La Guitare Baroque Part IV

Angelo Michele Bartolotti, sa vie, ses oeuvres et l'adaptation de ses oeuvres choisies en ré majeur pour la guitare moderne

Université de Montréal

Par Amir Houshangi
Présenté à l'examen général de doctorat
Novembre 2021

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4.2.2. Instructions and signs in the second book:
In the second book, Bartolotti used illustrative examples with brief explanations to clarify the instructions instead of using long sentences, making these instructions easier to understand.
These instructions are explained one by one below:
1- “Arpeggio disteso /Lettere con segni per l'arpeggio”, Stretched Arpeggio / Letters with signs for the Arpeggio.
Unlike his 1st book, in the 2nd book Bartolotti, used the % sign to indicate chord arpeggiation.
Explained with a pictorial example, he clarified that if the symbol % is placed below each Alfabeto letter, that chord should be arpeggiated instead of strumming. (Fig.36)

_{Fig.36. : Stretched Arpeggio / Letters with signs for the Arpeggio..}
 

2- "Colpi in giù et in su": Down and up Strokes
This one is straightforward; if the note's stem is downwards, it means downstroke, and if it is upwards, it means upstroke. (Fig37)

_{Fig. 37 Down Up Down Up}

This style seems to be Bartolotti's initiative, especially in the case of Alfabeto chords as Monica Hall states:
"His Secondo Libro is also unusual in that instead of indicating the direction of the strummed strokes in the Italian manner with small stroke marks down or up from the lowest line of the tablature; he has adopted the French system of placing the note values on the stave with the stems down or up as appropriate. In an added refinement to this system, he places the note-head on the tablature line representing the lowest note of the chord, which may be on the third, fourth or fifth course."⁸⁹

_{89 . Hall. Monica,” Angelo Michele Bartolotti: Prince of Muse”s, 2013, (p-39)}

3- “Lettere tagliate”: Cut letters
In simple terms, Bartolotti sometimes removed the fifth string from the chord by drawing a small line on Alfabeto's letters to avoid unpleasant harmony and converting the 2nd inversion chords to their root positions. These letters with slash lines are called Lettere Tagilate or cut letters, and of all Alfabeto's letters used by him, only the letters G. P and F have cut letters version. (Fig.38)

4- Tenute: Tenute signs are diagonal lines placed on a group of numbers (notes) that indicate that
the first note (s) should be held while subsequent ones are played, at least in theory allowing the
underlying counterpoint to be reconstructed. Fig (39)

_{Fig.39. Because note's time values are not specified in the tablature example, this can be one of the interpretations.}

5- "Lettere con numeri sopra" Letters with numbers above: this is a general instruction fully explained in the Alfabeto System section (see Fig.24)
6- "Modo per fare i Trilli", Trill: represented by a) indicates an upper auxiliary note or descending appoggiatura in the tablature examples. In the absence of any accompanying written explanation, the correct interpretation of the tablature does bring up some ambiguities.
"In the first two examples (Fig.40), it is not clear why the main note is repeated with a trillo sign attached to it, but as the note makes the interval of a fourth with the bass, it is presumably intended that it should resolve a semitone downwards at some point as partially illustrated in the last two examples.
In the music itself, the sign occurs both in single melodic lines and attached to one note in a chord, particularly at a cadence. Depending on the context, either a simple descending appoggiatura or possibly a more extended trill starting with the upper auxiliary note could be played, although there is no mention of the latter.⁹⁰

_Fig.40

By presenting the figure above, Monica Hall has converted Bartolotti's instructions in tablature into a modern notation; however, as she herself has stated, this Trillo sign can be interpreted differently based on the context of the music.

_{90 . Hall. Monica,” Angelo Michele Bartolotti: Prince of Muses”, 2013, (p-34)}

7. "Modo per fare il mordente, "Mordant: if the letter x is placed next to a number (note), a lower auxiliary note must be inserted between two notes of the same pitch. Whether it's a half step or a whole step below the main note depends on the context. Fig.41)
 

8- "Strascin tirar le corde,metter li diti," Slurs: The slurred notes are marked with a curved line above or below two notes or more. If the curved line is placed above the notes indicates hammered slurring, and if the curved line is placed below, it means pulled slurring. (Fig.42)

9- Modo per appoggiar le corde; ascending appoggiatura.: If a curved line is placed above just one note, it is interpreted as ascending appoggiatura. (Fig.43)

