Thomas Mace, in his “Musick’s Monument” (1676), tried to defend the lute and uphold it as the supreme instrument, but ultimately his argument showed that the lute was on a decline, and one from which it never quite recovered.Despite this decline, great players of the lute continued to produce amazing music and hold the highest positions at important courts. Depending on the type of the lute strings, the sound can be crisper and brighter than the modern guitar. However, some of the music was written for a lute with the first string at A, with a very short string length. The smallest movement or brush is audible on the body of a lute. (see de:Deutsche Basslaute) With time, you’ll figure out how to make it respond quickly by adjusting your level of force and perfecting your technique. Depending on the type of the lute strings, the sound can be crisper and brighter than the modern guitar. This allows for very fast and accurate diminutions. Courts like those of Henry VIII, Francois I and the Pope in Rome hired lutenists as personal musicians and as means of cultural competition, pitting lute players against each other in contests that often impacted a ruler’s status amongst his peers. In some instances your might People will often ask me, “What is a lute?” In truth, the history of the lute is a long one and I often simply explain that it’s like a guitar with more strings. The instrument has a regular six-stringed guitar setup on a lute bowl, however there are many theorboed variants with up to 11 strings. In terms of the actual instrument, even the largest lutes are significantly lighter in build than the average guitar. The hand position itself remained largely the same, but the instrument could now play solo material of remarkable complexity. A lute guitar or German lute (German: Gitarrenlaute, Deutsche Laute or Wandervogellaute, less commonly a lutar (modern Turkish), gui-lute or gittar) is a stringed musical instrument, common in Germany from around 1850. They're feather light in your hands and seemingly designed to maximize the sound produced by low-tension strings. Classical guitars sound very dead to me. It takes some getting used to.The sound when you pick closers to the bridge of a guitar is very "metallic" sounding, and closer to the neck is more "round". The most obvious difference between the lute and the guitar is the pear-shaped body of the lute, which is produced by gluing ribs of wood together and then gluing the soundboard on top. If I have the time, though, I really do love to give a more complete answer. (My solution to lack of volume in a mixed ensemble is to cheat and use stick-on piezo pickups and amplification. Lyre vs. Lute: Everything You Need To Know. A cheap Regarding reading music with lute, you’ll need to learn at least Note that reading from Renaissance era printed music is another challenge entirely. You need cleaner right-hand technique than with a guitar.Lutes are QUIET. Alberto da Ripa of Mantua, for example, was hired by the French court of Francois I, as the royal lutenist. Like oud players, the new European lute players continued to play the instrument with a plectrum or a bird quill.
As a guitar player, I rarely had to deal with the issue of explaining what my instrument was to people I met. If a really nice classical guitar is like a craft beer, a great lute is more like a fine aged wine. I've been looking for information on differences in sound of lute and guitar but am having a hard time finding specific examples of one versus the other. The fretting hand seems to have been very similar to modern technique. The gut frets I use don't reduce sustain terribly, but I use varnished gut so it lasts longer.A well-made lute will likely feel and sound MORE resonant than any classical guitar. Thomann Lute vs Roosebeck Lute vs Harp-Guitar, questions from a beginner A bit of background. Through paintings and other iconographic sources, we have been able to reconstruct much of this early picking technique and determine that it is remarkably similar to modern mandolin and even electric guitar playing.