As Lex has drawn attention to his web site presumably he is inviting comment upon it.
It is only reasonable to point out that most of what he says is supposition, unsupported by any evidence and some of it is inaccurate.. 1. Very few Italian books give any indication as to whether or not the 4th and 5th courses were strung in octaves. Those that do are Montesardo, Sanseverino and Foscarini in the introduction to Il primo, secondo e terzo libro (ca.1629) reproduced in subsequent editions of the books. I have not seen Banfi or Pesori, but will take Lex's word for it. It should be emphasized however that many Italian books are just re-hashed versions of earlier books, including introductory information. Even Foscarini has taken some of his introduction from Colonna. Some of the information is of questionable value. 2. The tuning charts which Lex refers to are the same as the example from Foscarini, but none of the other books includes Foscarini's octave check. The suggestion that this type of tuning chart should most likely be understood as an instruction to compare courses in unisons is bending the evidence to support a particular point of view. Taken literally they imply no treble strings on the 4th and 5th courses. It would be more honest to admit that they are ambiguous and cannot therefore be regarded as evidence in favour of one method or another. However, I should point out that the tuning check at the beginning of the scordatura pieces in Corbetta's 1648 book (p.58) if interpreted as unisons indicates a re-entrant tuning and the instructions for tuning 4 guitars of different sizes to play together in his 1639 book imply only treble strings on the 4th and 5th courses. He is just as likely to have used the re-entrant tuning for his early work. 3. The fact that only Valdambrini's two guitar books explicitly describe the re-entrant tuning and that they were printed in Rome proves nothing at all. We have no way of telling how representative of contemporary practice surviving books are. It is impossible to say how widely the re-entrant tuning was used in Italy. Bartolotti's "Lettere tagliate" do not indicate the tuning with a low A string. They are actually when passing notes are introduced between the chords. Alternative symbols are given for the chords G (F major) P (F minor), and F (E major) from which the note on the fifth course, the fifth of the chord is to be omitted, but not for + (E minor), C (D major) or E (D minor), which are also six-four chords. This is because of a difference in the left hand fingering. They are really just a convenient shorthand device to save the trouble of writing out different chords in full. 4. Valdambrini's books also include sections of instructions for accompanying a bass line which are no different from those of Corbetta and other Italian books. There is evidence that different methods of stringing were used for accompanying and the bass line would in any case have been supplied by another instrument. 5. Few people would now regard the comment on stringing in the Italian preface to La guitarre royale as uncertain or as indicating anything other than that a low octave or bourdon should be put on the 4th course which was usually strung without one - that is to the re-entrant tuning. There are several other sources besides de Vis�e and Carr� which clearly refer to this method of stringing. "Picciol" refers to the quality or guage of the string to be used for the bourdon. The most likely scenario is that this was the method of stringing preferred by Corbetta and adopted by his younger French contemporaries. 6. La Guitarre royale is not the first book Corbetta published after twenty-three years. He had published at least two, possible three other books between 1648 and 1671 which have not survived, although much of his music which has survived in the Gallot manuscript and the manuscripts copied by Jean-Baptiste de Castillion is probably from these missing books. 7. Finally Corbetta left Italy in about 1650 and spent the rest of his life in England and in France. Much of the music in Guitarre royale is dedicated to different members of the English royal family (the book itself is dedicated to Charles II) and would have been composed between 1660-1670 whilst Corbetta was living in England. One must assume that Corbetta was already using the "French" tuning by this time even though it is not mentioned in print until 1671. Not surprisingly this is the tuning mentioned in English sources. I haven't read the second part of Lex's article yet, but I've probably bored everyone to tears already! Cheers Monica ----- Original Message ----- From: Lex Eisenhardt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, September 19, 2003 8:12 AM > > Dear Luto's > > I uploaded some parts of an long paper to a new, provisory website. I did not find the time to learn HTML yet..... > > L:\> > > > The Secret of Francesco Corbetta's notation. > Look at: > http://home.planet.nl/~eisen073/ > > > > >
