User:Viktor van Niekerk
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Viktor van Niekerk is a conscious artist, with a total understanding of the ten-string guitar as envisioned by Narciso Yepes. (Fritz Buss, 10-string guitarist and long-term student of Yepes, 2007)
[edit] Viktor van Niekerk
Viktor van Niekerk (b. 1981, Johannesburg) has been active as artist and academic in a number of performative, visual, and literary disciplines. Since 1995, he has performed exclusively on the modern 10-string guitar.
Committed to both standard and contemporary repertoire, he devotes time each year to the transcription of baroque lute and keyboard music for guitar as well as championing new music by contemporary composers. Some of those who have written works for him include G. Florian Messner, Bob Dickinson, and the late David Hönigsberg whose four-movement African Sonata has been dedicated to Van Niekerk.
He studied the guitar with Fritz Buss (a long-term student of Narciso Yepes) and undertook further studies in performance with the Belgian conductor Bruno-Maria Brys. Aside from master classes with guitarists from Europe, Japan, Mexico and Australia, he also had lessons from the French specialist in contemporary & baroque guitar, Rafael Andia, harpist Olga Bosman, harpsichordist John Reid Coulter, and musicologist Dr. Gerald Florian Messner.
He has been a laureate at various competitions for the performing arts in South Africa (including the Classical Guitar Competition of South Africa), and he has performed: frequent recitals for the Classical Guitar Society of South Africa; live on South African national radio; at the National Arts Festival, Grahamstown (the African continent’s premier performing arts festival); at NewMusic Indaba; for the honorary Spanish Consul-General in South Africa; at the First Central Coast International Guitar Festival, Australia; and at many other events/venues in South Africa and Australasia.
In addition to musical activities, Viktor van Niekerk delivered a series of lectures on mythology in contemporary art, literature and cinema at the University of Johannesburg, in 2006. He is presently a candidate for the degree Doctor of Philosophy at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. His dissertation centres on the performance of Nobel laureate J.M. Coetzee’s novels through their mytho-musical motifs and forms. Upon completion of the PhD, he plans to undertake a second Doctoral degree in Performance, the research component of which will be dedicated to the modern 10-string guitar, its acoustics, the significance of sympathetic resonance, and the performance practice of its inventor, Narciso Yepes. As such, he has been invited to Madrid by the family of Narciso Yepes to continue his research in the Yepes archives.
Some current research interests: The novels of J.M. Coetzee: their performative aspect as an analogy with music and myth. The juvenilia of J.M. Coetzee (editing a publication of Coetzee’s early works, 1958-1963). The confluence between music and myth, between music and literature, and between myth and the arts in general, as fields of critical inquiry. Authenticities, period practices, and the philosophy of music. Acoustics of the ten-string guitar. The techniques, performance practice and transcriptions of Narciso Yepes.
[edit] Quotes
Viktor van Niekerk is a conscious artist, with a total understanding of the ten-string guitar as envisioned by Narciso Yepes. (Fritz Buss, 2007)
lovely clear playing ... lovely atmosphere ... very evocative and technically impressive ... excellent use of the 10-string guitar ... a very well controlled performance. (Tessa Ziegler, 10-string guitarist, 2001)
The recital was greatly enjoyed and appreciated by all my guests. Viktor van Niekerk is clearly gifted... (Eduardo García, Honorary Spanish Consul-General, 2003)
a fount of information! (Alan Thomas, guitarist, 2006)
Commendable playing! (Marian Friedman, pianist, 2001)
I am convinced that Mr Van Niekerk will...make a strong contribution not only to the academic community but also to broader society. (Mike Marais, Professor of literature, 2005)
When a young person of age fourteen walked into my studio with a ten-string guitar, of his own choosing, I was sure that here was something special. ... Since his first lesson with me there was never a dull moment. The lessons developed into mutual inspiration and Viktor developed at a rapid rate, technically and intellectually. From the start, he had no lack of understanding for the nature and spirit of the music at hand. (Fritz Buss, 2007)
[edit] The correct Standard Tuning of the modern 10-string guitar
The standard tuning of the modern ten-string guitar is:
eI - b - g - d - A - E - C - B♭ - A♭ - G♭ [from string 1 to 10]
(as written in the Helmholtz pitch reference notation) which can also be written enharmonically as:
eI - b - g - d - A - E - C - A♯ - G♯ - F♯
In the so-called Scientific (or American) pitch reference notation, the tuning is written as:
E4 - B3 - G3 - D3 - A2 - E2 - C2 - B♭2 - A♭2 - G♭2 [from string 1 to 10]
NB! In both pitch referencing systems the octave starts on C. Thus, correctly, string 7 (C or C2) should be that with the widest diameter and lowest pitch, not 10. String 8 is a minor seventh above string 7, not a whole tone below it. Numerous authors, apparently not au fait with these systems of notation, have misrepresented the instrument’s tuning in print. It is thus no surprise that numerous guitarists have, over the past decades, been misled into using erroneous string configurations in order to tune one or all of strings 8, 9 and 10 an octave lower than they ought to be.
Since the guitar is a transposing instrument, we notate its tuning (that is, for all the strings) an octave higher than they actually sound.
[edit] Why this peculiar tuning? Why play a 10-string guitar?
