Transcribing Lute and Vihuela Tablature into Finale

-The vihuela and lute were two of the most popular instruments of their time. -The literature for both is vast and diverse. -Since lutenists and vihuelists are somewhat hard to come by nowadays, guitarists represent some of the only musicians still interested in playing this music (except, of course, for early music specialists). -Unfortunately, this is the notation we’re dealing with…..

From Dlugoraj “Fantasie”:

Pros and Cons of Lute Tablature Simple rules for reading notation. No need for extensive knowledge of music. CONS: It’s really old and sometimes hard to read. It does no good for people trained in standard notation. You cannot see harmonies,etc.

We need some way to put this music into a more modern musical notation.

Finale Can Help! Finale has the ability to read, write and play lute tablature notation… Let’s explore, shall we?

From the startup screen…

Let’s transcribe Something!

The down and dirty of lute tablature: Each line (or space, depending on the style) represents one string. The highest string is oriented to the top of the staff, the lowest string to the bottom of the staff (except in Spanish notation where this is reversed…). Each letter represents a specific fret on which to place your finger. The various lines and slashes above the “staff” indicate which rhythms to play.

The letters work like this: a = open string (without any fingers) b = first fret c = second fret (this is written like an “r”) d = third fret and so on….

1. Select the desired rhythm from the rhythm menu 1. Select the desired rhythm from the rhythm menu. (A single stem is a half note, a stem with a single tail is a quarter, with two tails is an eighth.) 2. Click on the desired string on the staff. 3. Type the desired letter

Now this is all well and good, but we’re still using that outdated notation. Finale can accommodate us…

Let’s add a modern staff to the equation. From the “staff tool”:

The strings on the lute are tuned, from lowest to highest: G C F A D G So, the letters can also be written as: 1st String: a = G b = G#/Ab c = A d = A#/Bb e = B f = C 2nd String: a = D b = D#/Eb c = E d = F e = F# f = G 3rd String: a = A b = A#/Bb c = B d = C e = C# f = D 4th String: a = F b = F# c = G d = G#/Ab e = A f = A#/Bb 5th String: a = C b = C#/Db c = D d = D#/Eb e = E f = F These can be entered into Finale in the normal way…

We aren’t quite done, though…. -We mentioned that guitarists are the only ones who really play this music anymore (All early music people in the room take this time to groan and grumble….) but all we have done is rewritten the lute music into different notation. -Guitarists often need to transpose lute and vihuela music to make it more user-friendly. Unfortunately, this cannot always simply be done with Finale’s “transpose” tool as sometimes individual notes need to be tweeked. We can add another staff though!

Let’s add a guitar staff to the equation. From the “staff tool”:

When you’re finished, you have a page with: The original lute tablature, only more clearly written. A modern staff with the sounding pitches. A third staff with a new guitar-friendly part. Like this……..