[VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence
While Sanseverino tells us better not to use the guitar for plucking (in 1620, when alfabeto was the standard notation) we can suppose that he heard players doing that. Alfabeto is a form of shorthand. You can't have a system of shorthand which everyone interprets as they wish. Chord notation (in cifras and alfabeto) was very successful for at least half a century. It's indeed a very practical type of shorthand, but to me it seems odd to suppose that no player would ever have thought of the theoretical implications. I mean, how can you find the chords to a song if you have no idea of counterpoint and voice-leading at all. Perhaps a naive (singer-)guitarist would just have performed it thoughtlessly. And again - in French tablature the chords are written out in full - no ambiguity. Why assume that Italian players did anything different. Guitar music in French tablature is rather later. Chord notation in French tablature seems highly ambiguous to me, with regard to open strings. We have discussed this at length here and could not reach agreement. As far as the alfabeto song books are concerned the little information we have does seem to indicate that the guitar was not intended to reproduce the bass line etc. but just strummed the basic chords. It is an anachronism to do anything much more elaborate than that if what you are trying to is to re-create the ambience in which they were first performed. I could sum up several other things that would spoil the ambience for me, like improvising far out of the box of modality, accompaniment with18th c (or 21st c...) tonal harmony, poppy syncopations etc. The result of leaving out the 5th c bourdon is not inconsistent with the general style of the time. We, as well-informed hardliners, reach different conclusions as to whether this could possibly have been done by a guitarist in the 1620s or 30s. I would prefer to take in account that an experienced theorbist-guitarist would perhaps have tried to expand the system of alfabeto from within. I don't see alfabeto as a completely rigid system, mainly for amateurs, without any relation to the developments that were going on in the sphere of basso continuo or solo music. We can assume that the guitar was used as well by singers and composers such as Falconieri, Marini, Berti and Milanuzzi, who were often trained in church music, on instruments like the organ or the lute. This is music from the latter days of the alfabeto song repertoire, when the genre was at its height. At the same time the paradigm of the guitar as an instrument of chord strumming was losing ground. Lex To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence
Dear Lex, You write '.how can you find the chords to a song if you have no idea of counterpoint and voice-leading at all...' . Surely this is why a such a basically simple chordal instrument is so popular even today - once you've mastered a few chords and have a reasonable ear you're ready to tackle the mainly straightforward repertoire of songs alfabeto was used for. Of course, odd clashes would have occurred occasionally which is why more than just a few alfabeto chords are used in some songs. But I wonder how much it mattered to the 'non-expert' player that a passing dissonance which was soon resolved was not slavishly harmonised. And again you write ' I would prefer to take in account that an experienced theorbist-guitarist would perhaps have tried to expand the system of alfabeto from within'.But surely when looking at most simple alfabeto accompaniments we are not speaking of these expert practitioners but the more general strumming public who may not have been up to improvising more than the basic three tonal chords Finally if you've ever performed Cesare Morelli's (Pepys guitar teacher) arrangement of 'To be or not to be' (an experience of novelty rather than artistic merit I can tell you) from the later 17th century you'd not rush to suggest strumming to songs was little employed by then - little written down maybe. And Morelli, supposedly a 'professional' of sorts often gets the harmonisations 'wrong' rgds M. --- On Wed, 17/11/10, Lex Eisenhardt eisenha...@planet.nl wrote: From: Lex Eisenhardt eisenha...@planet.nl Subject: [VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence To: Vihuelalist vihuela@cs.dartmouth.edu Date: Wednesday, 17 November, 2010, 13:33 While Sanseverino tells us better not to use the guitar for plucking (in 1620, when alfabeto was the standard notation) we can suppose that he heard players doing that. Alfabeto is a form of shorthand. You can't have a system of shorthand which everyone interprets as they wish. Chord notation (in cifras and alfabeto) was very successful for at least half a century. It's indeed a very practical type of shorthand, but to me it seems odd to suppose that no player would ever have thought of the theoretical implications. I mean, how can you find the chords to a song if you have no idea of counterpoint and voice-leading at all. Perhaps a naive (singer-)guitarist would just have performed it thoughtlessly. And again - in French tablature the chords are written out in full - no ambiguity. Why assume that Italian players