The reasons for adopting the modern 10-string guitar are purely musical, and the first of them is that the guitar (in its other forms) is not properly balanced. There is no equilibrium, because of the 12 notes of the scale, only four - E, B, A, D - have significant resonance. If you play one of those notes on a treble string and then stop it at another fret or damp it with your finger, you will hear the same tone being sustained by resonance from one or more of the bass strings. But if you play one of the other eight tones of the scale, and do the same, the sound dies immediately. What this shows you is that the envelopes of the different tones are not consistent. However, on the 10-string guitar, one has the same resonance for all 12 tones.
After Narciso Yepes (1927-1997) had already achieved international fame as a concert artist of the first rank, he reached the point where the 6-string guitar no longer sufficed for his needs. For one, he felt that he was "cheating" his audience by compromising the music of Bach through the transpositions and changes in voice-leading imposed by the limitations of the 6-string guitar. However, more significantly, he was "disturbed" by the irregularity of resonance on the guitar, the consequence of an inherent flaw of its tuning. Four notes in particular (E, B, A, D) sounded full, enriched by sympathetic vibrations from the bass strings, while the other eight tones of the chromatic scale were without the same lustre and sustain. Yepes’s idea to correct this imbalance - a guitar with fully chromatic string resonators created in 1963 in collaboration with José Ramirez - followed a strict musical and scientific logic.
Upon adding four bass strings tuned a very specific way - C, B♭, A♭, G♭ - the same resonance is elicited by each of the notes that make up the fingerboard’s sonorous catalogue, by taking advantage of the natural resonant frequencies of the bass strings, which produce unison, sympathetic vibrations when their corresponding notes are played on adjacent strings. In other words, the seven bass strings act as tuned resonators (string resonators or sympathetic strings) that sustain and enrich the sound. That is not to say that the additional strings are not actively played. They are indeed also stopped by left-hand fingers and sounded by the right-hand, as required by the musical context. However, as resonators, each string responds to its unison, fifths, and their octaves. Thus C resonates with Cs and Gs; B♭ resonates with B♭s and Fs; A♭ resonates with A♭s and and E♭s; and G♭ with G♭s and D♭s, thus completing the string resonance for the twelve tones of the chromatic octave.
This does not mean a break from nor lack of respect for the admirable instrument of tradition, the repertoire and technique of which transfer easily to the new instrument without alteration (though with expanded technical and interpretative possibilities). Unlike some new guitars constructed from non-traditional materials or designs, the 10-string guitar is not basically different in sound colour, or timbre, from the traditional 6-string guitar. It does, however, offer extended tonal and dynamic ranges, greater and more consistent sustain, and greater consistency of timbre across the chromatic scale. Imagine a piano without a pedal that suddenly acquired one, what new possibilities in the enrichment of sound this means.
This result could be termed "resonance linearized over the chromatic octave" since any of the 12 tones can now receive the same sympathetic support from a bass string (or string resonator). As such, the envelope of tones (their "shape", timbre, sustain, decay) is now consistent over the entire chromatic scale. This is, in a certain sense, similar to the piano's equal timbre of tone and its ability to sustain by means of the pedals. Similarly, just as a pianist has the option to employ pedal or not, to allow sound to sustain or to damp it, the competent 10-string guitarist is able to execute complete control, sustaining or stopping notes as the Music (rather than the limitation of the guitar) dictates.
To those who object that it is too difficult, or "impossible", to do so, Narciso Yepes always responded that "If I have resonance, I can stop it. But first I must have it. You see, the problem is not in the [new] guitar, but in the player." With respect to the traditional 6-stringed guitar, this chromatic resonance and equal timbre of tone are intrinsically absent, but also equally unachievable with any tuning of a guitar with 10 strings other than the tuning discovered by Yepes.
Resonance is thus the primary reason for playing the modern 10-string guitar, but it is not the only reason. "If the guitar is to the lute what the piano is to the harpsichord - that is, a new expression of an old instrument -" said Yepes, "then, I should be able to take a piece of music composed for the lute and play it directly on the guitar, without making any [alteration] in the text, just as a pianist can play a harpsichord work of Bach or Scarlatti. This cannot be done on the six-string guitar, because the lute had more than six strings, especially during the Baroque period. At the same time, having the expanded range of the 10-string guitar makes it possible for me to approach [more faithfully] the music of Albeniz, Falla and other Spanish composers inspired by the guitar, but who composed for the piano. I can play their music as it is written, with no sacrifices."
Thus, it now becomes possible for the guitarist to play Bach and repertoire written for the Baroque lute without deleterious transposition of individual bass notes or compromises to voice-leading. The performance practice followed by Yepes (in particular when dealing with Baroque lute music) was occasionally to employ scordatura (’mistuning’) of the 7th string (the one with the lowest pitch), lowering it to BI or AI (that is, B1 or A1 in Scientific pitch notation).
A ubiquitous misconception (also rife among 10-string guitarists) is that these additional strings are intended to simplify the execution of bass notes by playing as many of them as possible on open strings (as on the lute or ’harp’-guitar). However, this approach is not consistent with the performance practice of Narciso Yepes. Actually, he played all notes between the tones of the open 6th and 7th strings as stops on the 7th string, not on individual open strings. (Appropriate scordatura of strings 6 and/or 7 would be applied, as required by the music.) This is evidenced in autograph manuscript sources indicating his own fingerings for works such as those of Bach or Weiss. His fingerings also show an implementation of the open (and stopped) strings 8-10 that, however, never becomes gratuitous or perfunctory. (A bass G♭ will frequently be executed with a full barré at II, rather than the open 10th string, out of consideration for nuance in tone and interpretation, or damping.)
