Lirone [lira da gamba, lira
in gamba, lyra de gamba, gran lira, lira grande, lirone perfetto, lyra
perfecta, lira doppia, arciviolata, arciviolatalira, arcivioladaslyras, lyrone,
lyra, lira]
(It.).
A
larger relative of the Lira da braccio, in use from approximately
1500 to 1700, primarily in Italy. Both types of lira were bowed chordal
instruments, their chief use being to accompany the voice, but the lirone was
played between the knees rather than under the chin because of its size. It
accommodated many more strings – as few as nine and as many as 20 – and was
therefore capable of playing in a greater number of keys. Its repertory was
more comprehensive than that of the lira da braccio, covering nearly all
genres from the frottola to opera and oratorio (whereas the lira da braccio
was more specifically associated with the accompaniment of the poetry and song
of the Italian humanists).
1. Structure, tunings
and playing techniques.
2. History in Venice,
Florence and Rome.
3. Other Italian and
European centres.
4. Associations with
other instruments.
5. Surviving
instruments and iconography.
6. Modern-day revival.
ERIN HEADLEY
Lirone
1. Structure, tunings and playing techniques.
The
following conclusions can be drawn about the lirone's structural
characteristics from iconographical sources and surviving instruments: it had a
body size between that of a tenor and a bass viol, shallow ribs (about half the
width of the ribs of a viol or cello), a flat back, and a quasi-violin outline,
often with pinched or squared-off corners. It had a short neck and fingerboard,
it was fretted, and the pegbox was leaf-shaped with frontal pegs. The bridge
was nearly flat (fig.1), and the instrument had
serpentine soundholes and a rosette. All the surviving examples are listed in
§5 below.
The
main function of the lirone was to provide sustained chords for the
accompaniment of the voice. Its ingenious tuning system (re-entrant throughout;
see Re-entrant tuning) meant that from three to six strings,
one or two of them usually open, could be bowed together, which lent extra
resonance and gave a particularly ethereal sound. Five extant tunings are
known, from Cerreto (1601), Praetorius (2/1619) and Mersenne (1636–7). All
these systems (ex.1) make it possible to play a
series of chords using the same fingering pattern across the entire
fingerboard. Major chords are fingered on the second and third frets, minor
ones on the first and third. Augmented, diminished, 7th and 9th chords are
obtainable, as are common suspensions (4–3, 7–6, etc.). The system most
generally used by modern players is a modified version of the Mersenne tuning (ex.2) which makes available a good balance of
sharp and flat keys and thus works well for the most common keys. An
exceptional feature of the lirone's tuning is that it affords pure 3rds in all
keys: with flats on one side of the bridge and sharps on the other, it is
possible to obtain, for example, pure 3rds in both E
and B major chords. One instrument also
shows double frets, so that alternative chord fingerings can be played in tune
as well. Some lironi have bourdon strings to the side of the bridge and pegbox;
Cerreto, Praetorius and Mersenne included these in their tunings. Bourdons
undoubtedly stem from the lira da braccio tradition; although useful for
playing music that is harmonically unadventurous, they are less relevant to
repertory such as the large-scale mid-17th-century lament with its
kaleidoscopic key changes.
Some
of the most valuable information about how the instrument was played comes from
Agazzari (1607), who stated that ‘the player of the lirone must bow with long,
clear, sonorous strokes’. Given the tuning and simple left-hand technique, the
player's main responsibility was evidently to provide shapely, sustained
harmonies to support the vocal line. Agazzari also recommended the use of a
long bow, and experience suggest this should have a flexible stick and black
hair. The bow should not be held above the frog (as with later viol technique),
but on the frog itself, to make available the maximum length of bow hair and to
enable the player to produce deep strokes well into the string; the effect is
thus more ‘vocal’ than instrumental. Agazzari also advised emphasizing the 3rds
and 6ths of chords: this is an excellent way to ‘centre’ the sound, and also to
obtain maximum projection. To assist resonance and produce a clear sound,
Cerreto advised that only the upper strings of a given chord be stopped. For
moving quickly from one harmony to another, the technique of jeu barré
(using the index finger of the left hand as a temporary nut by placing it
across a block of strings) is indispensable. Mersenne's examples demonstrate
playing in higher positions on the fingerboard; the resulting sound is akin to
that of the ‘halo’ effect produced by a choir of violins.
