Tablatures

Tablature: Alternate music notations 1300-1750, under the guidance of John Griffiths, David Dolata and Philippe Vendrix will present ca. 400 examples of tablature for close to forty instruments, with facsimiles, transcriptions, and commentaries on all the pieces. Camera-ready copy will be submitted to Brepls Publishers by mid2025.  It is expected to appear in two volumes, 600 pages each, by summer, 2025.

Collaborators on the project include Gregorio Bevilacqua, Hyacinthe Belliot, Vincent Besson, Aurelio Bianco, Andrés Cea Galán, Stuart Cheney, Annie Coeurdevey, Tim Crawford, David Dolata, Dinko Fabris, John Griffiths, Monica Hall, Thilo Hirsch, Jeffery Kite-Powell, Nuria LLopis, Andreas Michel, Jocelyn Nelson, Davide Rebuffa, John Robinson, Daniel Russo-Batterham, Andreas Schlegel, Anne Smith.

The notation used in the German-speaking lands for keyboard instruments is frequently referred to as "German organ tablature." In most cases the music served the organ, but there are numerous examples from the late sixteenth century into the eighteenth century that specifically call for harpsichord, generically referred to as "Instrument" in that era. The tablature is arranged as a matrix of superimposed lines that usually represent the polyphonic lines or voices and using the letters from the musical alphabet ('a-h', with 'h' indicating b♮.

To coincide with the eightieth anniversary of Willi Apel’s The Notation of Polyphonic of Music, 2022 will see the publication of the first substantial study of tablature notation in early modern Europe since Apel’s book. The fruit of a decade’s work and the study of thousands of works for close to forty instruments, it extends far beyond the alphanumeric representation of sound that co-existed alongside mensural notation until its demise around the middle of the eighteenth century. This paper seeks to offer new ways of defining tablature, to reconsider its functions, and to propose a revision of the historiography that unconsciously marginalised one of the mainstream notational systems of the renaissance. More specifically, the paper explores the essence of the graphic systems of tablature and  proposes numerous terminological changes. Tablature is shown as more than a simple notation for "playing by numbers,” instead an alternative way of thinking about music and transmitting it. In a musically bilingual society, tablature was the preferred notation for writing music in score, also the only renaissance notation to incorporate performance-related information that was impossible in conventional notation. The roles of tablature within the notational mainstream included it use as a compositional tool, for conducting scores, and for the transmission of elite repertoires into the urban sphere.

Toccate e ricercari per tastiera nella Germania meridionale tra Cinquecento e Seicento: una sintesi di diversi influssi stilistici Il nuovo stile che emerse nella musica per tastiera della Germania meridionale nel tardo Cinquecento e al principio del secolo successivo 1 fu in gran parte opera di Christian Erbach (ca. 1568-1635) e dei fratelli Hans Leo (1564-1612) e Jacob Hassler (1569-1622). 2 La loro formazione avvenne in un ambiente permeato dell'influsso della cultura italiana; in particolare Hans Leo e Jacob Hassler ebbero un legame diretto con Venezia: 3 la Bildungsreise di Jacob in Italia fu patrocinata dal consiglio della città di Augusta e da Christoph Fugger, membro della potentissima famiglia di banchieri augustani. 4 Gli scambi tra Venezia e la Germania 1. Per uno sguardo generale sulla musica solistica del secolo XVII cfr. Alexander Silbiger, Fantasy and craft: the solo instrumentalist, in

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/early-music-history/latest-issue
Placing amateur performers and their instrument of choice at the forefront of inquiry, this article makes a case for the Spanish guitar as an instrument through which knowing subjects sought an epistemology of musical practice, a way-of-knowing-and-doing that could even surpass other musical epistemologies already in circulation during the seventeenth century. Leading this investigation is a handwritten book of lessons wherein there emerges a preference for learning the violin using the principles of guitar playing. Next, I discuss the appearance of annotated guitar tablature in the copy of Giulio Caccini’s _Le nuove musiche_ held in the Library of Congress, which edits Caccini’s songs to purpose their accompaniments for easier guitar playing. Together, these two documents reveal earnest attempts at being musical with a guitar in the hands or guitar playing in the mind, opening us to a world-view that hinges on the guitar as the locus of musical knowledge.

