Just my opinion and not based on anything other than experience; those who
made the switch in the Sixteenth-Century and beyond were already habituated
toward a right hand approach that attacks both strings. This is not the
case with a person coming at the Lute from the Guitar. The right hand on
the Guitar is concerned with a single contact point, in other words the
target is smaller. When switching to the Lute from this mind set it is
somewhat difficult to re-educate the fingers to strike both strings, and the
mind, to hear the difference and respond to it. I watch a lot of YouTube
videos and play particular attention, in close ups, as to whether both
strings in a course are engaged or whether only one string in a course is
activated. There are many occasions where I see the latter.
----- Original Message -----
From: <chriswi...@yahoo.com>
To: "Lute List" <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu>; "howard posner"
<howardpos...@ca.rr.com>; "morgan cornwall" <mcornw...@ns.sympatico.ca>
Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 10:55 PM
Subject: [LUTE] Re: should i learn thumb-under technique?
Morgan,
--- On Wed, 3/17/10, morgan cornwall <mcornw...@ns.sympatico.ca> wrote:
Question to all. If thumb-under assists in playing
the double courses simultaneously and without double
striking, how did the baroque lutenists (or Dowland for that
matter) avoid this problem when they switched to thumb-out?
Ah, a subject near and dear to my heart. Try thumb-under... if you want to
make your lute sound "dull and rotten" (Stobaeus) ;-) In all seriousness, I
would advise you to give it a serious try. The touch and feel is
considerably different than classical guitar style and you'll probably like
it. The majority of ren. players obviously used this technique and the
music they left to us responds well with it.
Thumb-out can also be made to work and two strings can be simultaneously
struck just as effectively as with thumb-under, but it is generally more
appropriate for music c.1600 and later. Also, thumb-out is NOT the same as
classical guitar technique: you'll have to spend a lot of time practicing
real lute thumb-out. As the quote from Stobaeus above suggests, it seems
the practitioners of thumb-out had a different tonal ideal in mind.
Chris
And thank you, Howard, for the comments.
----- Original Message ----- From: "howard posner"
<howardpos...@ca.rr.com>
To: "Lute List" <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 8:20 PM
Subject: [LUTE] Re: should i learn thumb-under technique?
On Mar 17, 2010, at 11:51 AM, morgan cornwall wrote:
> I would like to make the best use of the time I
have. Given my
> circumstances, would you recommend
that I learn thumb-under technique?
> Does it make more sense to use this
technique from the start, or should
> I focus on the other aspects of lute
technique? If I don't learn
> thumb-under from the get go, will
this just be more to unlearn later?
> Should I not even worry about using
thumb-under?
I remember some years ago, a lurker on the list named John
Dowland asked if he should change from thumb-under to
thumb-out technique, since everyone seemed to have been
switching, and he got a mixed bag of responses. I wish
I could forward them on to you, but it was more than 400
years ago and my email archives don't go back that
far; Stewart McCoy probably has them. I believe
Dowland made that change, or so Stobaeus tells us.
As for you, you should arrange your right hand so that it's
getting a full tone and not banging two strings of a course
together, which in turn involves striking the string from
the top, as if you're pushing them down toward the
soundboard. Your guitar technique will probably not
accomplish this. Resting the pinkie on the soundboard
is helpful in orienting the hand, so even if it feels odd at
first, you should try it. Experiment with whatever
works, and don't worry too much about where your thumb is,
unless it's interfering with your fingers.
My first lute teacher told me to try thumb-under for at
least a week or so, mostly to get me doing something
different from what I was used to, the theory being, I
suppose, that doing something farthest removed from my
established habits would minimize the transfer of
lute-inappropriate technique to the lute.
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