Certainly good points. However, a renaissance musician used a transposing system, therefore they did not transpose in the modern sense because they were already transposing. Although there is not a handy modern analogy, unless you play the bass clarinet, it would be like saying a person who was sight-singing using "moveable Do" instead of "fixed Do" should use "moveable Do". They would say, I always use "moveable Do," what do you mean?
(Substitute "moveable Ut" if you are a purist, although Ut is by definition moveable) The most difficult part about renaissance theory--aside from the Formschneider codex--is that the lute is currently in a "fixed Do" space, but historically was in the "moveable Do" space: "G Lute" = fixed Do space "Lute in Sol" = moveable Do space Does it matter? Sure thing! Endless confusion otherwise about keys, pitch, performance, etc. dt At 11:53 AM 7/20/2009, you wrote: >A practical musician wiil use a practical tuning. >In the sense that a certain lute will sound right for certain >repertoire when tuned to a certain pitch with the appropriate strings. >When playing in an ensemble with other tuneable instruments one has >to come to an an agreement on which pitch to use. >When playing with fixed pitch instruments one will have to either >cancel the gigg, or transpose or play another size of lute. >All this is very much in accordance with "ye oulde practice" > >LvS > >Op 20 jul 2009, om 20:14 heeft David Tayler het volgende geschreven: > >>Terms like "alto lute" or "alto viol" are periodically floated and >>usually do not gain traction, however, this is simply a modern >>terminology phenomenon. >>Alto recorder did very well; on the other hand, male alto--now >>replaced by the more resplendent sounding "countertenor"--has pretty >>much disappeared. >> >>Several professional archlute players changed the name of their >>instruments from "archlute" to "theorbo" when the theorbo became more >>in demand from the hiring point of view--they didn't change >>instruments, just names. >>At one point, when it looked like "arciliuto" might gain traction, >>several changed to "arciliuto", then back again to "archlute" and >>"theorbo". You can see the trail reflected in CD liner notes. >>I sort of liked "arciliuto" myself--more historical and with that >>international flair. Does not rhyme with "hirsute" as well. >> >>And of course Shakespeare's famous line "a rose by any other name >>would smell as sweet" was originally "a rose by any other word", >>which avoids the careless repetition of the "word name": >> >>What's in a name? That which we call a Rose >>By any other Word would smell as sweet. >> >> >>dt >> >> >> >> >>To get on or off this list see list information at >>http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html >