Compiladas durante as décadas de 1820 e 1830, as Cifras de Música para Saltério, de Antonio Vieira dos Santos (1784-1854), constituem-se numa extensa e variada coleção de música brasileira não religiosa anterior ao Segundo Reinado. Além de minuetes e outras danças de corte, o manuscrito traz a música de danças populares de várias regiões do Brasil em fins do século XVIII e início do XIX, incluindo marcas de fandango, chulas, e lunduns, todas registradas em forma de tablatura. Esta edição apresenta o fac-símile completo da obra, precedido de um estudo histórico e analítico do instrumento e seu repertório, focalizando em especial a música em Paranaguá e Morretes do início do século XIX. Um número expressivo de obras é transcrito em notação musical moderna.

The Polish tablature written by Johannes of Lublin (collected between 1537 and 1548) contains four of Ludwig Senfl's motets: "Vita in Ligno moritur," "Homo quidam fecit coenam," "Ave rosa sine spinis," and "Philippe qui videt me." With its repertoire of about 400 pieces of the most famous contemporary composers the collection represents the most extensive anthology of keyboard music in the first half of the 16th century. An inscription in the front-cover of the manuscript tells us that Johannes was an organist in the monastery of Kraśnik, which raises the basic question of how he gained access to the vocal music he arranged (especially the prints in which Senfl's motets had been published). Johannes most likely lived in Krakow, the Polish capital at that time, where German culture was part of everyday life. Beyond that there existed several institutions that maintained cultural exchange with the neighboring countries. In particular the University of KraKow (founded in 1364), which Johannes possibly attended, and the Royal Chapel of Zygmunt I. and Zygmunt II. August received music by western-European composers.
The manuscript PL-Kp Ms. 1716 was collected over a period of about ten years and was notated in Old German Tablature, in which the Discantus is written in mensural notation and the other voices in letters. Most of the pieces were notated by Johannes himself, who also added a musical treatise, which introduces his collection. Apart from Johannes (and only in a very few cases) there were two other writers who could not be identified yet. Besides the mentioned works by Senfl, there are tablatures from (among others) Josquin, Verdelot, Finck, Stoltzer, Isaac, and Jannequin as well as many Polish pieces by the organist Nicolaus Cracoviensis, who might have been in personal contact with Johannes. Nevertheless the majority of the tablatures are still not identified.
Ludwig Senfl composed about 130 motets, of which 10 motets in 21 adaptations came down as organ tablatures. Especially "Vita in Ligno" (the "tertia pars" of the three parted motet "Qui prophetice prompsisti") was very popular and therefore used quite often as a model. Apart from PL-Kp Ms. 1716 and another copy (the so called "Holy Ghost Tablature," PL-Wn rkp.564) this piece can be found in the two sources D-B Sammlung Bohn Ms. mus. 18 and 119 as well as in two prints by Johannes Rühling and Jacob Paix. In the Lublin Tablature Senfl's motet was highly modified compared to its model, using (among others) numerous colorations and removing vocal elements for adapting the piece to organ-specific conditions. "Philippe qui videt me" and "Homo quidam" (which takes over the cantus firmus of Josquin's musical setting of the same text) were also modified but with lesser ornamentation than "Vita in Ligno." The extensive motet "Ave rosa sine spinis" (which also uses a cantus firmus by Josquin, in this case from his "Stabat Mater") was taken over as an almost verbatim reproduction. To figure out the function of the tablatures, each piece needs to be examined individually. On the one hand the intabulations could be considered as pure instrumental compositions that were performed only by the organist soloistically, on the other hand they could have simply been used to accompany the vocal choir. However, the exact intention of the author cannot be fully reconstructed in the end.

This article invokes the modern concept of “fakebooks” — collections of standard popular songs with partial and easy-to-read musical notation — to contextualize the networks of songs widely published in the guitar-strumming tablatures of seventeenth-century Italy. While scholars, performers, and audiences are familiar with many of these tunes today (e.g. the Folia, Spagnoletta, Ruggiero, Passacaglia, Ciaccona, and Granduca), in this article I begin by reporting on a few of the lesser-known songs of the strumming tablature books, whose concordances and genealogies have yet to be fully accounted for. Similar in design and function to today’s fakebooks, the tablature books served as pedagogical tools for learning to play the chord progressions of these well-known tunes on the fashionable five- course Spanish guitar.  The notion that these songs made up a library of “standards” that seventeenth-century musicians should learn presents for us a window into both the performing and compositional habits of practicing musicians. Similar to the way in which jazz musicians equip themselves with an inventory of standard songs, I note how seventeenth-century musicians framed this repertory into a kind of intuitive language, presenting evidence that this musical knowledge was distributed well beyond the boundaries of guitar playing. Most significantly, this article elaborates on how the strumming tablature songs figure centrally within the avenues of musical transmission during the seventeenth century, documenting a space in which the “compositional” mode of the scripted page negotiates with the (often collaborative) modalities of oral practice and musical pedagogy.  I argue that this negotiation asks us to consider strategies of early modern songwriting more distributive and adjustable than the author-centric model so often assumed in compositional practice.