Furthermore, aside from the fact that the instrument opens up more of the lute and keyboard repertoire, with less compromise, it also enables new possibilities for original composition. Some of the 20th century’s greatest composers, recognising the significance of Yepes’s development, have composed substantial works for the new instrument - among these, Bruno Maderna, Maurice Ohana, and Leonardo Balada.
Of course, the final reason is that, if you have a 10-string guitar, you have within it a six-string guitar; but if you have only six strings, you do not have 10. You have all the advantages and none of the disadvantages. All six-string repertoire is playable on the new instrument, with expanded interpretative possibilities. The new instrument also offers the guitarist the possibility to voice numerous "impossible" chords as originally written by non-guitarist composers such as Bach, Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Rodrigo, Ponce, Mompou etc. - once available only in versions compromised by the limitations of the 6-string guitar - now possible as written in the urtexts.
However, considering how much the modern 10-string guitar has been misrepresented and misunderstood, it is very difficult to find a well-made 10-string guitar, and the number of poorly made ones on the market can lead many guitarists to assume that those instruments are bad because they have 10 strings. No - they are bad because they have been built by bad luthiers, or otherwise by good ones who have not understood the tuning of the instrument and how it is meant to function. While there may now be other luthiers constructing good 10-string guitars, it is predominantly the Ramirez and Bernabe shops that have been associated with fine 10-string guitar.
[edit] Glossary of 10-string guitar terminology
"Baroque" tuning: (The same as Romantic tuning.) A misnomer. A string configuration of a guitar with ten strings that enables it to be tuned in a way that (it is claimed) approximates the tuning of the baroque lute. I add "approximates" because it is impossible to tune an instrument with ten strings exactly as an instrument with thirteen (or in some cases fourteen) courses. In this sense, numerous other "tunings" of guitars with ten strings can equally be said to approximate that of the baroque lute, including the standard string configuration of the Modern 10-string guitar that can be tuned in such a way that the open string pitches correspond to some of those of the baroque lute. For some decades this so-called "Baroque" tuning was mistakenly believed to be a prerequisite for the performance of baroque lute music on a guitar with ten strings. However, as the autograph manuscripts of Narciso Yepes’s transcriptions of baroque lute music prove, this assumption was false. (As a matter of fact, Yepes, who performed a substantial amount of baroque lute music, used the standard string configuration exclusively.) The earliest overt association of this "tuning" with the term "baroque" (at least, in the anglophone print) is in: Marlow, J. 1980. "Notes on the Ten-String Guitar". Soundboard 7(4): 151-154. Here this red herring is introduced as a "concept of tuning [intended] to satisfy guitarists interested in baroque lute music".
Damp: (verb). To check the vibrations of a string by touching it in some way. In this context used predominantly with regard to the silencing of a sympathetically vibrating string, or a vibrating open string.
Envelope: A change of amplitude, frequency, or timbre during a tone. The characteristic way in which the intensity of a note changes through time. The envelope of, say, an F4 played on a treble string of the guitar is usually an immediate attack followed by a very rapid decay after the stopping finger has been moved or the string has been stopped at a different fret. (See stop.) In contrast, an E4 would (because of resonance from strings 5 and 6) have a completely different envelope, one with a very gradual decay, or damping, of the amplitude. The aim of the Standard tuning of the Modern 10-string guitar is to achieve consistency between the envelopes of all twelve tones of the Western chromatic scale. While experiments with new soundboard materials and construction, and experimental bracing patterns may result in guitars with ever greater volume and sustain, it is only through the implementation of appropriately tuned string resonators that the shape of the envelope, in particular its decay, can be linearized for the entire chromatic scale even after the vibrating string has been damped or stopped at another fret.
Fundamental: The lowest pitched partial in a tone.
Harmonics: Frequency components of a complex tone that are positive integer multiples (greater than 0) of a fundamental frequency. Guitarists have sometimes used the term "harmonic" to refer to a resonance induced on a "sympathetic" string.
Harp-guitar: According to its proponents, a guitar with at least one "free floating" or theorboed string (i.e. a string that cannot be stopped; that does not run over a fingerboard). Such instruments commonly feature a number of extra strings descending (or ascending) diatonically, as in D2-C2-B1-A1. A problematic term since, by definition, the strings on instruments from the harp family run perpendicular to the soundboard, not parallel, as in the case of so-called harp-guitars. Unlike lutes, the string-holders and bridges of all true harps are vertical, not horizontal, and the plane of their strings is always perpendicular to the soundtable, not parallel. Perhaps a more appropriate term would be derived from the lute, like "theorbo-guitar". (See laudarra.) Both period instruments with ten strings that were used in the 19th century, including the Decacorde, were harp-guitars.
