Peter Martin wrote:
> If playing this polyphonic music on lute consort was standard in the 15th
> century, then it was a huge evolutionary (and technical!) leap to put it
> onto a solo instrument. Any ideas on how the process happened? Was there a
> sudden leap forward in playing standards at the end of the 15th century? A
> new age of the virtuoso, a switch from amateur to professional players?
>
>
Peter, I don't think this is right at all. Keith Polk has uncovered
accounts of payments to professional lute duos in fifteenth century Germany.
There are hundreds of accounts of payments. Professional lute duos must
have been commonplace - at least in Germany and maybe elsewhere too.
The most famous lute player of the fifteenth century, Pietrobono, was a
plectrum player (made of ivory). He was famed for his virtuosity. He too
played in the context of a lute duo (or plucked intrument duo).
Tinctoris mentions these professional lute duos ("associati") in 1482.
I think that many of the lute tablatures from 1507 onwards were aimed at
an amateur market.
The change was not from amateur to professional but from plectrum style
playing to fingerstyle playing. The ability to play more than one line
at a time on a single lute doesn't require virtuosity. It all depends on
the music.
> Also, Stewart, you have hit the nail on the head about tablature vs staff
> notation. Tablature is frequently treated by non-lute playing musicologists
> as a simplified system of notation, inferior to staff notation, suitable for
> amateurs, and with the implication that the music itself is at an amateur
> level. This is completely the wrong way round: actually, tablature implies
> musical complexity. As well as being practical to read, it neatly sidesteps
> a lot of the problems found when trying to render complex solo music into
> staff notation. For an entertaining account of the staff notation
> challenge, see Matanya Ophee's article in The Lute, 2003.
>
> P
>
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