Baroque and earlier cross picking

[billkilpatrick]

i've long since lost contact with the thread but long ago and far away ... alex produced photos of how to make plectrum from cherry wood for a lombardo mandolin.

what was produced was a longish, flexible(ish), thin slice of wood.

how this was best held is probably left to personal preference but i'd be very interested to know if anything like a rapid, cross picking was produced - along the lines of duu/3-1-2.

- bill

[Eugene]

Such plectra and techniques on mandolins came at the end and a bit after the baroque, not earlier. #Some of the most interesting proto-cross picking and "swept" arpeggio passages, at least for me, are found in the sets of variations by Leone (1768). #However, Leone prescribed the use of quills as plectra on the Neapolitan mandolin. #Wooden plectra were prescribed by Bortolazzi who also promoted the 4-string mandolino Cremonese in the early 1800s. #Bortolazzi was the dedicatee of Hummel's fine mandolin concerto.

[Eugene]

PS: Were you perhaps thinking of this thread (http://www.mandolincafe.net/cgi-bin/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=6;t=14744)?

[billkilpatrick]

proprio così ... thank you eugene.

[Bruce Clausen]

Eugene-- Does that mean Hummel was writing for a different tuning from the standard Neapolitan one (gdae)? Or just a different style of construction? Or did Bortolazzi play both instruments?

BC

[Eugene]

Nope, the mandolino Cremonese (or mandolino Bresciano) were built for four gut strings tuned g-d'-a'-e", exactly as a modern mandolinist would expect. #The early mandolin eye candy page (http://www.mandolincafe.com/archives/builders/early.html) pictures the bowl of a reproduction mandolino Cremonese by Carlo Cecconi on the top right. #Here's the top:

http://www.mandolinoitaliano.com/images/instrument/0051091.jpg

[Eugene]

PS: To hear the Hummel sonata on such a mandolin, check out:
Galfetti, Duilio & Diego Fasolis. 2000. Mandolin & Fortepiano. Arts Music, 47610-2.

Dorina Frati plays half of Boni's op. 2 Divertimenti on a mandolino Cremonese (the other half on a 4th-tuned mandolino in six courses) on:
Frati, Dorina & Daniele Roi. 1997. G.G. Boni (1650ca/1732): Opera II-Divertimenti per Camera. Tactus, TC 650201.

You can hear a couple sets of variations by Bortolazzi in their original instrumentation on:
Ensemble Baschenis. 1998. The Early Mandolin. Ducale, CDL 025.

...and:
Ensemble Baschenis. 2004. The Early Mandolin, vol. 2. Ducale, CDL 036.

[Bruce Clausen]

Thanks very much for the info Eugene. I seem to remember performing the Hummel sonata once years back from Hladky's edition, which doesn't give any background on the piece or the instrument. I will check out these recordings. (And sorry to stray off topic, Bill.)

BC

[Eugene]

I should have said this earlier. The concerto was dedicated to Bortolazzi. However, Hummel's sonata was dedicated to Malfatti, Beethoven's physician. There is no indication of what mandolin type Malfatti, a Tuscan expatriate, might have favored.

[billkilpatrick]

There is no indication of what mandolin type Malfatti, a Tuscan expatriate, might have favored.
... let's hope it wasn't in accord with his name - which means "badly made" in italian.

[vkioulaphides]

Bill, you may remember a hapless Italian soap-opera character, whose name was Molfetta; his mother-in-law --no sweetheart, for sure-- insisted on calling him, semi-accidentally, Malfatto. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

[billkilpatrick]

one of my all-time favorites is the italian sports-wear designer, sergio tacchini - "serge the turkey(s)" - but the most fascinating and poetic names i've ever come across was an old boy's here in the village (now dead, alas) named sig. eros vincaguerra - "mr. love wins the war."

[Eugene]

Those wacky Mal-s!

[RSW]

I've played the Hummel sonata on both types of 18th century mandolins (Neapolitan and Cremonese) with fortepiano. I can't say that I prefer one over the other but I do alter significantly the way I play the piece depending on the instrument. There is no evidence for the type of mandolin Malfatti used but I seriously doubt it was a 6 course lombard played fingerstyle or with plectrum. Do take note that the sonata by Hummel is for mandolin or violin, which would support an instrument tuned like the violin. The sonata was also written more than a decade later than Hummel's encounter with Bortolazzi.

[Eugene]

...And you can hear RSW playing the Hummel on one of my favorite recordings to feature the early Neapolitan mandolin:
Walz, Richard & Viviana Sofronitzki. 1998. Works for Mandolin and Fortepiano. Globe, GLO 5187.

[billkilpatrick]

in this germane thread:

http://www.mandolincafe.net/cgi-bin/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=6;t=14744

... alex has posted some olde photos of how the pick should be held. only incidently - tortuously as well (judged by the angle of the poor man's hand) - in one of the photos, the pick is centered on the pick guard below the sound hole. in the other (more relaxed photo) the man is picking directly over the sound hole.

if anyone else has earlier, b/w photos showing where bowlback mandolin players placed their picks ... i'd really appreciate seeing them. for the more technically adept, it might be possible to gauge the height (and possibly the arm length) of the musicians to see if the below-the-hole placement of the pick guard was specific for the more dimunitive - no doubt - mediterranean player.