did anything different. Guitar music in French tablature is rather later. Chord notation in French tablature seems highly ambiguous to me, with regard to open strings. We have discussed this at length here and could not reach agreement. As far as the alfabeto song books are concerned the little information we have does seem to indicate that the guitar was not intended to reproduce the bass line etc. but just strummed the basic chords. It is an anachronism to do anything much more elaborate than that if what you are trying to is to re-create the ambience in which they were first performed. I could sum up several other things that would spoil the ambience for me, like improvising far out of the box of modality, accompaniment with18th c (or 21st c...) tonal harmony, poppy syncopations etc. The result of leaving out the 5th c bourdon is not inconsistent with the general style of the time. We, as well-informed hardliners, reach different conclusions as to whether this could possibly have been done by a guitarist in the 1620s or 30s. I would prefer to take in account that an experienced theorbist-guitarist would perhaps have tried to expand the system of alfabeto from within. I don't see alfabeto as a completely rigid system, mainly for amateurs, without any relation to the developments that were going on in the sphere of basso continuo or solo music. We can assume that the guitar was used as well by singers and composers such as Falconieri, Marini, Berti and Milanuzzi, who were often trained in church music, on instruments like the organ or the lute. This is music from the latter days of the alfabeto song repertoire, when the genre was at its height. At the same time the paradigm of the guitar as an instrument of chord strumming was losing ground. Lex To get on or off this list see list information at [1]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence
Dear Martyn, You write '.how can you find the chords to a song if you have no idea of counterpoint and voice-leading at all...' . Surely this is why a such a basically simple chordal instrument is so popular even today - once you've mastered a few chords and have a reasonable ear you're ready to tackle the mainly straightforward repertoire of songs alfabeto was used for. Our ready ear is very much influenced/spoiled by functional harmony, I'm afraid. I suppose it went wrong so often (then) because the trick of finding the appropriate harmonies was to add 'middle voices' to a bass and soprano. Of course, odd clashes would have occurred occasionally which is why more than just a few alfabeto chords are used in some songs. But I wonder how much it mattered to the 'non-expert' player that a passing dissonance which was soon resolved was not slavishly harmonised. True, but I was thinking of the expert player. And again you write ' I would prefer to take in account that an experienced theorbist-guitarist would perhaps have tried to expand the system of alfabeto from within'.But surely when looking at most simple alfabeto accompaniments we are not speaking of these expert practitioners but the more general strumming public who may not have been up to improvising more than the basic three tonal chords If we are trying to figure out what was possibly done in the 1620s and 30s, to reach an optimal performance of the most beautiful songs, respecting the ambience they were performed in, then we should not only think of what the general strumming public did. That could of course also be interesting information (for a gig in 17th c costume). Finally if you've ever performed Cesare Morelli's (Pepys guitar teacher) arrangement of 'To be or not to be' (an experience of novelty rather than artistic merit I can tell you) from the later 17th century you'd not rush to suggest strumming to songs was little employed by then - little written down maybe. And Morelli, supposedly a 'professional' of sorts often gets the harmonisations 'wrong' No, but I've done Stairway to heaven, does that count? Lex -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence
Well, stairway to heaven brings up an interesting issue of music, and that's imitation. How many kids learned that old saw without having a clue of what they were doing? (I can name one for certain...) To ask it a bit more politely, how often is theory invoked to explain what we already imitate anyway? And so even the more educated players -- certainly those of today, but why not those back then -- have nothing against merely imitating a phrase or a piece, and maybe digesting the theoretical implications later. Or to consider it at yet another level, how much of the striving and arriving at the optimal beauty for a piece was a product of imitation, slight mutation, and a statement that is itself imitated. It's wonderful to think that all of art music's development was theoretical and pure, and never sullied by the iterative cycles of cultural acceptance we ascribe to folk and ethnic music. Somehow I'm not convinced. But you thankfully give the reminder that our ears are already trained to accept a harmonic orientation that didn't necessarily exist in the early Baroque. So without the benefit of theoretical underpinnings, what could the criteria have been for mutation and evolution? I see a happy tension between these issues. cud __ From: Lex Eisenhardt eisenha...