of some kind of substitute which the player consciously preferred to have on that course. are quite plausible (both possibilities); but if (3) and 7c was a preferred substitute, why was it not also preferred for 6c, which remains red (loaded?), unless 7c were a special type of loaded (but I might be missing something here about the reentrant tuning). Indeed, on my new 11c lute, Stephen Gottlieb did not put the full complement of loaded basses (from 6 to 11), instead he stopped at 8c, and substituted for the smaller basses : a Gimped on 7c and a pure Venice on 6c (probably just because he already had them), but also because he said they would be more frequently stopped down. Place marker? The gimped string, while good, did break the smooth transition of the voices, but proved quite useful while I was learning to use the basses, as a sort of place marker: I could both see and hear where I was. Although, I would not actually like to suggest a similar place marker role for the white string in this painting. I agree it is most likely a temporary substitute (as mine in fact were also), just possibly there for its preferred quality, if it was a special loaded string. Loaded? Could this white string have been a loaded one? Notice, that my Venice 6c was yellowish, but it looks quite white in contrast to the redder basses, and this is a painting, so the difference could be exaggerated: http://tinyurl.com/burdjo Could the 7c of this painting be the canary-yellow lead oxide MP mentions, if it was there for a specific purpose (Mimmo doesn't mention any white coloured loading)? I suppose it is more likely to be plain gut, but that is also usually yellowish, unless bleached. Some artistic implication? Although, the instrument could perhaps be an artist's prop, for which the strings could have been chosen for some particlular artistic effect, somehow part of its allegoric message. The white string runs through the heart of the rose. The index (trigger finger) is on this. If so, I have no idea what the implication for the artist might be. However, a painting with a primary allegorical message, could be a little less safe in terms of the data it gives us for an actual playing set-up, than say, the protrait of a particular lutenist (even if this might also have some allegorical undertones). Just my uninformed musings regards Anthony Le 21 févr. 09 à 00:00, Jarosław Lipski a écrit : The toy theorbo discussion reminded me the painting by Laurent de La Hyre I saw in Metropolitan museum (last month after my NY concert). It's called Allegory of music (1649) and shows the lady tuning rather not so big (at least in proportion to her body), single strung theorbo [1]http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/god4/ho_50.189.htm# or [2]http://tinyurl.com/conmfc . I wouldn't like however focus on toyness theme, which is very interesting btw, in spite we don't possess enough data to solve it now. What drew my attention when I saw it however (which is unfortunately not so visible on reproductions) were some small details. The whole painting is quite big 105.7 x 144.1 cm with fast colors and sharp contours so there can't be any ambiguity about it. Apart from slightly strange, flat bottom end, what makes one wonder is the stringing. The string color is very consistent from the bridge to the peg box (even the loose ends inside the peg box are of the same color so it can't be accidental). When you enter the hall and see the picture you have an impression that the theorbo is strung with copper wounds. Well, I am not suggesting it really was,
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
I snuck a peek at the other stringed instrument in the picture (to the right, on the side table, partly hidden by music), perhaps a violin or viola. Curiously thick neck on it. Only the bass string is visible, gave me the impression of gut. Hmmm, speaking of that music, it was uprioght, perhaps this is evidence of music stands, something I have seen little evidence of before (only the ones fixed to the large table sene in the painting which adorned the cover of Munrow's book _Instruments of the Middles ages and Renaissance_; not certain of the title or artist, (style is highly realistic, parrots are depicted), possibly 'hearing' or 'senses'. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Oh, I've forgot 2 other interesting details. The frets are double (except last 2), made of a thin gut with knots on the treble side. Both theorbo and the lute on the table has a folded double piece of gut going in the middle of the back (longside). It starts from the end pin (which is visible on the theorbo) and ends on the white spot (glue?) close to the place where the body meets the neck. There is a loop attached to the long gut - maybe some sort of the system for keeping the instrument while playing. I don't think it served for hanging the instrument on the wall. They wouldn't waist such a long piece of gut for this purpose. I hang it with a very short piece of used string attached to the peg box. Best Jaroslaw -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Thanks Alexander, that makes sense. The simple truth of this 7th string is - it does not have to be loaded or such. Being the first string to go OFF the neck, it is almost twice as long as the six courses ON, so to produce an octave lower then the 4th string, it has to be about the same diameter as the 4th. Mimmo notices that the diameter of the 6th is more or less identical to that of the 5th: the implication of that would be that its density, at equal tension/feel profile, must