The
most common way of notating a lirone part was by means of a figured or
unfigured bass. Both Mersenne and Cerreto included tablature examples, but
tablature is impractical for such a consistent and simple fingering system on
an instrument with so many strings. One seeming disadvantage of the lirone's
tuning is that for half the keys, only root-position chords, and for the
remaining keys, only second-inversion chords, are available, with consequent
problems of octave displacement in the bass line and inner parts. Francesco
Rognoni Taeggio (1620), however, dismissed these as minor annoyances and went
on to praise the instrument's soul-lifting, harmonious legato. Practitioners of
the 16th century were perhaps less concerned than modern-day musicians about
imperfections of part-writing, as may be attested by the fact that both Giulio
Caccini and Alessandro Striggio (i) were reported to have played the lirone
without a supporting bass instrument. Whatever its imperfections, the lirone
was a valued member of the continuo fraternity for nearly two centuries. Its
distinct and unique sonority destined it for laments, incantations and
invocations, and contemporary writers marvelled at its ability to inspire and
elevate the spirit. The wonderful effect of sustained chords on a single string
instrument may have originated in the Middle Ages, but it flowered in the
Renaissance with the lira da braccio, and reached its full development
with the lirone in the Baroque. Although the instrument fell out of use in the
early 18th century, its haunting, other-worldly tone colour is echoed in the
string accompagnato of Passion music.
Lirone
2. History in Venice, Florence and Rome.
The
first written reference to a large lira is in a letter to Francesco
Gonzaga in 1505 from the maker and player Atalante Migliorotti, who described a
new type of lira that he was constructing: ‘I shall add strings so that
there are 12 … in pure and consummate harmony’. Presumably the instrument was
first used for playing frottolas, laudi and other compositions with
slow-moving harmonies. References to lironi appear in documents of Venetian
religious confraternities from the 1530s until 1631, when a number of lirone players
died, presumably in the Great Plague of that year. The continuo body listed in
1618 for the Scuola Grande di S Rocco (where the composers Giovanni Picchi and
Giovanni Priuli both worked) included two small organs, three larger ones, two
lironi, three theorbos and a violone.
In
Florence the lirone was used as early as 1560 to accompany singing for the
services of the Compagnia dell'Arcangelo Raffaelo, and Caccini himself was
known to have played the ‘gran lira’ while singing inside a false tomb at a religious
feast in 1584. His early monody Angel' divin' (I-Fn Magl.
XIX.66), with its slow-moving harmonic accompaniment, is a good example of
likely repertory for the lirone at the end of the 16th century. In secular
music, the ‘arciviolatalira’ (a peculiarly Florentine name for the instrument)
had an important role in intermedio repertory (Alessandro Striggio's
Fuggi, speme mia, dating from 1565, is one of the most beautiful examples), and
in the basso continuo ensembles of early Florentine operas, such as Jacopo
Peri's Euridice (1600) and Francesca Caccini's La liberazione di
Ruggiero (1625). The last known reference to the playing of the instrument
in Florence is dated 1669, but presumably the Medici court lirone player Pietro
Salvetti (d 1697) continued to play to the end of his life.
Rome
was another important centre for the lirone. The preface to Cavalieri's Rappresentatione
di Anima, et di Corpo (1600) recommends the use of the lira doppia
(which the composer may well have come across during his time at the Florentine
court). Stefano Landi included a lira in the list of continuo
instruments in the printed score of his sacred opera Il Sant'Alessio
(1634). In 1639 André Maugars described the marvel of hearing the lirone in
Roman villas and in oratories; he may well have heard any of the six oratorios
attributed to Luigi Rossi, or others by Marco Marazzoli, Domenico Mazzocchi or
Bernardo Pasquini, all of which include substantial and extremely beautiful
laments written to be accompanied by the lirone.
Lirone
3. Other Italian and European centres.
Striggio,
who was born in Mantua, was probably the Lirone’s greatest musical ambassador.
He worked mainly for the Medicis in Florence, but his extensive travels took
him all around Italy, as well as to London, Flanders, Paris, Innsbruck, Vienna,
Landshut, Munich, Augsburg and Brno. He played large and small lire for
Maximilian II in Brno, Duke Albrecht V in Munich, and Duke Wilhelm in Landshut
(the last of whom, in a letter of 3 August 1574, described Striggio's lirone in
some detail). The Graz inventory of 1580 listed a ‘lira in camba’ on which the
Bavarian coat of arms was embossed; the Baden-Baden Hofkapelle collection of
1582 included several lyre da gamba; and later, the Austrian emperors
Ferdinand III and Leopold I included the lyra in their religious
compositions. According to Mersenne, the lyra de gamba was used in
France for the accompaniment of psalms; and a grande lire was included
in the 1589 inventory of the French luthier Robert Denis (ii). In the south,
Cerreto recorded a number of lirone players working in Naples around 1600,
while various references to lire are found in 17th-century Sicilian
church archives, and Spanish players' names appear in early biographical
sources. Finally, the printed inventory (1666) of the Milanese nobleman
Manfredo Settala includes one 11-string arciviola (which ‘con arco longa
rende melodia soavissima’) and four other lironi.