Preface to the facsimile edition of the book originally edited by the son of the blind organist of Felipe II of Spain Antonio de Cabezón, Hernando de Cabezón, in 1578, and now published by the Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla (School of Arts - Commission for Protection and Preservation of the University Cultural Heritage - H. University Council), under the care of Miguel Limón González and Gustavo Mauleón Rodríguez.

Prólogo a la edición facsímil del libro originalmente editado por el hijo del organista ciego de Felipe II de España Antonio de Cabezón, Hernando de Cabezón, en 1578, ahora publicado por la Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla (Escuela de Artes - Comisión de Protección y Preservación del Patrimonio Cultural universitario - H. Consejo Universitario), al cuidado de Miguel Limón González y de Gustavo Mauleón Rodríguez.

Wurstisen's lute anthology contains arrangements of Sacred Songs and Psalms in its last part. This is a repertory of fifteen German Protestant chorales and two psalms after the Genevan Psalter. Тhe research on Wurstisen's arrangement are preceded by a brief introduction of Luther's and Calvin's branches of Protestantism and their thoughts on the role of music for the new forms of worship. Historiographical data is involved in order to clarify the origin of Wurstisen's chorales. The greatest amount of them belongs to Luther's own liturgical legacy or to theologians and hymn-writers of his close circle. The idea was expressed that Wurstisen collected his chorales from the most preferable and popular titles among the lutenists of the time. The second part of the article is a study on the process of intabulation. It is focused on melody treatment, harmonization of the chorale tunes and embellishments. Several approaches to the musical texture are determined. In addition, certain comparison between Wurstisen's intabulations and those in the rest of Basel's lute mansucripts and Hainhoffer lute book managed. As a result, it can now be summarized that most of Wurstisen's chorale versions don't correspond to other arrangements. There is only one known exception, which leads to the idea that some of his intabulations might have been copied from another source, while others are possibly his own arrangements.

Wurstisen lute book contains twenty two fantasias in total. Main part of them are imitative pieces based on one or more thematic motives. The article in presence is focused on those part of them which can be assumed as polythmatic pieces. Investigation of the fantasias leads to idea of origin around the mid of 16th century. Statement that polythematic pieces generally belong to earlier stage of development of the repertory is confirmed by individual analyses of each pieces and it is also supported by some scholars. Part of the pieces bear certain authorship and are widespread in number of sources. Some of the attributions are studied in details by some musicologists. Their observations are involved at the present discussion. The article shows that some of the earlier polythematic pieces had a " classical' status and they were copied not only by Wurstisen but also by other compilers and lutenists of its generation. They were copied, colored, imitated and widespread as such during the late 16th century. The text in presence sheds light to the structural processes behind certain examples and simultaneously gives additional details about the formal and stylistic tendencies of the lute music in late 16th century. It is a part of bigger study dedicated to the Wurstisen lute book.

11 tabulatur lutniowych, pochodzących ze śląskiego Krzeszowa (olim: Biblioteka Instytutu Muzykologii Uniwersytetu w Breslau, sygn.: Mf. 2001, 2003-2006, 2008-2011 oraz 1938.111 – obecnie w zbiorach Biblioteki Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego – oraz tabulatura lutniowa z Biblioteki Narodowej w Warszawie, sygn. Muz. 396) były już przedmiotem studiów pod kątem zawartego w nich repertuaru; spora liczba zawartych tam kompozycji, szczególnie tych przypisywanych dobrze znanym kompozytorom XVII i XVIII wieku (m.in. Silviusa Leopolda Weissa), doczekała się nawet współczesnych edycji. Pomimo to, kwestia proweniencji wszystkich tych rękopisów nie jest przesądzona ani nawet ostatecznie pewna. Poza przyjętym dziś miejscem proweniencji tych tabulatur – cysterskiego (benedyktyńskiego) opactwa w śląskim Krzeszowie (niektóre z zanotowanych w nich kompozycji mogły być wręcz wpisane przez opata tegoż klasztoru, Hermiena Kniebandla) – ze źródeł tych wyłaniają się nadto i inne miejsca, takie jak Jelenia Góra-Sobieszów, Wrocław i Świdnica. Dotychczas przyjmowana proweniencja wszystkich tych tabulatur jest wątpliwa także w historycznym kontekście praktyki muzycznej kleru cysterskiego, dla którego uprawianie muzyki instrumentalnej było surowo zabronione. Inetersujący trop, który być może ułatwi atrybucję niektórych tych kolekcji, stanowią tytuły i incipity tekstowe wielu z zanotowanych tam kompozycji, bliższe raczej duchowości jezuickiej. Jeśli hipoteza ta da się zweryfikować, pozwoli ona spojrzeć na krzeszowski klasztor nie tylko jako na ważne centrum muzycznej produkcji, ale i ośrodek kolekcjonujący rozmaitą twórczość muzyczną.

