Two days ago I posted this message to the VIHUELA list. With a CC to the LUTE. I think it got lost in cyberspace. Probably because of the CC
Monica Hall wrote: > > The short answer to that is that what has survived in print is only a tip > > of the iceberg. And what is printed commercially reflects the economic > > situation at the time and place. Italy was apparently in economic > decline > > in the second half of the 17th century. Also it may have been that the > kind > > of songs which are included in these books had gone out of fashion rather > > than the manner of accompanying them. Surely this same is true of the > songs > > which don't have alfabeto? Economic situation yes, but the fact that almost no new material came out is telling. And indeed, the genre of self accompanied canzonette seems to have disappeared. Together with that, alfabeto probably has lost much of its attraction. > > The exercises in the books by Corbetta et al include examples showing > > which > > alfabeto chords match the the notes of the bass part e.g. The Regola per > > sonar sopra la parte on p.70 on Corbetta's are surely intended to help > > the > > player devise a strummed accompaniment. It is also self-evident that > > the > > accompaniments to the vocal pieces in Corbetta's Guitarre royale of 1671 > > are > > intended to be mostly strummed. Why else should he put the note values > > on > > the stave rather than above it? > > > The same is true of Matteis - the first lesson which Schollars ought to > > learn by heart - simply the standard chords and some of his > > accompaniments > > and exercises are mostly strummed. that on p.23 for example. I did not mean to say that the accompaniment of Matteis (and others) is without strumming. The idea is that once we refrain from playing battuto the guitar is much lower in volume and no longer a very practical companion in an instrumental ensemble. > >> However, some players may have been able to realize an accompaniment, > > >> departing from the bass (and losing considerably in volume, while > > >> plucking > > >> part of the harmonies). > > > Of course but that doesn't mean that they didn't vary the kind of > accompaniment which they provided. Matteis' manual is full of variation. But no all-battuto examples (even not the one on p. 23). I have been searching rather diligently for evidence for such a practice but no examples of purely strummed realization of figured bass from France or England come to mind. I do not consider Scaramouche, dancing with his guitar on the stage, as an example of BC. > > Note that he suggests that it should be used with the bass viol amongst > > > > other things............. Yes. It is 'his present design to make it company for other instruments'. With many plucked chords. Is there anything to confirm that this has lead to success? > > That is the point - the guitar is more suitable for accompanying the > voice > > or in small groups. I would agree with Martin today that the guitar is > > often added to the continuo groups inappropriately. And that is indeed a sort of an answer to my question: in how far does historical information support the modern practice of including the guitar (and all-battuto performance) in all different kinds of music? > > Murcia wasn't printed until 1714. The point is that they didn't need to > > include instructions on how to strum an accompaniment. Spaniards > didn't > > need this kind of instruction. Their objective was something different. > > There are large numbers of manuscripts with Castilian or Catalan cifras. Yes, the situation in Spain may have been different. Yet, for ensemble performance Sanz and de Murcia considered it necessary to learn to play a proper BC from a figured bass. In the Marin songs there is no strumming at all. Is there information about purely strummed accompaniment (from cifras or alfabeto) that was used in Spain in instrumental ensembles? I'm not so sure that Spaniards didn't need instructions on strumming an accompaniment. As we can learn from the many defective harmonies in Italian alfabeto songs, finding good harmonies in a composed repertoire (as opposed to the stock dance genres of the ruggiero, canario or ciaccona) was not everybody's skill. Lex To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