@planet.nl To: Vihuelalist vihuela@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wed, November 17, 2010 9:42:03 AM Subject: [VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence Dear Martyn, You write '.how can you find the chords to a song if you have no idea of counterpoint and voice-leading at all...' . Surely this is why a such a basically simple chordal instrument is so popular even today - once you've mastered a few chords and have a reasonable ear you're ready to tackle the mainly straightforward repertoire of songs alfabeto was used for. Our ready ear is very much influenced/spoiled by functional harmony, I'm afraid. I suppose it went wrong so often (then) because the trick of finding the appropriate harmonies was to add 'middle voices' to a bass and soprano. Of course, odd clashes would have occurred occasionally which is why more than just a few alfabeto chords are used in some songs. But I wonder how much it mattered to the 'non-expert' player that a passing dissonance which was soon resolved was not slavishly harmonised. True, but I was thinking of the expert player. And again you write ' I would prefer to take in account that an experienced theorbist-guitarist would perhaps have tried to expand the system of alfabeto from within'.But surely when looking at most simple alfabeto accompaniments we are not speaking of these expert practitioners but the more general strumming public who may not have been up to improvising more than the basic three tonal chords If we are trying to figure out what was possibly done in the 1620s and 30s, to reach an optimal performance of the most beautiful songs, respecting the ambience they were performed in, then we should not only think of what the general strumming public did. That could of course also be interesting information (for a gig in 17th c costume). Finally if you've ever performed Cesare Morelli's (Pepys guitar teacher) arrangement of 'To be or not to be' (an experience of novelty rather than artistic merit I can tell you) from the later 17th century you'd not rush to suggest strumming to songs was little employed by then - little written down maybe. And Morelli, supposedly a 'professional' of sorts often gets the harmonisations 'wrong' No, but I've done Stairway to heaven, does that count? Lex -- To get on or off this list see list information at [1]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- References 1. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/%7Ewbc/lute-admin/index.html
[VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence
Our ready ear is very much influenced/spoiled by functional harmony, I'm afraid. I suppose it went wrong so often (then) because the trick of finding the appropriate harmonies was to add 'middle voices' to a bass and soprano. I think you are mistaken here because throughout the 16th century general practice was to add contrapuntal parts to a tenor voice. The shift to working from the bass took place at the beginning of the 17th century. The practice of basso continuo was new and not well established at the time many of these songs were composed. It started off as a way of creating a keyboard accompaniment to mainly polyphonic works. Underlying this discussion is the idea that it is somehow inferior or amateurish to accompany the songs in this way. This in my view shows a lack of historical insight and sensitivity to changes taking place at the time. A kind of 21st century superior and censorious attitude to what people did in the past. Triadic harmony was new, original, exciting and in tune with other developments taking place at the time i.e. accompanied monody. The guitar was ideally suited to be part of this change and certainly contributed to developments in harmonic thinking. It is of its time. It is not helpful to suggest that the harmonic language of alfabeto is somewhat one-dimensional. This is a bit like saying that Wagner's music is superior to that of Mozart because he used larger forces and more complex and colourful harmony. An evolutionary view of musical history which went out of fashion in England years ago. If we are trying to figure out what was possibly done in the 1620s and 30s, to reach an optimal performance of the most beautiful songs, respecting the ambience they were performed in, then we should not only think of what the general strumming public did. No.. we should think about what writers at the time said about what they were trying to achieve. I have already quoted Marini and Milanuzzi who presumably prepared their own books for the press and indicate that they thought it was necessary and satisfactory to suggest a different way of accompanying on the guitar.Do you think they were writing for the general strumming public - if indeed such a public existed. That could of course also be interesting information (for a gig in 17th c costume). Your views seem to coloured by the need to please a 21st century audience. This is understandable but if we are trying to understand what these songs meant to people in the past and what gave them pleasure we should leave our personal prejudices at the door. Monica Finally if you've ever performed Cesare Morelli's (Pepys guitar teacher) arrangement of 'To be or not to be' (an experience of novelty rather than artistic merit I can tell you) from the later 17th century you'd not rush to suggest strumming to songs was little employed by then - little written down maybe. And Morelli, supposedly a 'professional' of sorts often gets the harmonisations 'wrong' No, but I've done Stairway to heaven, does that count? Lex -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence
