Phalese wrote:
It is so amusing to hear Edin (in an interview for the DG Mag) say he
doesn't
think you have to read 30 books or be part of a lute cult to be able to play
the lute well. But I think that reading 30 books about the lute and being a
member of a lute society (which is I suppose
Dear All:
What I'm interested in is whether the next time one of us HIPsters does a
Dowland concert, any more people show up as a result of Sting stirring the
waters.
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on or off this list see list information at
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
Anyone had a look at the new EMS theorbo?
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on or off this list see list information at
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
Dear David and All:
I would say a larger body is more important, because it takes a critical
mass of top area to reproduce that bass note, sort of like a bass drum. That
is
one reason why many archlutes are deficient in the bass register, in my
opinion.
A luthier once showed me an archlute
Dear Dick and All:
Even more helpful, hasn't the Lute Society in England actually published a
volume of Piccinini and Kapsberger in French tab for 10-course lute?
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on or off this list see list information at
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
Dear Sterling and All:
My question on the Toccota is whether your transcription renders the opening
portion in octaves, as in the original organ version; or as a single line,
which would be much much easier to play, and as one guitar version I have seen
has it.
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on or
Dear Francesco and All:
Isn't there an inventory of the Maler workshop on his death indicating
several hundred lutes in various stages of construction? That would indicate a
lute
every few days. Perhaps his was not a typical operation and probably employed
many masters and apprentices, but it
Dear Rebecca:
Please forgive me if the following opinions appear rigid or overbearing:
Under no circumstances have the lute made with fixed metal frets!
1. It will severely diminish the resale value of the lute.
2. The fret height will not be adjustable.
3. Any repair or replacement would
Dear All:
I think what happens with diminishing fret diameters as they go up the neck
is that at some point the diminishment stops. That is, once you get to the
seventh fret, for example, the increasingly acute angle of the fretted string
means that one no longer has to graduate frets, so one
But if you slowly draw a bow and arrow and then release it, the arrow will
travel just as fast as if you drew it quickly. The initial addressing of the
string can be slow, but the stroke itself must be quick, like a mousetrap, or
touching a hot stove, as one teacher once put it. Beginning
Dear Luca and All:
I have a one-word answer for you:
Dowland.
True, most of Dowland can be played on a seven-course lute, but that eighth
course really comes in handy on a few of the fantasias.
Cheers,
Jim
p.s. Don't sell the lute! Or better still, sell it to me! 8^)
--
To get on or off
Dear Kenneth and All:
So it's not just me. For some reason I cannot abide the sound of nylgut, at
least on a lute that I am playing.
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on or off this list see list information at
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
Dear All:
Some organs may have been clumsy, but there is a playable organ in
Switzerland -- it's been recorded several times, including at least once by E.
Power
Biggs -- from before 1400 and it does not appear clumsy at all. Let's not sell
early craftsmen short!
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on
Dear Doctor Oakroot and All:
I must say I couldn't disagree more with what Dr. O has said about double
stringing. It almost sounds as if he hasn't played the lute much at all. All
the
theory in the world will fail to convince me that this very subtle effect
does not in fact make a huge
Dear all:
As this item was not written by Arthur Conan Doyle, it strikes me as
preposterous -- as bad as most Holmes pastiches (which would make it pretty
bad). It
takes Holmes out of the 19th century; his violin playing was never portrayed
as antiquarian.
On the other hand, Holmes was
You might see if lutemaker Jiri Cepelak is around. I think he's in the
Prague area. I have a nice (and reasonably priced) baroque lute that he made,
which
I've been playing a lot lately.
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on or off this list see list information at
Sad but true, most art history books would better be titled painting and
sculpture history books. A recent volume, The Renaissance In Rome has no
reference whatever to music. A book on Dresden in the baroque era does not
mention Weiss -- or any other musicians, as if the Dresden opera that
Dear Laura and All:
The AER Alpha I mentioned in an earlier posting was designed for acoustic,
steel-string guitars. It came with a set of guitar strings!
On a related topic, once I was playing at a reception with my Fender
Acoustasonic Jr., and a friend walked up and said, Hey, you're amp's
Dear All: Lately I've been using a Shure KSM 137 condenser microphone, which
seems to have several benefits. It's quite small, less than 6 inches long. It
tends to pick up only sounds directly in front of it, filtering out
background noise somewhat. It has a bass roll-off adjustment that helps
It could be that the frets are not seating properly. If the edges of the
fretboard come to a sharp point or are not beveled, sometimes it is difficult
for the fret to lie flat along the edge. This is especially a problem with the
larger frets one might use near the nut. The problem is
Dear Taco and All:
When Nigel played Vallet in a concert not long ago, he mentioned that he
thought his composition style ideal for a 10-course lute, a kind of paragon of
writing for that instrument. (I'm paraphrasing here, from memory, of course.)
So
that may explain in part his recording
For the 10-course lute, I would highly recommend Vallet. The solos are not
too hard, and there are enough of them that one could select the easier ones to
begin with. It's very nice use of all 10 courses, especially the tasteful and
refined use of the basses.
One could also play the soprano
Dear Manolo and All:
It's very easy to play renaissance guitar music on the six-course lute. Just
pretend there is no first string and no sixth course. One plus is that high
first-string positions can be played in a lower position on the otherwise
unused top string.
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on
I'm not fully convinced that Elizabeth really knew what she was doing. For
example, she castigated the heads of the English fleet for not boarding the
Spanish Armada and engaging them hand-to-hand -- the only thing that could have
saved the Spaniards and a likely route to disaster for the
Dear All: I would agree with Ed on the matter of octave stringing with
Palladino. For example, some of his chords utilize a fingered fourth course
when an
open third course would appear much easier to play, presumably to take
advantage of the octave to enrich the chord.
Cheers,
Jim
--
To
Dear Shaun:
A couple of thoughts:
A greater number of ribs enables the maker to build a flatter, less
simicircular back. I think the prevailing wisdom, going back to Baron (or
earlier), is
that a flatter back yields more projection of tone and emphasizes the higher
end; a rounder back
Dear All: If the instrument will have frets, I would call it a lute. If not,
it's still al ud. the frets, I think, are the crucial thing. Fretted Middle
Eastern instruments do exist, of course, but with a completely different
fretting system.
Cheers,
Jim
--
To get on or off this list see list
Dear All: I'm back on the list. Interested parties may contact me at the
above address.
Cheers,
Jim Stimson
--
To get on or off this list see list information at
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
28 matches
Mail list logo