Helmholtz system of pitch referencing: Middle C is indicated as c’, the note below it as b and the note above it as d’. An octave lower these notes are B-c-d, another octave lower BI-C-D. [It is understandable that some individuals unfamiliar with the system have assumed, incorrectly, that the Standard tuning descends in a whole-tone scale from 7 to 10, misreading C-Bb-Ab-Gb as meaning C-BbI-AbI-GbI. Actually there is a re-entry after the 7th string. Thus, on the Modern 10-string guitar proper, 7 or C is correctly the string with the lowest pitch, and not 10.] (NB: The note written as Middle C in sheet music for guitar is, of course, not C4, but C3, since the guitar is a transposing instrument.)
Laudarra: From the Spanish laud (lute) and guitarra. A misnomer as applied to the Modern 10-string guitar proper, one that emphasises the secondary reason behind the Modern 10-string guitar while disregarding the primary reason of resonance and linearized envelopes over the chromatic scale.
Marlow tuning (Marlow Method): Formerly this used to be D2, C(sharp)2, G(sharp)2, F(sharp)2 [from string 8 to 10]. Presently it is an altogether different string configuration: B2, F(sharp)2, C(sharp)2, G(sharp)1. Whatever the merits of this system may be, it must be stated that it is categorically unsuitable for a tasteful and stylistically authentic performance of baroque (lute) music. The aesthetic problem is the introduction of stylistically inappropriate melodic intervals (compound intervals) in the bass line, concomitant with problems of voice-leading. The cause of this problem is the octave transposition of numerous individual bass notes that are placed on the available open strings, without regard for the original melodic intervals, voice-leading, or register of the original bass note/s, or of the aesthetic rules underlying the composition of baroque music. The technical cause of these problems is the string configuration that makes it impossible to stop the lowest string (which would otherwise render the bass notes in the appropriate register) while stopping the trebles. The idea behind this system was supposedly to have the 7 notes of the heptatonic scale available as open bass strings [more like a harp than a guitar]. Unfortunately this "scale" does not follow step-wise, but leaps about randomly. For example, the so-called Marlow C-tuning actually delivers this "scale": C2, D3, E2, F2, G1, A2, B2 [strings 9, 4, 6, 8, 10, 5, 7 - in that order, which must surely be a nightmare to damp individually]. Of course, this sort of "scale", made up as it is of leaps of compound intervals, is simply not suitable for baroque music. Instead of having 7 as the lowest string (in which case the left hand fingers could stop the lowest string to form a true scale, with the basses in the appropriate register), this configuration introduces a wholly redundant B2-string. That is, it introduces no resonance that is wanting, while B2 can already be stopped in high or low positions on the fingerboard, on 5 (fret II) and on 6 (fret VII). I therefore see no musico-aesthetic, technical, or acoustic justification for this string configuration.
Modern tuning: See Standard tuning.
Overtones: Harmonic components in a tone that are pitched higher than the fundamental. They are also natural resonant frequencies. Guitarists have often used the term "overtone" to refer to a resonance induced on a "sympathetic" string.
Partials: Individual sinusoids that collectively make up an instrumental tone; also called components. Observing that a string, say C, will resonate strongly when tones are played (on adjacent strings) that correspond in frequency to the C-string’s partials 1-4, 6 and 8 (in Helmholtz notation: C, c, g, c’, g’ c’’ - which are resonant frequencies), guitarists have sometimes used the term "partial" to refer to a resonance induced on a "sympathetic" string.
Re-entry tuning: A string configuration where a string of wide diameter is suddenly followed by a string of considerably smaller diameter. For example, a re-entry occurs between the 7th or C-string of the Standard tuning and the 8th or B-flat string, which are a minor 7th apart, string 7 being the thicker and lower-sounding of the two. In Marlow method the re-entry occurs between the 6th and 7th strings (7 has the highest pitch of all the Marlow basses, except string 4), while there is no re-entry present on 19th century 10-stringed guitars.
Resonance: The tendency of a system (like a string) to vibrate sympathetically at a particular frequency in response to energy induced at that frequency. For example, the A-sharp (Bb) or 8th string of the Modern 10-string guitar has resonant frequencies (A-sharps and Fs are by far the most efficient) that will cause it to vibrate in unison with these frequencies when they are produced on adjacent strings.
Resonant frequency: The frequency that is most effective at enabling a vibrating system to return to its original energy level by dissipation. A vibrating object will pick out its resonant frequencies from a complex excitation and vibrate at those frequencies, essentially "filtering out" other frequencies present in the excitation.
Romantic tuning: In the 19th century, the standard tuning of the most widely used harp-guitar with ten strings: e’-b-g-d-A-E-D-C-BI-AI [in Helmholtz pitch reference notation]. (See "Baroque" tuning.) The tuning for which most of the original 10-stringed guitar repertoire of the 19th century was written. Over the past two to three decades, proponents of this system have appropriated instruments designed to be Modern 10-string guitars. This has led to the confusion of two conceptually and sonorously disparate instruments with (for the most part) incompatible repertoires and technical approaches. [Or, I should say, some of the Romantic 10-string repertoire can be successfully transcribed for Modern 10-string guitar, while the inverse is not true. Another point to consider is that Romantic 10-string guitar music, in many examples, requires the left hand thumb (indicated by the sign ^) to come around the back of the neck and stop the 6th string, usually to produce basses such as G(sharp)2. This becomes problematic if you are using a Modern instrument in Romantic tuning since you are no longer dealing with a harp-guitar and the LH thumb does not have access to the 6th string.]
