Hello Cyril and welcome to the lutelist!
Some people start by putting a capo and tuning 3rd to F# on the guitar, but
the proper lute is a completely different beast. At first the double courses
can be daunting and require a different approach to striking than the guitar
to sound well. Roughly thumb-in for Renaissance, and thumb-out for Baroque.
There has been talk of making a FAQ page for people like you, but I doubt
that its been done yet.
Here FWIW is a quick and short answer.
A good place where to begin is the mother of all lutepages, Wayne Cripps'
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute/lute.html
and the English Lute Society
http://www.lutesoc.co.uk/pages/thinking-of-taking-up-the-lute
Also the Lute Society of America has much educational stuff
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~lsa/
See f. ex. Martin Shepherd's page
http://www.luteshop.co.uk/firstlute.htm
and (for links) Ed Durbrow's
http://www9.plala.or.jp/edurbrow/
You should check the links to the different lute societies and also google:
lute podcast
lute facsimiles
lute tablatures
etc...
There are many good lute tutors. Diana Poulton, Stefan Lundgren and Andrea
Damiani for Renaissance and Stefan Lungren (11 course) Satoh (13 course) and
others for Baroque.
The best way, I think is to just start searching by yourself. You'll readily
find more than enough to digest.
Good Luck in your quest and best wishes!
G.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Cyril Kríz" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2011 3:47 PM
Subject: [LUTE] Overview of old music - beginner question
Hello, I'm new to this lute discussion and I'm from Czech Republic.
Sorry for my bad english.
Now my question (I'm very sorry if this subject was discussed
already...): I'm thinking to buy a lute and start to learn it (I'm
guitar player - CG and electric), because I love its sound and also I
love old music. Every time I hear it I immediately feel that this music
has something almost magical inside (otherwise I like many genres of
music, including modern subgenres of metal, experimental electronic,
chiptunes etc.). The problem is that I'm the beginner and I don't know
what exactly is "typical music" of 16th, 17th, 18th century, Italian,
French music, what lute music is typical for Germany, England... So I
cannot judge which old music is my favourite and it means I don't know
which lute to buy. Intuitively I feel that ideal lute could be 7 course
rennaisance lute, but I'm not sure. Is there any way to get some
overview of whole lute music across the centuries? I mean, for example
any web page with short mp3 examples of every period in lute music? Or
any "educational" compilation on CD? Or something like that... Because
there is so much music that I don't know where to start exploring it...
I want to find my favourite genre of lute music so I can tell it to my
luthier and he/she can build me a lute which is ideal for my chosen
music. . I hope I say it clearly (again, sorry for my english). Thank
you very much for your suggestions and I wish you all a nice day,
Cyril
(from Prag)
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