Motet intabulations for organ and lute printed during the second half of the sixteenth century are a barometer of their longevity. More than simply exemplifying instrumental performance practice, they attest to musical fashion and the life of liturgical works beyond their strictly ecclesiastical context. The study shows a continued veneration of older motets from the first half of the century as as models of refined polyphonic elegance completely independent of their liturgical function. Whether embellished for virtuosic display or kept unadorned, older motets proliferated alongside works by Lasso and his contemporaries seemingly impervious to the liturgical reforms of the times.

It is a project prepared in cooperation with the Polish Digital National Library “Polona” (Sonia Wronkowska, Łukasz Kozak) and Grzegorz Joachimiak. It concerns a manuscript connected with the collection of lute tablature of Krzeszów (Grüssau) Cistercians that before the war was kept in the library of the Schaffgotsch’ family in Cieplice Śląskie (Bad Warmbrunn) and after 1945 it has been stored in the collections of the National Library in Warsaw (shelf mark: PL-Wn Mus. 396 Cim.). This lute tablature contains a distinctive title page with a dedication to the Cistercian monk Hermann Kniebandl (1679-1745), who loved to play music, moreover, he was a prior of Cieplice Śląskie provostry, and there he died.

The Book for Lute project is not just about performing pieces written in the lute manuscript, but also about recording the music in places where it had previously sounded. As part of The Book for Lute there have been prepared 11 episodes with audio and video recordings, which will be presented at the National Digital Library “Polona” Web Blog in cycles. They were registered in the Ballroom of the former Schaffgotsch’ palace in Cieplice Śląskie (now Wrocław University of Technology branch in Jelenia Góra) and former Krzeszów Cistercian provostry in Cieplice Śląskie (now the Museum of Natural History in Jelenia Góra). Each of the presented work is accompanied by texts describing the compositions, as well as the scanned manuscript of lute tablature. This way it will be possible not only to view one of the most precious treasures of music in the library, but also to learn them by listening to some tracks and observing master musicians – Anna Wiktoria Swoboda and Jan Čižmář, who are performing them in the movies and also to complete information by texts attached to each of the pieces.

One of the planned 11 episodes is the piece which probably could be ascribed to Father Hermann Kniebandl himself. It will be the first lute composition ever, whose authorship can be attributed to a Cistercian monk.

To know more see to http://blog.polona.pl/kategoria/muzyka and http://lute.pl/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=20&Itemid=21

This article is concerned with one of the largest surviving collections of 18th-century lute tablature manuscripts, from the Cistercian abbey of Grüssau in Silesia (now Krzeszów, Poland). The collection consists of 15 volumes of manuscript lute tablature, containing more than 2,000 pieces for Baroque lute. I focus on a group of otherwise unknown compositions from these sources, all connected with the entwined monogram ‘HK’. Contemporary sources, including previously unexplored correspondence, suggest that these initials can be associated with Father Hermann Kniebandl, who also seems to have been one of the scribes represented in the collection—the first to have been identified in the entire collection up to now. Furthermore, among the works copied in this hand are seven pieces identified with the ‘HK’ monogram which may be the first identified autograph compositions by Kniebandl. Until now, his name has been associated only with the title-pages of two manuscripts from the Grüssau collection, but both are dedications copied by other scribes (though the music that follows in one of these sources is copied in his hand).

This paper presents a corpus study that identifies the number of statistically distinct modes used in sacred and secular genres from 1400--1750. Corpora used for the study include Masses, motets, and secular songs from the Franco-Flemish School, works by Palestrina, secular Italian songs with alfabeto guitar tablature from the early seventeenth century, and works by J.S. Bach. K-means clustering of key profiles are used to determine the number of distinguishable modes in each corpus. The results of this study show that the number of modes present in a corpus depends not only on date of publication but also on the genre of a composition. Secular genres are more likely to cluster into two modes while sacred genres cluster into several modes. This paper also explores the differences between systems of notation and musical practice and suggests other ways in which machine learning techniques can be in dialogue with the study of harmonic practice in early music.