have been arround X 2. Thus likely to be loaded, I suppose. Thus there does seem to be a good reason for two string types on 6c and 7c. There is much more detail than an allegory necessitates. As Dana pointed out you can see the curling strings from the pegs, as well as the spiralling of an HT or twine on the string of the bowed instrument, and the string's loops at the lute's bridge shows that the bass strings were quite soft. Another detail, in keeping with the allegory that I hadn't noticed, the nightingale (I think) to the right of the lutenist's shoulder, which is quite well rendered, compare: http://www.finerareprints.com/animals/cassell/1008.jpg Regards Anthony Le 21 févr. 09 à 19:05, alexander a écrit : AS far as material it is made of, there are a few possibilities, one of which is that a longer sulfured (= whiter) string will be not as strong (not important in this position), but a little stiffer and brighter, which would match better other basses around it (important). I have people asking for one particular string which they fit in with others, as they feel it works better. It definitely has a different color. People were no different back then, at least at this. alexander On Sat, 21 Feb 2009 16:49:34 +0100 Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr wrote: It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico Lana 1597-1646): http://www.aquilacorde.com/valeriani1.JPG red basses: they suggest a loading treatment http://www.aquilacorde.com/b.jpg but your example is sort of in between, interpretable either way? unless there is a technical reason (string length) which would preclude loading? Demi-filé? However, if the date is 1649, it seems unlikely that the white string could have been silver wound demi-filé, because of the early date. Mimmo's example is from 1770: Zophany, 1770 ca. The Sharp family: see the white basses http://www.aquilacorde.com/zophany.jpg If for a specific purpose, why substitute for 7c and not also for 6c? I think your suggestion that 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original proper (loaded?) string had broken 3/ 7th string was made of some kind of substitute which the player consciously preferred to have on that course. are quite plausible (both possibilities); but if (3) and 7c was a preferred substitute, why was it not also preferred for 6c, which remains red (loaded?), unless 7c were a special type of loaded (but I might be missing something here about the reentrant tuning). Indeed, on my new 11c lute, Stephen Gottlieb did not put the full complement of loaded basses (from 6 to 11), instead he stopped at 8c, and substituted for the smaller basses : a Gimped on 7c and a pure Venice on 6c (probably just because he already had them), but also because he said they would be more frequently stopped down. Place marker? The gimped string, while good, did break the smooth transition of the voices, but proved quite useful while I was learning to use the basses, as a sort of place marker: I could both see and hear where I was. Although, I would not actually like to suggest a similar place marker role for the white string in this painting. I agree it is most likely a temporary substitute (as mine in fact were also), just possibly there for its preferred quality, if it was a special loaded string. Loaded? Could this white string have been a loaded one? Notice, that my Venice 6c was yellowish, but it looks quite white in contrast to the redder basses, and this is a painting, so the difference could be exaggerated: http://tinyurl.com/burdjo Could the 7c of this painting be the canary-yellow lead oxide MP mentions, if it was there for a specific purpose (Mimmo doesn't mention any white coloured loading)? I suppose it is more likely to be plain gut, but that is also usually yellowish, unless bleached. Some artistic implication? Although, the instrument could perhaps be an artist's prop, for which the strings could have been chosen for some particlular artistic effect, somehow part of its
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Dear Anthony, Nice to talk to you again. I agree, there are several possibilities and some of them very probable. Aesthetic/loaded? Maybe aesthetic, but why only one string? I don't exclued loading however personaly I wouldn't use a plain gut in between two loaded strings. This not a transition like a Venice string. Besides Venice is a good transition between treble and bass, but not in the middle of basses! Demifile? I agree - too early. Well, at least as far as our knoledge is correct. Special loaded? We know nothing about white loading. Place maker? Possible, however people that like this sort of things usualy make more than one - like the dots on the neck's side. Plain thicker gut? Could be, although this wouldn't be my choice as mentioned before. Artistic implication? This one I rather exclude. The allegory is made by juxtaposing some objects, however it doesn't mean they wouldn't be painted faithfully. For example La Hyre juxtaposed the singing bird sitting on the back of the chair symbolising the free music and the theorbo player as a symbol of the learned music. However both are painted faithfuly I believe. In general La Hyre was very acurate in portrait-painting so it would be rather strange if he made an exception and didn't pay any attention to the details this time. So my guess is, it could be some kind of a temporary substitute. Regards Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr To: Jarosław Lipski jaroslawlip...