Very interesting question.
Use of the third finger in renaissance music may not be quite as common
as we tend to think. Dalza and Hans Newsidler, for example, didn't use
it at all, if the evidence of their printed music is anything to go by.
I wonder how Kapsberger played his lute music? For the chitarrone he
says you must place the third and fourth fingers on the soundboard and
keep them there.
Even when there are chords of four notes, it is not safe to assume the
third finger was used. For example I find I am sometimes tempted (for
reasons of sonority) to play c2d3c4a5 using the thumb for the lowest two
notes so that I can use the second finger on the top note. Perhaps some
16th century players did the same.
Robinson (1603) explicitly advises the use of the third finger in a
"modern" way, even though he also advocates "thumb-inside" technique.
Obviously different people did different things, perhaps even more than
we do today.
I would be interested to see examples (big chords, for example) from the
French repertoire which are typically played these days using the third
finger but which would have been played differently using only thumb,
middle, index. I haven't explored this music enough to have any choice
examples to offer myself.
Martin
On 24/02/2013 21:10, [email protected] wrote:
It is my understanding that the french baroque lute players/composers did not
use the third finger of the right hand to sound any strings, limiting only to
thumb, first and second fingers, but clearly the third finger was widely used
in earlier renaissance music, and again in later baroque lute music. Does
anyone know what prompted this change in technique (or am I wrong in my
statement). From what I've read, it seems that the french school was well
enmeshed with a very philosophical approach to the instrument and to music. I
was wondering if there was a philosophical reason perhaps to avoid using the
third finger?
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