30s. I would prefer to take in account that an experienced theorbist-guitarist would perhaps have tried to expand the system of alfabeto from within. There was no need for them to expand the system of alfabeto from within. The experienced theorbist-guitarist could use lute tablature for this purpose. music. We can assume that the guitar was used as well by singers and composers such as Falconieri, Marini, Berti and Milanuzzi, who were often trained in church music, on instruments like the organ or the lute. I have already pointed out that Marini and Milanuzzi did seem to think that the guitar had fewer consonances etc... And Sanseverino and Montesardo were both trained church musicians. This is music from the latter days of the alfabeto song repertoire, when the genre was at its height. At the same time the paradigm of the guitar as an instrument of chord strumming was losing ground. It never lost ground. It was still alive and well and living in Italy until well into the 18th century. It is just that the idea of what was possible expanded to include lute style counterpoint. Wagner is not superior to Mozart. You may not be in sympathy with earlier ways of doing things but that is no reason for heaping scorn on those of us who are. Monica To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence
That is not true. Renaissance bass patterns certainly predate 17th century. RT - Original Message - From: Monica Hall mjlh...@tiscali.co.uk To: Lex Eisenhardt eisenha...@planet.nl Cc: Vihuelalist vihuela@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Wednesday, November 17, 2010 12:13 PM Subject: [VIHUELA] Re: Valdambrini's evidence Our ready ear is very much influenced/spoiled by functional harmony, I'm afraid. I suppose it went wrong so often (then) because the trick of finding the appropriate harmonies was to add 'middle voices' to a bass and soprano. I think you are mistaken here because throughout the 16th century general practice was to add contrapuntal parts to a tenor voice. The shift to working from the bass took place at the beginning of the 17th century. The practice of basso continuo was new and not well established at the time many of these songs were composed. It started off as a way of creating a keyboard accompaniment to mainly polyphonic works. Underlying this discussion is the idea that it is somehow inferior or amateurish to accompany the songs in this way. This in my view shows a lack of historical insight and sensitivity to changes taking place at the time. A kind of 21st century superior and censorious attitude to what people did in the past. Triadic harmony was new, original, exciting and in tune with other developments taking place at the time i.e. accompanied monody. The guitar was ideally suited to be part of this change and certainly contributed to developments in harmonic thinking. It is of its time. It is not helpful to suggest that the harmonic language of alfabeto is somewhat one-dimensional. This is a bit like saying that Wagner's music is superior to that of Mozart because he used larger forces and more complex and colourful harmony. An evolutionary view of musical history which went out of fashion in England years ago. If we are trying to figure out what was possibly done in the 1620s and 30s, to reach an optimal performance of the most beautiful songs, respecting the ambience they were performed in, then we should not only think of what the general strumming public did. No.. we should think about what writers at the time said about what they were trying to achieve. I have already quoted Marini and Milanuzzi who presumably prepared their own books for the press and indicate that they thought it was necessary and satisfactory to suggest a different way of accompanying on the guitar.Do you think they were writing for the general strumming public - if indeed such a public existed. That could of course also be interesting information (for a gig in 17th c costume). Your views seem to coloured by the need to please a 21st century audience. This is understandable but if we are trying to understand what these songs meant to people in the past and what gave them pleasure we should leave our personal prejudices at the door. Monica Finally if you've ever performed Cesare Morelli's (Pepys guitar teacher) arrangement of 'To be or not to be' (an experience of novelty rather than artistic merit I can tell you) from the later 17th century you'd not rush to suggest strumming to songs was little employed by then - little written down maybe. And Morelli, supposedly a 'professional' of sorts often gets the harmonisations 'wrong' No, but I've done Stairway to heaven, does that count? Lex -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
