Dear Martin
I cannot recall offhand any quote with the exact meaning you mention.
The closest I can think of is from Bermudo (Declaracion de
Instrumentos, 1555, fol. xcix-verso), where he deals with the process
of intabulation and suggests intabulating the vocal works from several
composers (Tellez, Morales and Gombert). As a matter of fact, he does
not equate here the "fantasia" with the composed work as found in the
vihuela books, but rather as the product of the budding vihuelist's
imagination and advices against indulging in such a practice, otherwise
the beginner might end paying with "bad air":
"It is a sore mistake for the beginners to try to come up with their
fantasia when they start to play. Even if they would know counterpoint
(unless it is as good as that of the aforesaid musicians) they should
not play "fantasia" so early in order not to develop "bad ayre" [mal
ayre].
Milan, on the other hand, considers that the pieces in his book should
be called "fantasias" because they proceed form the author's fancy.
Fuenllana does not comment about the fantasias characteristics other
than comparing them with the "obras compuestas" (i.e. intabulations of
vocal polyphony), and even states that if his own fantasias may have a
"certain odour of composed works", it is due to the many such works he
has seen and intabulated; his advice to the beginner is to study and
play "obras compuestas" if he desires to truly learn music.
Hope this helps. Best regards,
Antonio
__________________________________________________________________
From: Martin Shepherd <[email protected]>
To: Lute List <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, 3 March 2018, 12:22
Subject: [LUTE] Calling all lute nerds...
Dear Collective Wisdom,
Can someone point me in the correct direction for the quote (from
Bermudo? Milan? someone else entirely?) who said roughly (in
translation) "but the highest form of this art is to play fantasia" or
something like that, meaning to take a theme or themes from vocal music
and use them to create an instrumental piece.
Merci d'avance,
Martin
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