[smufl-discuss] Re: Lute tablature (Was: Towards SMuFL 1.0)

[dspreadbury]

Steve wrote:

> I’ll send you some print outs (scanned) from unknown sources on lute
> notation this weekend. Currently visiting family and away from my
resources.

That's very kind, but what would actually be most useful to me would be a
categorised list of the glyphs relating to lute tablature that should be
added to SMuFL, rather than print-outs of lute music or other
uncategorised sources.

If there are others in the community with some expertise in this area, I
would welcome your contributions, too.

Daniel

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[Maurizio M. Gavioli]

I am not an expert of all kind of historic tabulatures, being more familiar with the (not so often used) tabulature for the viol than else (lute, guitar or 'chitarriglia', cittern and so on), but I believe I can summarize the most important points.

As far as historic tabulatures are concerned, briefly speaking there are 3 kinds of symbols (note that 'Italian' and 'French' are standard conventional names; Italian tabulature was used also in Spain and French tabulature also in England):

1) Fret marks:

Placed on (or above) the staff lines, they mark the fret to be played. They can be:
1a) Digits '0' - '9' (Italian tabulature); can be combined into 2-digit numbers, but in historic sources, 'X' is more often found than '10', with any sort of vagaries for '11', '12' and so on.
1b) Letters 'a' - 'p' (French tabulature).
1c) Fret marks can also appear in an additional row below (French) or above (Italian) the staff to indicate playing an open, non-fingered, string ('bass strings' or 'bordoni'); Italian tabs may use '0' with as many 'ledger lines' as the number of the bass string or may simply use the string number itself; French tabs use as many '/' before the letter as the number of the bass string minus 1 ('a', '/a', '//a', ...); assuming ledger lines are already known to the program, the additional '/' symbol should be included.

It is customary for tab programs to include several styles of both 1a) and 1b).
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2) Duration symbols:

Placed above the staff, they mark the duration of the fret marks below. Usually the symbol is not repeated if the duration of following notes/chords does not change. There are several styles, which can be summarized in three major variants (all variants also include the augmentation dot):
2a) more or less 'regular' note shapes, with note head, stem and flag; prevalently used in later French tabulatures; same meaning as similar shape in standard notation;
2b) head-less note shapes, usually with 'cursive' flags; more used in late Italian tabulatures and/or French tabulature; same meaning as the corresponding shape in standard notation
2c) 'stick' stem-flag: made of just a stem with 0-to-4/5 flags in a characteristic 'stick' style. 0 flag = semibreve, 1 flag = minima, 2 flags = semiminima and so on. In practice, symbols have each 2 flags more that standard notation. Stem is usually slightly slanted and the dot, if present, is a rectangle, rather than a circle or a diamond.

Whether to use stylistic alternatives for these variants or not may not be a simple decision. Programs supporting historic tabulatures are expected to have them; also they refer to different times and/or cultural contexts, so they are not really 100% equivalent semantically. Keeping in mind that, despite being there since long, OTF stylistic variants are still badly supported by most OSes or application frameworks, forcing the use of stylistic variants to spare a dozen of symbols or so may add an unnecessary level of complication.
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3) Diacritics: tabulatures can have any kind of additional symbols.

3a) The most important are, I think, the fingering marks; for this, dots under the digit/letter were commonly used: nothing = thumb, 1 under-dot = index, 2 under-dots = middle, 3 under-dots = ring (the little finger was not used). 2-dots and 3-dots are later additions; occasionally, the dot(s) are placed after the digit, if there is no room below.

3b) Ornaments may also be present and were for the great part the same as the (contemporary) 'standard' scores (assuming there was anything standard in ornaments!). One may assume the notation program to be already equipped to deal with them or they to pertain to other sections of SMuFL. Lute may be special, as 'standard' scores were not used for it until much later, so lute tabs may use specific ornaments: a lute specialist is required for this; I can consult some, but I'm sure you will have no problems in contacting more.

3c) 'Tenute' (Fr. 'tenues', 'held notes?') were also common, shown as slightly curved lines, similar to very flat slurs, starting on a fret mark and ending 'nowhere', telling that a note should be held, without removing the finger from the string; they are not candidate for glyphs, though, as they will be surely rendered with graphic primitives by the notation program.
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If useful, I can provide a sample TTF (or .SFD) font with 1) and 2) in several styles, which is used in MuseScore 2.0 unstable, unreleased version (for which I implemented tab support).

Hoping it helps,

Maurizio M. Gavioli