At 12:01 PM 7/8/2005, Arthur Ness wrote: >What has confused many is >that in treble clef, the lute sounds an octave lower. I >think these days this is accepted, whereas earlier >O'Dette and others proposed a small lute to play an >octave higher than the usual instrument. I think Paul >now agrees that the works are for the usual lute, >sounding an octave lower than written.
For Mr. O'Dettes old Hyperion recording of the Vivaldi works, he played all with the mandolino but RV 540. The works that specified "leuto," he played with the fingers, and those that specified mandolino he played with a plectrum. I asked him about this when he played with a baroque orchestra in Cleveland a couple years ago. I got the excessively terse and truncated answer, but, in essence, he has recanted; he plays the "mandolino" works on mandolino (unfortunately, still with a nylon guitar pick by Jim Dunlop), but plays the works to designate "leuto" on archlute. Best, Eugene To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
