G'day Daniel,
While others are fussing over facsimiles I'll have a go at your questions....
>1) What are the early signs that lute strings and frets need to be
>replaced? (short of the obvious
>late decomposition)
The 3 warning signs of an impending string change are
1) Your gut string is growing hair at some particular place. Actually
starting the unravelling dance. It may last a little while longer. You have
the choice of clipping it off w/ a sharp clipper (don't pull it--it will
just get worse!) or living w/ the duller sound. Usually this will cause
warning sign #2. Personally l prefer the duller sound for this very reason.
2) The intonation is going off. This means that while it may be in tune as
an open string its charactistics change a little sharp or flat at various
frets. A good test of this is to fret it at the 7th fret and then hit the
harmonic at the 7th fret. If it isn't the same note (give or take an
octave) then your string is "false" (--or your fret has wandered. To check
the your fret, measure the string length and make sure your fret is exactly
1/3 the distance from nut to bridge.)
This intonation problem is not limited to gut strings. Metal wound strings
can load up w/ finger grunge and even nylgut trebles may go funny after a
year or so.
3) It translates from an entity of one to a new life of two seperate entities.
>2) Anyone know the words or at least general meaning of "I can not keepe
>my wyfe at howme"? Is it
>that she drags me around to things I don't want to do or is she sleeping
>around?
Probably not the former but there's an honestly good chance she really is
just shoppynge all daie. The ballad tune that precedes it in the Margeret
Board book is "Howm againe Market is done". Are they related? A good
excuse? Doth she protest too much?
>3) I recently downloaded a wonderful piece by Vallet called Malsimmes. Any
>indication if this should
>be a slow or fast piece? It seems to work either way.
It's easy and tempting to get a running tempo until one sees the
unbelievably complex variations on it in the Pickering manuscript. Then you
must needs take it w/ a grain of salt and not a dash.
In the modern edition of NV's "Secrets des Muses" there is a very nice list
of other places where this tune shows up. One of the downsides of these
downloads is that one often misses out on these niceties and other secrets.
It takes a lifetime of keeping your eyes open (and, yes, a little cash) for
these books but it pays off. The SdM facsimile is available from the Dutch
Lute Society though the modern edition --published by CNRS-- contains the
nifty concordances.
>4) Any idea the story behind the name of Hans Judenkunig? Was he Jewish or
>does "king of the Jews"
>refer to Christ? I'm guessing he isn't behind the intabulations of the
>Dreydel song and Oseh Shalom
>in the pdf archives!
I wouldn't get too caught up in the names. I gather Luther nailed more
theses than lutes.
>5) For those of you who play Ren and Baroque, is it reasonable to learn
>both at the same time or does
>it make more sense to achieve a fairly high level of technique in one
>before switching to lessons
>exclusively on the other?
It's an awful lot of work and patience to learn even one. Back then one
learned only one at a time. Remember that there are wonderful composers of
equal caliber in each period.
>6) I notice that some Rennaisance tablature archives have the letters
>placed in the spaces and others
>have them on the lines. The few facsimilies I have seen seem to be only in
>the spaces. Are there
>different conventions?
Original prints exist using both. See Besard (1603), Adrianssen (1584 &
1592) and all the anthologies by Pierre Phalese (1546-1571) for very
legible lines through letters. And see the Vallet facsimiles for examples
of letters between lines.
all the best,
Sean Smith