Scientific/American system of pitch referencing: Middle C is indicated as C4, the note below it as B3 and the note above it as D4. An octave lower these notes are B2-C3-D3, another octave lower B1-C2-D2. (It is understandable that some individuals unfamiliar with the system have mistakenly assumed that the Standard tuning descends in pitch from 7 to 10. Actually there is a re-entry after the 7th string. Thus, on the Modern 10-string guitar, 7 or C (C2) is correctly the string with the lowest pitch, not 10 (Gb2). [NB: The note written as Middle C in sheet music for guitar is, of course, not C4, but C3, since the guitar is a transposing instrument.]
Scordatura: ’Mistuning’, abnormal tuning of a string instrument to obtain special chordal effects or extended bass range. (Occurs most often, with reference to Standard tuning, as the raising of string 7 from C2 to D2, or the lowering of this string to B1 (or, less commonly, A1).
Standard tuning: e’-b-g-d-A-E-C-Bb-Ab-Gb [in Helmholtz notation]. The original tuning of the Modern 10-string guitar as conceived by Narciso Yepes. The singular tuning of the last four strings which catalyses linearisation of dynamic response for the entire chromatic scale by eliciting exact sympathetic resonance. The string configuration for which the majority of original compositions for Modern 10-string guitar have been written, including the works of Maurice Ohana, Bruno Maderna, and Leonardo Balada. (Sometimes referred to as Modern Tuning, Yepes Tuning, or Resonance Tuning.)
Stop: (verb). On string instruments, ’stopping’ means the placing of the fingers on a string, thereby determining the length of portion of string which is to vibrate. A characteristic of the Modern 10-string guitar as conceived by Narciso Yepes is that most tones lower than the E2 of the open 6th string (i.e. Eb2, D2/Db2, C2, B1/Bb1) are not consigned to their own open strings (as on harp-guitars), but formed by stopping the 7th string (which can be lowered from C2 to B1 or A1). (For the act of silencing a vibrating string, see damp.)
String configuration: Often incorrectly called "tuning". The arrangement of strings of various diameters. For example, Romantic "tuning" and Marlow "method" are not scordatura (or different tunings) of the same string configuration, but totally different arrangements of strings of various diameters. Where Marlow string-7 has a diameter smaller than that of the normal 5th string, the Romantic string-7 (at least, not on period instruments from the 19th century, but appropriated modern instruments) has a diameter greater than that of the normal 6th string. Where Romantic string-10 has the greatest diameter, the Standard-Modern string-7 has the greatest diameter.
"Tuning": A misnomer as used regarding guitars with ten strings; for example Romantic "tuning", so-called baroque "tuning" (a double-misnomer), Marlow "tuning", etc. Not synonymous with scordatura, this is not simply a case of tuning the strings in a manner other than the standard, but such a drastic re-tuning as to require a totally different method of stringing (different string order and/or strings of different diameter) compared to the standard string configuration.
Unison: Tones sounding at the same pitch. The resonances produced by the bass strings of the Modern 10-string guitar with the tuning D3-A2-E2-C2-Bb2-Ab2-Gb2 are intended to sound in unison with any tone of the chromatic scale played on the instrument’s treble strings.
[edit] FAQs
(in preparation)
Are the additional basses ever played or do they just resonate?
All seven basses act as tuned resonators, and all seven basses are actively played. One need only open the sheet music of Maurice Ohana’s Si le jour parait... to see that all the strings are played by the right hand, while string 7 is frequently stopped by fingers of the left hand. In pieces like T.E. Fleming’s Solis - Prim, in fact, all strings are played by both the right and left hand fingers. In addition, Narciso Yepes’s autograph manuscripts, like that of the "Suite" (or Sonata) II by S.L. Weiss, show that Yepes even stopped notes on the 10th string. His reason in this example (from the last page of the Giga) has to do with avoiding dissonant "bleeding" of one bass note over another when playing a melodic interval of a minor 2nd, A2 stopped on 10 to G-sharp2 on the open 9th string (rather than the open 5th string followed by the open 9th string). [I myself stop notes on the 9th and 10th strings in various works, from Sonatas by Adam Falckenhagen, to Granados’s 5th Spanish Dance, to contemporary works by Stanley Glasser and others.] Furthermore, pieces by Bruno Maderna and Leonardo Balada feature 10-note cluster chords.
Why is 7 the lowest string and not 10? Why is there a re-entry in the tuning of the modern 10-string guitar?
There are two reasons. One has to do with resonance, the other with technical considerations.
Resonance: Just as the higher overtones of a vibrating string become increasingly inaudible, the higher resonant frequencies of a string elicit increasingly weaker resonances. The standard tuning of the modern 10-string guitar’s additional four strings is C2, Bb2, Ab2, Gb2 [from 7 to 10] and not C2, Bb1, Ab1, Gb1 because this [the standard] configuration places the most efficient resonant frequencies in the range of the treble strings, rather than the bass strings.