_{Fig.43. Ascending Appoggiatura, *. Bartolotti drew the figure in reverse}

10- Corde Insieme, Corde separate strings at the same time, strings separated
If a vertical line connects two notes, those notes must be played simultaneously; if a diagonal line is between two notes, those notes should be played separately. (Fig.44)

Bartolotti's instructions in his 1st book seem to be more of basic information such as fingering, vibratos, etc. In contrast, in his 2nd book, he provided the performer with more detailed information and instructions that can be used to understand his music in terms of Performance-Practice better.
(Refer to table No.4 to compare the signs and instructions in the 1st book and the 2nd book)

It should be stated that although Bartolotti elaborated better on the instructions in both books' preface compared to other examples at that time, unfortunately, some of his explanationsare ambiguous and inconsistent when it comes to their practical implementation; this was one of the challenges in the adaptation process that this study will address it in the last section.

The last point that can be considered one of his indirect influences on the next generation of French guitar composers is the influence of his writing style in terms of signs and ornaments he has used. If we refer to the first and second books of Robert de Visée, almost all the signs and ornaments that he used are similar to Bartolotti's first or second books' instructions. It is not clear whether these signs were borrowed directly from his books or passed into the next generations by other Italians like Corbetta. But what is clear is that Bartolotti was the first to use these symbols in the same sense in the baroque guitar literature. Fig. (46)

_{Fig.46 Instruction Page from Robert de Visée's second book 1686}

Nevertheless, given everything that has been presented so far in this research, sufficient information should be provided to understand the adaptation challenges, which is the last part of this study.

4.3 Challenges
It is evident that more and more understanding of the theoretical principles that have been mentioned so far, including learning Italian tablature, the Alfabeto system, the instructions provided by Bartolotti, and even learning the French tablature to compare with other works, if necessary, leads to reduction of errors in the adaptation process.
Accordingly, in this research, the adaptation process began after a period of learning and proper understanding of all the above.
The initial challenges went back to the fundamental understanding and learning process.
Fortunately, the presence of Professor Sylvain Bergeron as an expert, and his guidance alongside this project provided the answer to many questions that could not be found in the written sources.
After all this and a detailed study of Bartolotti's works from his 2nd book, I decided to choose a selection of his works in D major, These works include:
I. Prelude (page 42) II. Allemande (page 45) III. Courante (page 46) IV. Sarabande (page 44)
V. Gavotte (page 50) VI. Gigue (page 47) &VII. Passacaglia (page51) 
The main reason I chose this collection was the variety of movements such as gavotte and gigue,
along with the challenging & beautiful Passacaglia as its last movement
In general, in the adaptation process, I encountered four types of challenges as follows:
I. Unreadable notes
II. Missing signs
III. Composer's typographical error
IV. The right decision in choosing octaves
V. Bartolotti's inconsistency in the number of courses he includes in the strumming signs This part will present an example of each type to clarify the issue.

Example of Challenge type 1: Unreadable notes:

_{Example.1. Bar No.37 from Prelude in D}

As you can see in the example above, most of the notes are almost unreadable in the last bar due to improper printing. In such cases, finding the connection of a few remaining readable notes could be helpful.
In this case, the highlighted numbers represent notes; red represents A, blue represents a (an octave higher and yellow represents d).
Since the tonality is in D, the bass note of the 2nd chord is also A( dominant), and there is a 4th interval between A and d in the first chord; most likely, we are dealing with 4-3 suspension.
So the restored sample of the example above is as below:

And since, according to instructions, % is an arpeggio sign, the modern notation is as follow

Example of Challenge type II: Missing signs

_{Example.2 Bar No.38 from Prelude in D}

In the example above, the bar around which the yellow rectangle is drawn is rhythmically incomplete because one of its time-value signs is missing.
The time signature is 4/4, and this bar only has six 16th notes and six 32nd notes.
There is a double barline in the blue segment, and an element seems to be out of print in the red segment.
In this case, there is no choice but to make a musically meaningful decision, given to the piece's atmosphere.
Since we are facing the end of the Prelude that gives a sense of improvisation, and the numbers 7 & 8 represent A and G, I decided to keep the previous chord in bar 37 as a sustained chord and add two 32nd notes between those A and G trill-like section.

