Dear Bruno,
I own a guitar made by Mario Gropp and a vihuela by Alexander
Batov and
am very happy with both instruments. I also had a Liuto Forte for
several years, which I unfortunately had to sell for financial
reasons.
I miss that beautiful instrument a lot.
First of all, it is a wonderful instrument in its own right, so I
estimated it highly such as I estimate my guitar and my vihuela.
There
is no need to compare any of these instruments on the cost of the
others - every of these has something the others have not and the
other
way around, which is trivial of course but has to be told to
purists of
any sort. Recently I've had the privilege to host Andre Burguete who
invented the instrument. It was pure joy to hear him fill the house
with his beautiful and tasteful playing, still a wonderful
memory. He
plays with nails but recently developed a playing technique somewhat
different from Segovia style to serve the possibilities of the Liuto
Forte best.
So most importantlyl, the instruments of the Liuto Forte family are
beautifully crafted and sound beautiful. In that respect they can
only
be praised highly. Really highly, to my humble judgment.
If you have to classify the sound of a Liuto Forte on a scale
between
early music lute (or vihuela, if you like) on one end and the
guitar on
the other end, it would certainly be closer to the guitar than to
the
early music lute or vihuela, while you can shift the position
closer to
early music instruments when you play the Liuto Forte without nails.
But to leave it with that one-dimensional judgment of sound
characteristics would not really do justice to the instrument.
It has to be said that the Liuto Forte has an astonishing range and
variability of sound characteristics which can neither be covered
by a
modern guitar nor by a lute. When played with nails, the strings
feel
somewhat softer than guitar strings and can be played with less
force.
This is no wonder as string tension is lower than on a guitar.
Overall,
to my impression a Liuto Forte sounds more transparent, which serves
polyphony. This is particularly so in the bass range where a guitar
often (or probably usually) sounds somewhat "thick" and "too strong"
while a Liuto Forte has more clarity here as well as a better
balance
between bass and treble in my judgment. Not to forget the
possibilities
that open up with the enlarged bass range and the variability made
possible by the family of instruments.
One may well say, the lute family is all one needs and be happy with
this. I have nothing to say against such a stance except that
this is
only spoken from a certain taste and viewpoint which is open to
discussion to say the least. I myself do much welcome a new
family of
instruments which mirrors the world of lutes in a way the violin
family
mirrors the viol family. I feel quite strange seeing them
dismissed in
a sentence, called them "fake lutes" etc. Couldn't one call, with
equal
right, a modern violin a "fake viol", or a modern guitar a "fake
guitar" as it is not a Renaissance or Baroque guitar, or a Bach
concert
played by a modern orchestra a "fake concert". There are certainly
people who do so... I see no reason why I shouldn't love all of
these
instruments and ways of playing music (if well done of
course...). As
said, there's nothing to say against different tastes and viewpoints
here, but much to say against dogmatic and dismissing viewpoints.
(By
the way, the Liuto Forte team was, awarded the European Innovation
Award for Musical Instruments in 1999 given by Robert Schuman
Foundation and the Europaeische Kulturstiftung. So it seems I'm
not the
only one with my high esteem.)
The Liuto Forte sounds well also without nails. Thus you can play
romantic music without nails to an astonishing effect. It sounds
quite
intimate and soft. I never played a parlor guitar thus I cannot
compare
but I loved the possibility to use the Liuto Forte in this way
which is
not possible with the modern guitar. You can also play lute music
without nails which produces - in my view - a sound which quite
deviates from normal guitar sound and may give more justice to, say,
Renaissance lute music as a guitar would. I played some English
Renaissance music without nails in a room filled with about 200 not
always silent people sitting around tables, on the occasion of a
Christmas celebration. It worked really well.
Professional guitarists seem to like, in addition, that Liuto Fortes
can be well heard in ensembles.
In sum I would say: if you like the sound a Liuto Forte you can
enjoyed
that beautiful instrument its own right and also play it in concert
simply because you like it. Depending on what your equipment and
needs
are, there might be opportunities where you might prefer playing a
Liuto Forte not only for subjective taste reasons but also for
practical reasons.
Please take this as the opinion and experience of a non-expert who
loves music and simply likes the Liuto Forte regarding sound and
possibilities as well as regarding design.
Best
Franz
-----------------------
Dr. Franz Mechsner
Zum Kirschberg 40
D-14806 Belzig OT Borne
[email protected]
+49(0)33841-441362