Technique: I would argue that, aside from resonance for all notes of the chromatic scale, the other defining characteristic of the modern 10-string proper is Yepes’s ingenious decision to use the tone of C for string 7 and to make this the string with the lowest sound. Why? For one reason, a C-string (C2) can be raised to D2 [for the 7-string music by Coste and others] or lowered to B1 or A1 (giving the full bass tessitura of the 13-course baroque lute). [Unfortunately, most string manufacturers still don’t realise that this is how the instrument has actually been designed to work and, to my knowledge, only Aranjuez’s 7th string is manufactured specifically to cope optimally with this scordatura.] The second (and very important) reason why this lowest string is number 7, not number 10, is because the guitarist should be able to stop it (to form the bass notes that are not available as open strings: G2, F2, Eb2, D2, Db2...down to Bb1) while, at the same time, stopping the trebles, playing chords, arpeggios, or other voices with the left hand on the trebles. This would, of course, be very awkward and often impossible if 10 were the lowest string instead of 7. In such cases, the solution (transposition of single bass notes to open strings) would be the one we observe in the published transcription for the Marlow Method of "Suite" VIII (London Ms.) by S.L. Weiss, where, instead of hearing a smooth bass line moving by steps (A2 to G-sharp2 [minor 2nd] to F-sharp2 [major 2nd]), we hear erratic leaps of augmented octaves [A2 to G-sharp1], minor 7ths [G-sharp1 to F-sharp2] and such stylistically inappropriate melodic intervals. Of course, instrumental music from the baroque period – the "daughter", in the words of Johann Mattheson (1739) – must conform to the motherly precepts of vocal music, in which "everything is beautifully graceful and flowing", not leaping about in augmented octaves and other compound intervals.
Would it not be simpler to do away with the re-entry by switching strings 8 and 10?
[This would result in a descending and then ascending tuning as follows: E4, B3, G3, D3, A2, E2, C2, Gb2, Ab2, Bb2]
No. The original configuration is a conscious invention that Narciso Yepes did not settle on without a considerable amount of though (not to mention considerable musical experience and knowledge). The musical and technical logic behind it is thorough. What Yepes must surely have been aware of is that, when playing a descending line, with each descending step the higher note must be damped or else the line becomes muddled, while ascending lines are not equally susceptible to this phenomenon. So the technical reason for not inverting the order of the strings is that the thumb naturally damps the higher string (say 9 or Ab2) after sounding the lower (say 10 or Gb2) and coming to rest on the higher string. Of course, the other way around the string could also be damped, by the knuckle-side of the thumb, just a millisecond before sounding the next string, but this approach is unnecessarily technical and never quite as smooth or legato. Also, the suites of Maurice Ohana, Leonardo Balada, and other composers’ works, in fact the majority of original compositions for the modern 10-string guitar, have been written with the standard string configuration in mind and contain, among other things, fast arpeggios across the basses or across all ten strings, which would be impossible to play correctly if the order of the strings is unnecessarily changed.
What tuning did Narciso Yepes use to play baroque lute music?
For aesthetico-acoustic reasons, as much as possible the standard tuning in which 7 or C2 is the lowest string. However, when he has basses lower than C2, it is due to a scordatura of 7 (and NOT a so-called "baroque" tuning, which is really another string configuration and does not exist, as such, before it is "made up" by others in the late-1970s).
What those individuals who refuse to accept these facts seem to overlook are three things:
ONE, that scordatura can be applied (as Yepes did) to either 7 alone (which can be raised to D2 or lowered to B1 or A1) or to both 7 and 6 (which can be lowered to D2), while the tones between the two are stopped on 7.
TWO, that one tuning need not apply to all parts of a multi-movement work; for example, 6 can be in D2 for the initial movement/s, then later raised to E2 between movements.
THREE, that even on the 10-string guitar some minor changes are still necessary when playing baroque lute music written for instruments with 13-14 courses. In fact, it is in keeping with the performance practice of baroque musicians like J.S. Bach to adapt a composition to the instrument at hand. Quasi-religious reification/deification of the text is a thoroughly modern mentality that has nothing to do with authenticity in baroque music. Having said that, any changes need to be made within the space of what is stylistically appropriate and for the period!
Yepes played a considerable amount of baroque lute and keyboard music (by Bach, Weiss, Straube, Falckenhagen, and many others) most of which is not available on CD or in print. (I am fortunate to have access to some of these arrangements, either as transcribed by Yepes’s long-term students Fritz Buss and Godelieve Monden, or in Yepes’s own autograph manuscripts.) What is evident is that there is no one key that opens every door, no one tuning that makes all baroque lute music immediately accessible on the 10-string guitar. [Though having 7 as the lowest string is of the utmost importance!] What is required is careful consideration of the various possibilities; often, appropriate transposition of the entire piece (this is more often than not a tone or semitone up when dealing with transcription from baroque lute to modern guitar); appropriate scordatura, not just for technical simplification, but when it is a technical necessity (most often this is 7 lowered to B1); where necessary, stylistically informed changes (for example, rather transposing an entire phrase of the bass line to maintain the correct voice-leading and appropriate melodic intervals, instead of transposing individual bass notes, unless at appropriate points such as unisons or octaves); and, finally, careful and conscious fingering (as opposed to the perfunctory use of open strings concomitant with ill-considered octave transpositions of individual notes).
[There's a video on youtube that clearly shows Yepes performing two movements from Bach’s Suite in E minor BWV 996, with a scordatura of 7 to B1. His performance practice of stopping all the low-basses on string 7 is evident and undeniable.]