Lirone
4. Associations with other instruments.
There
are a few examples of lironi playing with trombone consorts, the most notable
being Striggio's lament for the 1565 intermedii (in which the
instruments are placed off-stage); here the gentle regal-like quality of the
lirone binds the ensemble very effectively. The lirone also joins a viol
consort in Francesca Caccini's Ruggiero. Although the organ and the
lirone might be expected to cancel each other out – and the lirone was often
used in place of the organ – the two actually blend surprisingly well,
particularly if the organist avoids the middle register: a marvellous layered
chordal effect can be achieved with the keyboard player's right hand covering
the register above the lirone, the left hand playing the bass and the lirone in
the middle of the texture. Numerous references to the lirone playing with
plucked instruments, particularly the chitarrone, abound, but Luigi Rossi went
further to combine it with the harpsichord in his oratorios (albeit it with a
supporting bowed bass). A combination of a bowed bass instrument (bass violin,
violone etc.) and lirone is very effective; the bass instrument should probably
play at 8' pitch.
Lirone
5. Surviving instruments and iconography.
There
are seven surviving examples, only some of which were originally lironi. The
earliest, by L. Morella (1530 or 1550) is now housed in the Conservatório
Nacional, Lisbon; a similar instrument, but more crudely designed and executed,
is the anonymous example of about 1550 in the Musée des instruments de musique,
Brussels. There are three in the Musikinstrumenten-Museum, University of
Leipzig: two may originally have been viols (by Antonio Brensio and Gasparo or
Francesco da Salò), while the third is in fragments (pegbox, neck, tailpiece
and end block). Before World War II this last instrument was part of the Kraus
Collection in Florence, and it is depicted (not always accurately) in a number
of 17th-century paintings. The lirone by Wendelin Tieffenbrucker (c1590),
now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, is perhaps the most elegant and
eye-catching with its festooned body shape, but it may have been cut down from
a cello. More recently, an anonymous figure-of-eight example has been
discovered in a private collection in Burg Sternberg, Germany (see David).
Besides
woodcuts, prints and drawings, there are a number of important and reasonably
accurate 17th-century paintings of lironi, including Pier Francesco Mola's Homer
(Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden; fig.2), Ferdinand
Bol's Dame mit lira da gamba (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna), an
anonymous Apollo with lira da gamba (source unknown, mid-17th century;
see Disertori), Jan Roos's Orphée charmant les animaux (private
collection, Gênes; and A.D. Gabbiani's Ferdinando de’ and his musicians
Medici (Palazzo Pitti, Florence); the last portrays Pietro Salvetti holding
his cello and bow, with his lirone propped next to him.
Lirone
6. Modern-day revival.
Since
the early 1980s the lirone has enjoyed a successful revival, beginning with
Erin Headley's research, performances and recordings, and has once more been
restored to its rightful place in the continuo ensemble. It is no longer a rare
event to hear the instrument in Baroque opera, oratorio or vocal chamber music.
The lirone has been taken up professionally by other players, most notably Imke
David, Paulina van Laarhoven and Hildegard Perl, while distinguished makers
include Henner Harders, Peter Hütmannsberger, Günter Mark and John Pringle. In
1997 the Lira-Forum was founded by Igor Pomykalo in Vienna for the exchange of
information about lire da braccio, lironi, lyra viols and related
instruments.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
MersenneHU
PraetoriusSM, ii
PraetoriusTI
S. di Ganassi
dal Fontego: Regola rubertina
(Venice, 1542); ed. W. Eggers
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L. Zacconi: Prattica di
musica (Venice, 1592/R)
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sopra 'l basso (Siena, 1607, 2/1608); Eng. trans.
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Eng. trans., 1982)
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F. Rognoni
Taeggio:
Selva di varii passaggi (Milan, 1620/R)
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premier octobre 1639 (Paris, c1640, copies in F-Pn and Pm); ed.
J. Heuillon (Paris, 1991, 2/1992); ed. H.W. Hitchcock with Eng. trans.
(Geneva, 1993)
A. Kircher: Musurgia
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D. Arnold: ‘Music at the Scuola di San Rocco’, ML, xl (1959), 229–41
D. Arnold: ‘Music at a Venetian Confraternity in the Renaissance’, AcM, xxxvii (1965), 62–72
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Honor of Tillman Merritt, ed. L. Berman (Cambridge, MA,
1972), 1–28
H.M. Brown: Sixteenth-Century
Instrumentation: the Music for the Florentine Intermedii, MSD, xxx (1973)
C.A. Miller: The Writings
of Jerome Cardan on Music, MSD, xxxii (1973)
H.E. Smither: A History of
the Oratorio, i (Chapel Hill, 1977)
J.W. Hill: ‘Oratory Music in Florence, I: Recitar cantando, 1583–1655’, AcM, li (1979), 108–36
J.W. Hill: ‘Oratory Music in Florence, II: at San Firenze in the Seventeenth and
Eighteenth Centuries’, AcM, li (1979), 246–67
W.F. Prizer: ‘Isabella d'Este and Lorenzo da Pavia, “Master Instrument-Maker”’, EMH, ii (1982), 87–127
C.A. Elias: ‘Musical Performance in 16th-Century Italian Literature: Straparola's Le
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D. Butchart: ‘The Letters of Alessandro Striggio: an Edition with Translation and
Commentary’, RMARC, xxiii (1990), 1–78
I. David: Della lira
da gamba (thesis, Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, 1995)