@wp.pl; lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 4:49 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico Lana 1597-1646): http://www.aquilacorde.com/valeriani1.JPG red basses: they suggest a loading treatment http://www.aquilacorde.com/b.jpg but your example is sort of in between, interpretable either way? unless there is a technical reason (string length) which would preclude loading? Demi-filé? However, if the date is 1649, it seems unlikely that the white string could have been silver wound demi-filé, because of the early date. Mimmo's example is from 1770: Zophany, 1770 ca. The Sharp family: see the white basses http://www.aquilacorde.com/zophany.jpg If for a specific purpose, why substitute for 7c and not also for 6c? I think your suggestion that 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original proper (loaded?) string had broken 3/ 7th string was made of some kind of substitute which the player consciously preferred to have on that course. are quite plausible (both possibilities); but if (3) and 7c was a preferred substitute, why was it not also preferred for 6c, which remains red (loaded?), unless 7c were a special type of loaded (but I might be missing something here about the reentrant tuning). Indeed, on my new 11c lute, Stephen Gottlieb did not put the full complement of loaded basses (from 6 to 11), instead he stopped at 8c, and substituted for the smaller basses : a Gimped on 7c and a pure Venice on 6c (probably just because he already had them), but also because he said they would be more frequently stopped down. Place marker? The gimped string, while good, did break the smooth transition of the voices, but proved quite useful while I was learning to use the basses, as a sort of place marker: I could both see and hear where I was. Although, I would not actually like to suggest a similar place marker role for the white string in this painting. I agree it is most likely a temporary substitute (as mine in fact were also), just possibly there for its preferred quality, if it was a special loaded string. Loaded? Could this white string have been a loaded one? Notice, that my Venice 6c was yellowish, but it looks quite white in contrast to the redder basses, and this is a painting, so the difference could be exaggerated: http://tinyurl.com/burdjo Could the 7c of this painting be the canary-yellow lead oxide MP mentions, if it was there for a specific purpose (Mimmo doesn't mention any white coloured loading)? I suppose it is more likely to be plain gut, but that is also usually yellowish, unless bleached. Some artistic implication? Although, the instrument could perhaps be an artist's prop, for which the strings could have been chosen for some particlular artistic effect, somehow part of its allegoric message. The white string runs through the heart of the rose. The index (trigger finger) is on this. If so, I have no idea what the implication for the artist might be. However, a painting with a primary
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Dear Alexander, In general it is possible, however as a musician I have to say I wouldn't use a plain gut in between two strings of a different type. As I explained Anthony, this is not a smooth transition like in the case of Venice string. We are talking about a bass register, not a transition between the treble and bass. At least it wouldn't be my choice. Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: alexander voka...@verizon.net To: Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr Cc: lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 7:05 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre The simple truth of this 7th string is - it does not have to be loaded or such. Being the first string to go OFF the neck, it is almost twice as long as the six courses ON, so to produce an octave lower then the 4th string, it has to be about the same diameter as the 4th. AS far as material it is made of, there are a few possibilities, one of which is that a longer sulfured (= whiter) string will be not as strong (not important in this position), but a little stiffer and brighter, which would match better other basses around it (important). I have people asking for one particular string which they fit in with others, as they feel it works better. It definitely has a different color. People were no different back then, at least at this. alexander On Sat, 21 Feb 2009 16:49:34 +0100 Anthony Hind anthony.h...@noos.fr wrote: It's good to read you again, Jarosław, and with such an interesting example. I would not presume to give any answers, just add a question or two. It would be good to have Mimmo's specialist opinion, on this. Aesthetic/loaded? I note that MP does give two examples contrasting aesthetic use of string colour, with something more systematic that he thinks could be consistent with loading: aesthetic (Ludovico Lana 1597-1646): http://www.aquilacorde.com/valeriani1.JPG red basses: they suggest a loading treatment http://www.aquilacorde.com/b.jpg but your example is sort of in between, interpretable either way? unless there is a technical reason (string length) which would preclude loading? Demi-filé? However, if the date is 1649, it seems unlikely that the white string could have been silver wound demi-filé, because of the early date. Mimmo's example is from 1770: Zophany, 1770 ca. The Sharp family: see the white basses http://www.aquilacorde.com/zophany.jpg If for a specific purpose, why substitute for 7c and not also for 6c? I think your suggestion that 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original proper (loaded?) string had broken 3/ 7th