Wurstisen lute book emerges as a very late source of German lute tablature. Written down n the last decade of the 16 th century, it stands out for its remarkable size and repertory. The latter is organized in eight books. Fantasias are placed in the third book. Their variety is in respect of chronology, origin, technique, required instruments. The paper in presence is concentrated on the imitative fantasias. Observation leads to the notion that monothematic ones are generally a later part of the repertory, while on the contrary, the polythematic ones refer to a layer preceding with decades the time of copying the manuscript.

Renaissance tablatures for plucked strings such as lute and vihuela form a vast repertoire of pieces whose transmission ranges from 'single' to multiple, and which can serve both for performance, research and modern critical editions. On the other hand, researchers who are not used to this type of notation may find it difficult to use, even when performing on other instruments. In this article, a rudimentary method for cross-reading this repertoire on the keyboard is presented, based on the distinction between diatonic or chromatic nature for numerical tablatures for keyboard or strings, respectively, aiming at a broader application of this repertoire in research and performance.

Intellectual honesty and the will for justice are elements that can go together in a single person. Life can lead us to develop the most varied activities, but these always end up deÐning and characterising us through those fundamental elements. I have always felt the claiming of Galician guitar as a musical and social duty, which implied a revision of the ofÐcial musicology and supposed settling the scores with the Spanish nationalist historiography.
On the same note, although from another perspective, the excellent paper by the musicologist John GrifÐths (Melbourne, Australia, b. 1952) developed last December, entitled Turning the tables: reassessing tablature, about the vindication of the tablature as a fundamental element of European musical evolution, and an essential tool to understand the formation of European musicians.

The subject of this thesis is the characteristic features of the 17th-century French lute style defined by the term style brisé. In the first part of the paper the author refers to the state of research on 17th-century French lute music and recalls the definitions of style brisé formulated by leading scholars of French baroque music. In the next part she presents the development of this style and at the same time describes the context of 17th century French music, regarding tablature notation, the history of lute tunning and discussing the works of the most important composers and genres of lute music. The last element of the work is the characterisation of the lute manuscript from the University Library in Poznań and the analysis of selected attributed and anonymous compositions from the perspective of their brisé style features. Thesis was written under supervision of prof. UAM dr hab. Magdalena Walter-Mazur.

Przedmiotem pracy są charakterystyczne cechy XVII-wiecznego francuskiego stylu lutniowego określane terminem style brisé. W pierwszej części pracy autorka referuje stan badań nad francuską muzyką lutniową XVII wieku oraz przywołuje definicje style brisé sformułowane przez czołowych badaczy barokowej muzyki francuskiej. W kolejnej części przedstawia rozwój tego stylu, a zarazem opisuje kontekst XVII-wiecznej muzyki francuskiej, poruszając kwestie zapisu tabulaturowego, historii stroju lutniowego oraz omawiając twórczość najważniejszych kompozytorów i gatunki muzyki lutniowej. Ostatnim elementem pracy jest charakterystyka tytułowego rękopisu lutniowego z Biblioteki Uniwersyteckiej w Poznaniu oraz analiza wybranych zachowanych w nim kompozycji atrybuowanych i anonimowych pod kątem występowania w nich cech style brisé. Praca została napisana pod kierunkiem prof. UAM dr hab. Magdalena Walter-Mazur.

Unpublished paper, originally presented at the 14th Annual Conference on Medieval and Renaissance Music, King's College, London, 1986. Revised version presented at the Southeast Chapter of the American Musicological Society, Greensboro NC, 1987. Handout with examples and tables at the back.

