"howard posner" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> schrieb: > > 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? Admittedly, there are no 15th century recordings available, as far as I know, but perhaps we may consider a) surviving written music and b) iconographic material as evidence. Pictures show single instruments (harps, fiddles, lutes, flutes), playing together with singers. Surviving ars nova music, when executed with instruments so distinct, leaves no chance to merge or blend. Only once you execute the music with families of instruments, e. g. lute ensemble, sounds blend. (Cf. Jon Banks, Music for Lute Consort c.1500, available from the Lute Society, see http://www.lutesoc.co.uk/DavidVanEdwards/pubpics/Lute%20trios%201.jpg ) Yet that's not what we see on related pictures. > 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. How can he / she, playing his / her own part? > Rhythm guitar players play with plectra today, but they > rarely want to focus attention on their individual instrument. No such thing like rhythm lutes in medieval ensemble music, or baroque for that matter, as far as I can see. > > 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). Again, how can he / she (cittern), playing his / her own part? > Orchestral oboes and violins in unision, and bassoons and cellos, are > combining into a blended sound, as are the continuo instruments. As I said, orchestras started another development, viz. merging the sounds of several instruments. Still in baroque orchestras it's all about distinct parts to be heard, speaking to each other, not glidingly changing sound colours of the whole sound body like in 19th and early 20th centuries orchestra music. But let's omit orchestras, the lute not being an orchestra instrument. Mathias > > 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