Sample of the reconstructed tablature based on this decision:

_{Same tablature, Modern notation verison}

Example of Challenge type III: Composer's typographical error

_{Example No.3 Bar No.60-62 from Passacaglia in D major}

In the example above, we have three groups of notes, yellow, green and blue
These are the yellow group's notes: E,e,f#,g,a,b,c
These are the green group’s note :c#,d,e,f#,g,a,b
And these are blue groups notes: b,c#,d,e,f#,g,a
According to the information above, it is clear that we have a descending sequence consisting of three groups of seven notes.
Since the first note of the 2nd group (green) is c#, and the first note of the 3rd group is b, then the first note of the first group should be definitely d, not e.
Therefore, this is a typographical mistake, and the correct version of this sequence in the tablature is as follows:

As well as modern notation as follows:

Example of Challenge type IV: The right decision in choosing the octave notes

Bars No.60-63 from Passacaglia in D major

As mentioned before, the example above is a musical sequence, the notes around which a red circle is drawn are notes on the 4th and the 5th course, which the player can choose to play an octave higher on them.
If in the adaptation process, we choose the bass note instead of the higher octave, we will ruin the sequence as follow:

If we select the higher octave, which is undoubtedly the correct option, we get the following option:

However, another challenge arises; the possibility of choosing a higher octave note on the 4th and the 5th string in the baroque guitar is a possibility that modern guitar does not have.
This feature leads to the Campanella finger on a Baroque guitar, and modern guitars do not.
Solution: Although modern guitars do not have this capability, appropriate fingering can partially solve this challenge.

If we are fingering the mentioned sequence without considering the Campanella's effect, we would probably come to the following decision: straightforward and easy to play

But if we want to get closer to Bartolotti's point of view, then we must use fingering that are not very common in today's guitar practice, such as the following:

Bartolotti's inconsistency in the number of courses he includes in the strumming signs:
Although Bartolotti in the instruction section explains the number of strumming courses to avoid unpleasant harmony, there are several occasions where he includes courses that do not belong to harmony.

Example of Challenge type V: Bartolotti's inconsistency on his strumming instruction

_{Bars No.5 and 6 From Passacaglia in D major}

According to the second chord of each bar, the second inversion seems to cause an unpleasant harmony, so given that both letters G and P are among Bartolotti's Lettere Tagliate in the Alfabeto system, it seems that he made a mistake in using these letters as Lettere Tagliate.
Therefore the correct sequence of chords is as follows:

It is hoped that the mentioned examples provide an overview of the challenges of the adaptation process and the importance of details in the decision-making process to the reader.
In the last section, this study explains the stages of research, defines the signs and the performance suggestions, and presents rewritten tablature and modern notation resulting from the adaptation process.

Summary & result
 

Stages of research
In summary, this study should briefly mention the research steps that resulted in the rewriting of several pieces by Bartolotti with Italian tablature and its adaptation to modern notation.
1- The first step was to learn the principles of baroque guitar playing and its basic techniques, which allowed the researcher to study the characteristics and characteristics of the instrument.
2- In a second step, we had to familiarize ourselves with the principles of interpretation of Italian tablature as a central Bartolotti notation system
3- The next step was learning and using the Alfabeto system, which made it possible to learn the importance of chord strumming as the primary basis for harmony progression.
4- The fourth step was to learn the French tablature, which was used to compare and study the influence or ineffectiveness of Bartolotti on French guitarists.
5- The fifth step has been the careful study of Bartolotti's Instructions, which can be considered as the main decision-making element for the production of modern notation.
6- And the last step is to provide a copy of the modern notation and the new tablature version of Passacaglia and some interpretation points from other pieces.

Signs & suggestions
In the modern notation version that comes at the end of this section
1- To give the performer the opportunity for personal interpretation, all the ornament signs in modern notation are the same as the tablature version; therefore ) presents all kinds of trills X presents mordants, ⌒ presents ascending appaggiaturas and % presents arpeggios.

2- In Bartolotti’s music, double bar lines mean repeated barlines; in some cases, such as Sarabande, although the piece is two-part, there are three double barlines. In this case, the second double bar line means a petite reprise, and it means the bars indicated with the blue line should be repeated after the second repetition. ( See example below)

3- In some pieces, based on the type of dance such as courante, there are interpretation suggestions ( see example below)

4- In modern notation, the numbers indicate the finger number; circled numbers indicate string numbers, and Roman numerals indicate position numbers.

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