The article is devoted to one of the lute music manuscript which comes from the lute tablatures collection of Krzeszów (Grüssau) Cistercians from the 18th century. It is kept now at the National Library in Warsaw (call number: PL-Wn Mus. 396 Cim.) but until World War II it was placed in the Schaffgotsch’s library collection in Cieplice Śląskie (Bad Warmbrunn). There it was made available for the public as a lute tablature with the call number K. 44. This manuscript aroused interest of, among others, a famous bibliophile, lute music lover and researcher Wilhelm Tappert (19.02.1830 – 27.10.1907). He was of the Silesian origin because he was born in Tomaszów Bolesławiecki (Thomaswaldau) in the Lower Silesia. During his research on this manuscript since July 10th, 1895 until April 8th, 1900 he stayed in neighboring Agnieszków (Agnetendorf) — since 1998 a district of Jelenia Góra city (Hirschberg). He placed his own remarks, notes, transcriptions, copy of pieces and printed brochures in his notebook which now functions as a manuscript in the „Nachlaß Tappert” collection preserved in the Staatsbibliothek Berlin – Preussischer Kulturbesitz under call number D-B Mus. ms. 40277. This manuscript has not been a subject of a detailed research until now. It has been only mentioned by researchers that it exists in general. The research has shown that the manuscript D-B Mus. ms. 40277 does not contain a copy of all pieces from the lute tablature of the 18th century. There are only 46 works, moreover, the vast majority of their genres are minuets (13). The copy of the Silesian manuscript was also a pretext to reach for Wilhelm Tappert’s collection, what allowed to pay attention to his broad journalistic, scientific, artistic and especially bibliophile activity. Nachlaß Tappert is a collection which contains not only information which present a huge spectrum of Wilhelm Tappert’s work, but it is also an extremely valuable information source for doing research on the history of lute music. While making many copies of handwriting and printed sources Tappert used the collections which are unavailable now. His huge heritage appears to be a priceless information source about the lute music history and also about the musical culture of Silesia together with folk music.

Abstract:The article concerns a rarely explored lute manuscript from the Viennese region (1526–40) and focuses on the “pure” instrumental settings (mainly entitled “Preambulum”) that have been discovered recently. The article contains a new index of the manuscript, allowing better orientation for modern musicians or researchers. The analysis of the instrumental settings in the context of lute teaching and learning techniques in the first third of the sixteenth century shows that the scribes, on one hand, follow these techniques, but, on the other, still reflect the non-written practices. The “Preambula” are formulated as pieces and are related to Latin spoken verse, formulaic sententiae-exercises, dance interludes, or even improvised dances. The manuscript was a handwritten educational lute book based on printed prototypes. Its sources are international: They can be found both in Northern Italy (Petrucci prints) and in the Southern German-speaking region (Judenkünig, Gerle, Neusidle...

IS THE ITALIAN KEYBOARD INTAVOLATURA A TABLATURE?

Alexander Silbiger

This paper was presented at the Fourth Biennial Conference on Baroque Music, London, July 1990, and was published in Recercare 3 (1991): 81-104.
It is accessible at http://www.jstor.org/stable/41701072

From the article about the Air:
„[...] Johann Anton – a lutenist, was probably born in the Czech Štěkeň in 1650 and grew up in the atmosphere of Jesuit piety and the Czech nobilité environment in Prague, where he lived until his death in 1721. He belonged to the group Liebhaber, as well as he composed [...]
While listening to this composition, it is difficult to question Baron’s opinion about matching the Italian and French styles by Count Losy. The clearly audible melody is supported by the rhythm which refers to the gavotte and which recalls ballet compositions by Jean-Baptiste Lully [...]”.

More in Polish on http://blog.polona.pl/2015/06/losinthal-aire/
There is also a movie with this piece performed by Jan Čižmář: https://vimeo.com/131530849

A honestidade intelectual e a vontade de justiça são elementos que podem ir juntos numa única pessoa. A vida pode levar-nos a desenvolver as mais variadas atividades, mas estas sempre acabam por nos deÐnir e caracterizar através desses elementos fundamentais. Sempre senti a reclamação da guitarra galega como um dever musical e social, que implicava uma revisão da musicologia oÐcial e supunha um ajuste de contas com a historiograÐa nacionalista espanhola.
Nessa mesma linha, ainda que desde outra perspectiva, desenvolve-se a excelente comunicação oferecida pelo musicólogo John GrifÐths (Melbourne, Austrália, n. 1952), o passado mês de dezembro, intitulada Turning the tables: reassessing tablature, sobre a vindicação da tablatura como elemento fundamental da evolução musical europeia e ferramenta indispensável para entender a formação dos músicos europeus.

Foreword to number 69 of the music yearbook "Anuario Musical (Revista de Musicología del CSIC), this time dedicated monographically to the figure of the composer and organist of Philip II of Spain, Antonio de Cabezón. Prólogo al número 69 de "Anuario Musical (Revista de Musicología del CSIC)", en esta ocasión dedicado monográficamente a la figura del compositor y organista de Felipe II, Antonio de Cabezón.