A missed opportunity

Anyone heard of Mary Queen of Scots? She was a Renaissance Queen, a 6
feet tall redhead who ate men for breakfast, a sort of Nicole Kidman
with attitude. Anyway where I live in Jedburgh there's a house, more of
a castle really, called Mary Queen of Scots' House where she lived for a
while until the vile English : - ) got their perfidious paws on her and
relieved her of her finely shaped head. Recently a lock of her hair was
found (nobody has asked how they know it's hers and more to the point
nobody has asked which part of her body it came from) and there is to be
a grand event in the House this Thursday the 14th June to inaugurate the
lock of hair. All the important government and civic dignitaries will be
there and they are to be entertained by listening to Renaissance lute
music provided by - yes - your's truly! I got the gig and this could be
the first time that real Renaissance lute music has been played in the
House since the 16th century.

The point is that if I had bothered my *&^% to do my research I reckon
that I could have adopted an appropriate historical tuning and could
have added even greater authenticity to the recital. Or if I had been
brave enough I could have refretted my lute (a difficult job) and spiced
up the Fantasias of Luis Milan and the Ricercars of Francesco da Milano
with 7 limit harmonies.

I have at least two more 'historical' performances this summer, both in
medieval Abbeys (sacked by those dreadful English again) so if anyone
has concrete information on successful Renaissance lute
other-than-12-tunings I'd be grateful for a lead.

Thanks in anticipation,

Regards.

In a message dated 6/12/01 5:37:45 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
alison.monteith3@which.net writes:

> I have at least two more 'historical' performances this summer, both in
> medieval Abbeys (sacked by those dreadful English again) so if anyone
> has concrete information on successful Renaissance lute
> other-than-12-tunings I'd be grateful for a lead.
>
>

Alison, may I recommend John Dowland's tuning which is a well-temperament as
reported by his son Robert. Dowland was Irish writing for the Danish in a
tuning that gave choices for pitches, notated in tablature. All you need is
the fretting which I have (as the title page of PITCH I:1), or through Monz.

Best, Johnny Reinhard

Dear Alison Monteith,
I don't know anything about the tuning your asking for but I've recently been on a Scottish music
kick and just received Jeannie Robertson's recording of Scottish ballads from Amazon.com. From
the bits I've heard on a German site, they sound pretty authentic. It's at:

http://www.jpc.de/jpcdb/frames/jpcset.html?hnum=8774314&iampartner=music&maktion=artikel&msparte=pop&language=en

While I'm at it I might as well mention that after hearing Sara Grey sing "Tiftie's Bonnie Annie"
2 weeks ago I just had to learn more about the song and discovered several websites devoted to the
song. The music is just some organ playing the melody.

http://www.acronet.net/~robokopp/scottish/atfyvie.htm

Another example of some music on the web is a Christian music site that unfortunately has the
music come on when you open it, but it's a great hymn tune "Lo How A Rose." I find it interesting
that it is basically in 10. The reason for my interest in this song, other than a personal
fondness for the song, is Swedish composer Jan Sandstrom's setting for choir where he basically
elongates Michael Praetorius' harmonies and likens it to the opening and closing of a rose. It's
at:

http://www.rememberjosie.org/Xmas/s1447-deutsch.html

auf deutsch no less.

For me these presentation of songs on the web set a great example of how we might share info on
tuninglist.

Yours,
Rick

Alison Monteith wrote:

> <snip> they are to be entertained by listening to Renaissance lute
> music provided by - yes - your's truly! <snip>

> an appropriate historical tuning and could
> have added even greater authenticity to the recital. Or if I had been
> brave enough I could have refretted my lute (a difficult job) and spiced
> up the Fantasias of Luis Milan and the Ricercars of Francesco da Milano
> with 7 limit harmonies.
>
> I have at least two more 'historical' performances this summer, both in
> medieval Abbeys (sacked by those dreadful English again) so if anyone
> has concrete information on successful Renaissance lute
> other-than-12-tunings I'd be grateful for a lead.
>

--- In tuning@y..., Alison Monteith <alison.monteith3@w...> wrote:
> I have at least two more 'historical' performances this summer, both
in
> medieval Abbeys (sacked by those dreadful English again) so if
anyone
> has concrete information on successful Renaissance lute
> other-than-12-tunings I'd be grateful for a lead.

In the Scala scale archive
http://www.xs4all.nl/~huygensf/doc/scales.zip
see the scales
dow_high.scl
dow_lmh.scl
dow_low.scl
dow_middle.scl
dowland_12.scl
mersen_l1.scl
mersen_l2.scl
artusi.scl

Regards,
-- Dave Keenan

Rick Tagawa wrote:

> Dear Alison Monteith,
> I don't know anything about the tuning your asking for but I've
> recently been on a Scottish music kick and just received Jeannie
> Robertson's recording of Scottish ballads from Amazon.com. From the
> bits I've heard on a German site, they sound pretty authentic. It's
> at:
>
>
> http://www.jpc.de/jpcdb/frames/jpcset.html?hnum=8774314&iampartner=music&maktion=artikel&msparte=pop&language=en
>
> While I'm at it I might as well mention that after hearing Sara Grey
> sing "Tiftie's Bonnie Annie" 2 weeks ago I just had to learn more
> about the song and discovered several websites devoted to the song.
> The music is just some organ playing the melody.
>
> http://www.acronet.net/~robokopp/scottish/atfyvie.htm
>
> Another example of some music on the web is a Christian music site
> that unfortunately has the music come on when you open it, but it's a
> great hymn tune "Lo How A Rose." I find it interesting that it is
> basically in 10. The reason for my interest in this song, other than
> a personal fondness for the song, is Swedish composer Jan Sandstrom's
> setting for choir where he basically elongates Michael Praetorius'
> harmonies and likens it to the opening and closing of a rose. It's
> at:
>
> http://www.rememberjosie.org/Xmas/s1447-deutsch.html
>
> auf deutsch no less.
>
> For me these presentation of songs on the web set a great example of
> how we might share info on tuninglist.
>
> Yours,
> Rick
>

These are great links Rick and of great interest to me. I live in the
Scottish Borders and Sir Walter Scott the writer claimed that more
ballads have been written about this area than anywhere else in the
world. The place is reeking with history, not all of it pretty. Some of
your Presidents (I'm assuming you're American - forgive me if I'm wrong)
like Nixon and LBJ carry names that are still big down here. The point
I'm making is that there is a vast resource of great depth for a
composer.

I recently met with the Traditional Arts Officer for the region who has
the job of promoting traditional song and music. She wants to put
together a reasonably proficient female voices choir made up of the
better young singers who are specialising in voice. Always on the look
out for commissions I've offered my services as a composer and the great
Ballads naturally come to mind. My idea is to get down to the original
tunes as far as possible and to harmonise sparingly and modally
(sneaking in as much microtonal content as I can get off with) and using
the lyrics to structure the pieces. There's the full range of material
from love songs to war songs. So thanks for these references as they
might help me with background. BTW Kate Rusby is making big waves in the
traditional song department over here. I'd recommend any of her recent
work.

Best Wishes

>
>
>

--- In tuning@y..., Afmmjr@a... wrote:
>
> Alison, may I recommend John Dowland's tuning which is a well-
temperament as
> reported by his son Robert. Dowland was Irish writing for the
Danish in a
> tuning that gave choices for pitches, notated in tablature. All
you need is
> the fretting which I have (as the title page of PITCH I:1), or
through Monz.
>
> Best, Johnny Reinhard

It might be hard or impossible to use this fretting for a piece not
written by Dowland.