string was made of some kind of substitute which the player consciously preferred to have on that course. are quite plausible (both possibilities); but if (3) and 7c was a preferred substitute, why was it not also preferred for 6c, which remains red (loaded?), unless 7c were a special type of loaded (but I might be missing something here about the reentrant tuning). Indeed, on my new 11c lute, Stephen Gottlieb did not put the full complement of loaded basses (from 6 to 11), instead he stopped at 8c, and substituted for the smaller basses : a Gimped on 7c and a pure Venice on 6c (probably just because he already had them), but also because he said they would be more frequently stopped down. Place marker? The gimped string, while good, did break the smooth transition of the voices, but proved quite useful while I was learning to use the basses, as a sort of place marker: I could both see and hear where I was. Although, I would not actually like to suggest a similar place marker role for the white string in this painting. I agree it is most likely a temporary substitute (as mine in fact were also), just possibly there for its preferred quality, if it was a special loaded string. Loaded? Could this white string have been a loaded one? Notice, that my Venice 6c was yellowish, but it looks quite white in contrast to the redder basses, and this is a painting, so the difference could be exaggerated: http://tinyurl.com/burdjo Could the 7c of this painting be the canary-yellow lead oxide MP mentions, if it was there for a specific purpose (Mimmo doesn't mention any white coloured loading)? I suppose it is more likely to be plain gut, but that is also usually yellowish, unless bleached. Some artistic implication? Although, the instrument could perhaps be an artist's prop, for which the strings could have been chosen for some particlular artistic effect, somehow part of its allegoric message. The white string runs through the heart of the rose. The index (trigger finger) is on this. If so, I have no idea what the implication for the artist might be. However, a painting with a primary allegorical message, could be a little less safe in terms of the data it gives us for an actual playing set-up, than say, the protrait of a particular lutenist (even if this might
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Dear Stewart, I hope they had better clothes than us and well stiched buttons to withstand the theorbo weight. No, but seriously.Thanks a lot for a good tip! Now I remember reading it some time ago, however the loop seems to be too big for just one button. Best wishes Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: Stewart McCoy lu...@tiscali.co.uk To: Lute Net lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 10:14 PM Subject: [LUTE] Laurent de La Hyre Dear Jaroslav, You hook the gut on to one of the buttons of your coat to stabilise the lute while you are holding it. I seem to remember Mersenne mentioning it. See also Robert Spencer's article on the theorbo in Early Music. It is likely that Mouton is holding his lute this way in the famous picture of him. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: Jaros^3aw Lipski [mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: 21 February 2009 18:06 To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Oh, I've forgot 2 other interesting details. The frets are double (except last 2), made of a thin gut with knots on the treble side. Both theorbo and the lute on the table has a folded double piece of gut going in the middle of the back (longside). It starts from the end pin (which is visible on the theorbo) and ends on the white spot (glue?) close to the place where the body meets the neck. There is a loop attached to the long gut - maybe some sort of the system for keeping the instrument while playing. I don't think it served for hanging the instrument on the wall. They wouldn't waist such a long piece of gut for this purpose. I hang it with a very short piece of used string attached to the peg box. Best Jaroslaw -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
BTW, am I right that the gut is fixed with some glue near the neck (white spot)? JL - Original Message - From: Stewart McCoy lu...@tiscali.co.uk To: Lute Net lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 10:14 PM Subject: [LUTE] Laurent de La Hyre Dear Jaroslav, You hook the gut on to one of the buttons of your coat to stabilise the lute while you are holding it. I seem to remember Mersenne mentioning it. See also Robert Spencer's article on the theorbo in Early Music. It is likely that Mouton is holding his lute this way in the famous picture of him. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -Original Message- From: Jaros^3aw Lipski [mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: 21 February 2009 18:06 To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre Oh, I've forgot 2 other interesting details. The frets are double (except last 2), made of a thin gut with knots on the treble side. Both theorbo and the lute on the table has a folded double piece of gut going in the middle of the back (longside). It starts from the end pin (which is visible on the theorbo) and ends on the white spot (glue?) close to the place where the body meets the neck. There is a loop attached to the long gut - maybe some sort of the system for keeping the instrument while playing. I don't think it served for hanging the instrument on the wall. They wouldn't waist such a long piece of gut for this purpose. I hang it with a very short piece of used string attached to the peg box. Best Jaroslaw -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Dear Dana, The reproduction doesn't show that detail particularly well because that area is very dark, but as far as I can remember it from the museum, the book stands on the table covered with some black fabric, and leaning against the basoon with the top end. Best wishes Jaroslaw - Original Message - From: dem...