On Oct 2, 2008, at 9:10 AM, Mathias Rösel wrote: > Lemme try to clarify this. Split sound is when the sounds of different > ensemble members do not blend, that's all.
> I think we can all agree by > and large with the following: I don't think the conclusions follow from the premises at all; indeed, I think the opposite conclusions can easily be drawn. > The medieval hofkapelle at the Burgundian court consisted of single > musicians who would do their best to get heard distinctly (the lute > being played with quills therefore). That's split sound (spaltklang). But there's no evidence of such a sound ideal other than the interpretation of later musicologists, is there? If other instruments are producing a treble-heavy sound, a lute player playing with a quill might just as well be trying to blend with them. Rhythm guitar players play with plectra today, but they rarely want to focus attention on their individual instrument. > As opposed to that, renaissance musicians preferred to play ensemble > music with families of instruments (flutes, viols, lutes) so as to > make > the music sound as though one big instrument was at work. That's not > split sound, it's merging sound (schmelzklang). > > Musicians of broken consorts usually played as single members of their > bands, trying to be heard as well as possible. Like in Burgundia, that > is split sound. It's an integral part of baroque rhetorics of music > (klangrede). Again, I think just the opposite is true. A viol player in a polyphonic consort needs to have his instrument and his line heard distinctly. The cittern player in a broken consort wants to blend with the pandora (and lute, if the lute isn't playing divisions). Orchestral oboes and violins in unision, and bassoons and cellos, are combining into a blended sound, as are the continuo instruments. > Orchestras from the Twenty-Four Violins of the King onward started > another development, viz. merging the sounds of several instruments of > the same type, and blending the sounds of groups of instruments (wood > wind, strings, brass etc), resulting in 19th century orchestra > aesthetics (mischklang). > > Surviving lute music dates from the renaissance through rococo > periods. > The HIP lute was a solo instrument, an ensemble instrument, but > never an > orchestra instrument. > So, one might argue that if lute players followed the general > aesthetics of their respective era, renaissance lute players probably > tried not to stand out when playing in ensemble, whereas later broken > consort lutenists would try to stand out as much as possible. > Which would explain why renaissance lutenists' propensity of playing > near the rose, and the shift from 1600 onward to the bridge. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
