Thanks for the lovely pictures. I was speaking of the use of the cittern for chords and continuo, which was one of the primary uses for the instrument. All chordal instruments at the beginning of the 17th century were required to play the Marenzio Chord, which is not a chord but a third progression from G Major to E Major, or its relative transposition. Whether it is Dowland or Monteverdi, most of the music from this time has this progression, in fact, much of the music uses this particular progression as a key compositional element. The suggested tuning is one that is suitable for the Marenzio Chord, which is something a player would play every day, so as a practical matter one would have to have a G sharp or get a lot of cold stares. So basically, this is just a very simple way to play without tastini for basic repertory.
Because players used a transposing system, like movable Do, instead of a fixed system, the first fret does not occupy a pitch but a position in a transpositional hexachord, or, alternatively, a transpositional harmony for purely chordal music. In the position in which "mi-fa" in Dorian is sounded by the lowest string and the first fret, the "mi-fa" here in meantone is a major semitone (the biggest) and is proportionally echoed by the G sharp in fourth position. This allows the Marenzio chord to be sounded in pure meantone, which is a totally different sound. Using the fingering (top to bottom) in the proposed tuning 3 0 2 3 Then 4 2 2 0 We accordingly play the Marenzio chord in meantone with no doubled third and reinforcing the fifth against the sounding bass. This avoids doubling the third at cadences as well.. Although theorists allow for differences in temperaments, no one advocates substituting an A flat for a G sharp in pure meantone, because the sound is truly awful. Of course there are other solutions possible but this was the only one I could see that avoided doubling the third and using higher positions. Plus it sounds great! The last thing to consider is the transposition set of the ensemble. If the ensemble is reading down a tone, or third, or fourth, as is described in historical accounts, the Marenzio Chord would have to be adjusted according to the prevailing mode. Intabulated parts have fixed modal relationships; however, a good player can easily read the tablature in different keys, especially if it is just a set of chords. dt At 10:38 PM 11/11/2009, you wrote: > Hi David et al., > I'm not a regular member of the lute list these days, but I had to > rejoin for a while now that the cittern has surfaced here! (Yes, there > are spies everywhere...) I'd have expected a cittern post on the > cittern list, but I'm at least glad to see it is interesting enough to > be discussed on the lute forum. > Your post is interesting because, if I understand it correctly, it > comes from the assumption that the cittern was not normally fretted in > meantone, and hence you are exploring the theory of how/whether it can > be done. Something that should be noted, however, is that the 16th and > early 17th century cittern (as we understand it, based on surviving > instruments) was *always* fretted in meantone, usually something > approximating 1/6 to 1/5 comma. One can see this clearly from any of > the photos in the "old instruments" section on my site: > [1] > We also have a fair amount of information about the tuning, the most > common of which appears to be (as you mentioned) those with a top > course e', though there is some evidence for tone low, fourth low, > fifth low, and fourth high tunings. Regardless, all surviving > instruments (despite size differences) appear to have the same > arrangement of frets, including the large first fret. (For a diagram of > the fretting, see Peter Forrester's "Fretting notes" > http://cittern.theaterofmusic.com/articles/fretting.html ). > This raises the specter of your question: What's the deal with the > first fret, 3rd course, Ab? This is where one must flee the realm of > theory and look to the practical. Having examined nearly all of the > extant music for cittern (whether chromatic or diatonic, 4,5, or 6 > course, or "French" or "Italian" tuning), I can state that the 1st fret > on the 3rd course was simply rarely used! Oddly enough, when it was > (only a very small number of instances for both tunings, on the order > of you could count it on one hand with several fingers missing) it > appears as a part of an Emaj chord in which the Ab (instead of the > required G#) simply does not work [1st example French tuning, 2nd > Italian]: > -a- or -a- > -c- -c- > -b- -b- > -c- -a- > In these contexts, the chord even more rarely dwells on the note and > either quickly changes chord or adds a passing tone to something else. > From this we can conclude that either a) some citterns were fretted > with an alternate fret position for the 1st course 3rd fret, or b) some > citterns might not have been fretted in meantone, or c) that the > players just weren't that bothered by it. So far we have not discovered > proof of a) or b), and substantiating c) might be impossible. > At the end of the day, that citterns were commonly fretted in meantone > (as, it appears, were orpharions and, likely, bandoras) should raise > some questions for lute players about historical fretting practice for > lutes, especially those played in consort with wire instruments! > Best regards, > AMH > > Date: Tue, 10 Nov 2009 15:59:36 -0800 > To: "lute-cs.dartmouth.edu" <[email protected]> > From: David Tayler <[email protected]> > Subject: [LUTE] the cittern in meantone > Everyone loves the cittern. But suppose you want to play in > meantone? > Specifically, alternating major and minor semitones such as in > this > delicious photo? > [1] > [2]http://www.cittern.theaterofmusic.com/old/img_1600/34cm_citternsc > ale > .jpg > Let's look at a few possibilities. > The French 4 course tuning > aa'a' gg'g'd'd'e'e' > and the Italian > bbggd'd'e'e' > And let's assume this is tastini free--puh-leeze-- > Right away, we see the the G makes an A flat on the first fret of > both > tunings. Rats, shades of F minor. > And right away we see that the Italian tuning is no good because > there > is a both a B and a G. > But if we tune the French tuning up a fifth--and adjust the > strings-- > we get the pitch set > E D A B > Which gives the following scales > E F F# G G# A > D Eb E F F# G > A Bb B C C# D > B C C# D D# E > This gives good meantone for chords, and has both an E flat and a > D > sharp, although for solo music the the E on the top course is a > bit > high, this is mitigated by the the lowness of the open string. > For the Italian tuning, a single extra fret would help the G > sharp, as > it does on the baroque guitar. > dt > -- > References > 1. > [3]http://www.cittern.theaterofmusic.com/old/img_1600/34cm_citternsc > ale.jpg > To get on or off this list see list information at > [4]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html > > -- > >References > > 1. http://www.cittern.theaterofmusic.com/old/ > 2. http://www.cittern.theaterofmusic.com/old/img_1600/34cm_citternscale > 3. > http://www.cittern.theaterofmusic.com/old/img_1600/34cm_citternscale.jpg > 4. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