Ana Yepes (in private communication, 9 April 2008) categorically confirms what I have stated all along:
"Concerning the tuning ot the strings for Bach’s Suites, you are right, the standard tuning is: 7th string is C[2], 8th string is B flat (a minor 7th higher then the 7th string), 9th string is A flat, 10th string is G flat. For some pieces, the 7th would be B natural, for pieces in A minor [BWV 995], the 7th would be in A. The 10th also has some changes. Sometimes he also retuned the 7th string in-between movements of the same piece." [Brackets are my editorial additions.]
What tuning did Yepes use to play/record the Suite [London Ms. II] by S.L. Weiss? (Transposed to E major)
E4, B3, G3, D3, A2, E2, B1, A-sharp2, G-sharp2, F-sharp2
Source: Yepes’s autograph manuscript showing his transcription, tuning and fingering (all in his own handwriting).
All notes between E2 and B1 are fingered on string 7. G-sharp2 and F-sharp2 basses are not mindlessly played on open strings, but sometimes open, sometimes stopped on 6, and other times stopped on 7 - always with thought for aesthetic effect, always considering the musical context, consistency of timbre, purity of line, and damping to avoid dissonances (for example, the minor 2nd between A2 and G-sharp2, which are not just perfunctorily played on open strings for the sake of simplicity).
[edit] The Ten-string Guitar, Defended Against its Devotees
There exist numerous types of period instruments with the same number of strings, including the Lacoste/Carulli ’Decacorde’ and the 10-stringed guitars used, in the 19th Century, by such players as J.K. Mertz: all of which are, really, types of harp-guitars.
These are in no way antecedents or precursors of the modern 10-string guitar of Yepes whose raison d’être is linearised string resonance over the entire chromatic octave. Since, on these instruments, the tunings of the additional strings (usually descending diatonic basses, such as D2, C2, B1, A1), normally augment the already extant imbalance of resonance on the guitar rather than rectifying it, they should be recognised as conceptually (and acoustically) disparate from the modern 10-string guitar. Moreover, the additional strings on these "Romantic" 10-stringed guitars are intended only to be played by the right hand thumb, while the additional strings on the Modern 10-string guitar: 1) are intended to function as resonators, 2) can be played open, and 3) can be played stopped (to facilitate new fingering possibilities and otherwise impossible chords).
That is not to say that these early instruments should not be used by period practitioners to play the music of, say, Ferdinando Carulli or J.K. Mertz. Indeed, it is most appropriate to use these instruments for this music. However, a problem arises when modern instruments, visually similar to the Ramirez/Yepes 10-string guitar, are appropriated to be strung in the manner of the 19th century, with diatonic basses. From my experience, this sort of hybridised guitar (that looks like a modern 10-string guitar, but is not) is neither truly well adapted for playing 19th century multi-string guitar music (which requires the theorboed configuration, both for reasons of sound and technique), nor is it really any better adapted for lute music than the modern string configuration. Unlike the new interpretative possibilities offered by the linearised resonance of the Yepes tuning, a modern type 10-string guitar with "Romantic" tuning does not add anything to the interpretation of 6-string guitar music (except the need for more damping of over-ringing tones of E, B, A and D), and it cannot, at all, be used to play the great 10-string guitar works of Maderna, Balada, and Ohana.
Still more systems of stringing/tuning have recently been introduced. Some are even touted off as "evolutionary development[s]" following from and "furthering the meaning" of Yepes’s ideas (which have, unfortunately, been misunderstood or disregarded). Based on many years of theoretical research and practical experience, it is my conclusion that these developments have little or no grounds to such claims, acoustically or aesthetically. To change the manner in which the modern 10-string guitar is strung and tuned is to dispense entirely with the instrument’s primary raison d’être (balanced, chromatic resonance) as well as a number of its most ingenious technical features (such as placing as 7th, rather than 10th, the string with the lowest pitch).
The results are not novel and no improvement on the foundations already established by Yepes. They simply introduce technical ’crutches’: tricks that resolve difficulties (and obviate thought) at the expense of the music, which is stylistically mangled in the process. I refer particularly to baroque (lute) music played on the 10-string guitar with individual bass notes transposed intermittently up and down by octaves (rather than transposing the entire phrase of the bass line), for the sake of using open bass-strings as frequently as possible, resulting in stylistically inappropriate melodic intervals, problems with voice leading, and general disruption of the bass line. (Unfortunately, in art there are no short-cuts that lead anywhere except culs-de-sac.)
For some this is good enough, but I cannot imagine elite musicians being satisfied with such. This is truly "progress" in the wrong direction; there is no point in reinventing the wheel as an oval.
[edit] Defending (against) the Importance of (bass range over) Resonance
An argument that has been made against "the balanced resonances" of the 10-string guitar is that (although the "[f]acts are straight") its "importance is a personal opinion" and that "[m]any 10-string players prefer more bass range over the resonances."
As someone who implicitly ’believes’ in "the importance of balanced [chromaticised] resonance", I should like to respond to the above statements.