@suffolk.lib.ny.us To: lute List lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 6:01 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre I snuck a peek at the other stringed instrument in the picture (to the right, on the side table, partly hidden by music), perhaps a violin or viola. Curiously thick neck on it. Only the bass string is visible, gave me the impression of gut. Hmmm, speaking of that music, it was uprioght, perhaps this is evidence of music stands, something I have seen little evidence of before (only the ones fixed to the large table sene in the painting which adorned the cover of Munrow's book _Instruments of the Middles ages and Renaissance_; not certain of the title or artist, (style is highly realistic, parrots are depicted), possibly 'hearing' or 'senses'. -- Dana Emery To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
February 20th, 2009 Dear Lutenists: This painting is quite classically romantic . . . what if you could play a Lute with copper phosphorous wound strings? I had an Offman Lute/Guitar with copper strings but the neck broke and had to be repaired . . . however I must say I am very happy with the low resonant sound of the gut strings on my 6c Renaissance Lute, plays beautiful and haunting music. I was quite intrigued by this picture (I had some nude with Lute pictures taken in heavy shadow but my photographer was unreliable and would not deliver the photographs . . . so I hope to have them taken again). A great concert in the Lionel Groulx Metro today. Have a great weekend! with thanks, Rebecca Banks Tea at Tympani Lane Records [1]www.tympanilanerecords.com __ So many new options, so little time. [2]Windows Live Messenger. -- References 1. http://www.tympanilanerecords.com/ 2. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowslive/products/messenger.aspx To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
That is terrific painting, when you look at it really, really closely you can see that it is not reentrant. dt At 03:00 PM 2/20/2009, you wrote: The toy theorbo discussion reminded me the painting by Laurent de La Hyre I saw in Metropolitan museum (last month after my NY concert). It's called Allegory of music (1649) and shows the lady tuning rather not so big (at least in proportion to her body), single strung theorbo [1]http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/god4/ho_50.189.htm# or [2]http://tinyurl.com/conmfc . I wouldn't like however focus on toyness theme, which is very interesting btw, in spite we don't possess enough data to solve it now. What drew my attention when I saw it however (which is unfortunately not so visible on reproductions) were some small details. The whole painting is quite big 105.7 x 144.1 cm with fast colors and sharp contours so there can't be any ambiguity about it. Apart from slightly strange, flat bottom end, what makes one wonder is the stringing. The string color is very consistent from the bridge to the peg box (even the loose ends inside the peg box are of the same color so it can't be accidental). When you enter the hall and see the picture you have an impression that the theorbo is strung with copper wounds. Well, I am not suggesting it really was, but the tone color of the bass strings resembles copper quite a lot. There is another surprise: strings 1-5 look like ordinary gut, then 6th is copper-like, 7th (here, here) almost white (!) resembling silver wound, and 8-13 again copper color. Okay, so let's assume they were loaded, but then why the player wasn't consistent in the choice of basses? If they weren't wound or loaded so what are the other possibilities? Dyed? Maybe, but another interesting feature of the strings is the way they look at the bridge - the knots are tight (unusual for thick gut) so they had to be pretty elastic (low tension?). Then, obviously the painting process comes to mind which very often played the role of photography. La Hyre was known in Paris as a painter of a great number of portraits especially those of the principal dignitaries of the municipality and was called by Richelieu to the Palais Royal. In short we can rely on his paintings as a good source of information. So we are probably left with 3 possibilities: 1/ basses were dyed and the player picked 7th course from different manufacture 2/ La Hyre painted what he saw at that given moment - the white 7th string was put on after the original proper (loaded?) string had broken 3/ 7th string was made of some kind of substitute which the player consciously preferred to have on that course. Actually, 1 and 2 are most probable IMHO, however inconsistencies in string coloration can be found on paintings of some other masters as well. Any other ideas? Best Jaroslaw -- References 1. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/god4/ho_50.189.htm 2. http://tinyurl.com/conmfc To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre
Now THAT changes the whole damn ball game. What do we do now? (Actually, just you theorbo dudes- I'm strictly a toy boy.) That is terrific painting, when you look at it really, really closely you can see that it is not reentrant. dt -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