First, let us consider the Facts:
1. That the primary purpose behind the invention of the modern 10-string guitar of Yepes is resonance linearized across the 12 notes of the chromatic octave. 2. That the secondary purpose behind its invention is extended bass range to facilitate more faithful playing of lute and keyboard music. 3. That the bass strings act as tuned resonators. To put it simply—forgoing a lengthy acoustic explanation of resonance and the overtones of vibrating strings—(4) resonates strongly with D [and A], likewise (5) with A [and E], (6) resonates strongly with E and B, likewise (7) with C and G, (8) with A-sharp and F, (9) with G-sharp and D-sharp, and (10) with F-sharp and C-sharp. [In other words, the harmonics corresponding to the open strings’ octaves and fifths produce the only resonances that are pronounced enough to be of significance. Four strings tuned a specific way are required to compensate for the missing or feeble resonances, which are eight in total, not four as stated in some unscholarly and misleading (con-)texts. 4. That chromatic string resonance is present as a direct consequence of the singular tuning: e’ b g d A E C A-sharp G-sharp F-sharp. 5. That the above is not a matter of opinion, but that it is based on laws of physics/acoustics and can be mathematically and empirically proven.
These facts belong to the category of Truth. However, I aim to refute the categorisation of "the importance of the balanced resonances" as a Belief—a subjective, "personal opinion of the writer". [A tacit ’individual’ is implied before "writer", as in belonging to the margins rather than consensus. I shall return to this in a moment.]
While the above judgment repudiates the Truth of this importance (and by extension disclaims its epistemic foundations) it is ironically unaware of its own, self-deprecating argument. In other words, let us not forget that this statement ("the importance of the balanced resonances is a personal opinion of the writer") also belongs to the category of Belief as a personal opinion of its own writer. It refutes nothing, but undermines itself as the proverbial pot that calls the kettle black.
Let us also bear in mind that the ’opinion’ (that resonance linearized over the chromatic octave has interpretative advantages and therefore aesthetic significance) is an ’opinion’ that has been shared by a number of highly respected musical figures, persons with significant experience, who’ve been highly trained and/or possess a high degree of knowledge/skill, including the late Bruno Maderna and Maurice Ohana. Ask any concert pianist whether s/he would deem acceptable a piano whose pedal mechanism is damaged in such a way that only tones of E, B, A, and D resonate/sustain, and the answer will universally be an emphatic: NO! Even guitarist Stephan Schmidt, whatever tuning he may have used to record Bach (and I emphasise the difference between recording and live performance), without any doubt, predominantly uses the Yepes tuning of the 10-string guitar in concert. His reason for playing the instrument is, after all, to have access to the works of significant 20th century composers, like Messrs Maderna & Ohana, who wrote their music specifically for Yepes’s instrument because of its chromatic resonance. And, it goes without saying, as an authority there is Narciso Yepes himself: the most musically and otherwise erudite concert guitarist of his generation, an already brilliant mind sharpened by studies with such luminaries as Nadia Boulanger, Vicente Asencio, Walter Gieseking, and Georges Enesco.
For some [and I include myself here] this recourse to authority is sufficient to establish as Truth the aesthetic significance of chromatic resonance [though this is hardly the sole basis for my own ’opinion’ on the matter].
In contrast, a statement such as "Many 10-string players prefer more bass range over the resonances" is recourse not to authority, but to majority. It is an argumentum ad populum, a fallacy of logic that states Truth is the opinion of the majority, or Truth is what the masses believe. (Another eyeless uroboric worm devours its own backside.)
In addition, this argument also contradicts its author’s previous statement that the "[f]acts are straight". [Now I’m being facetious, but let’s see it through.] The fact given (above) as number 2 is that Yepes’s 10-string guitar already offers an extended bass range in addition to chromatic resonance. [This comes straight out of the article in question, which is drawn almost verbatim from Yepes’s own press materials, recital programmes and interviews.] In other words, extended bass range and chromatic resonance (i.e. Yepes Tuning) are not mutually exclusive.
On a more practical level: if one has a correctly built instrument (for example, Ramirez or Bernabe), and one uses a correctly manufactured 7th string (that is to say the 7th by Aranjuez and not LaBella or Hannabach), and one lowers the 7th or C string to B1 or A1 [in Scientific/American pitch notation], and one has a technique approaching [or surpassing?] that of Yepes, then one ought to be able to have access to the full extended bass range, without completely re-stringing the instrument. Though one would, like Yepes, have to finger many of the additional low bass notes. It is, after all, expected of any 6-string guitarist to do the same, rather than resorting to the technical crutches of harp-like open strings.
Finally, let us not forget, the purpose of having "more bass range" (for playing lute or keyboard music) is to be, in our capacity as guitarists, more faithful to the composer’s musical Ideas—to approach a more formally and stylistically accurate representation of these Ideas—than is possible on the 6-string guitar. If a 10-string guitar does this, while also offering the extended interpretative possibilities of chromatic resonance—the possibility of more rounded phrasing, greater sustain and cohesion, extended dynamic range, greater evenness of timbre, the possibility of playing slow pieces at an appropriately slow tempo without running out of sound, and other interpretative subtleties (think of the benefits of the piano’s various pedals)—then the existence of the 10-string guitar on the world concert stage is fully justified, even [dare I say?] as the Standard. (It has the potential.) However, if a 10-stringed guitar is used for neither of these purposes—when that uroboric telos of extra basses merely for the sake of extra basses rears its ugly head—...well, this is, after all, the general misconception that the guitar world holds about the instrument—and the reason why (despite being promoted by great players like Yepes and Schmidt, or in another incarnation, by Carulli, Mertz, Regondi, Coste et al.) the instrument itself remains in the margins of the margins.
