(Sp.: ‘touch’; Port. tento).
A term derived from the Spanish verb tentar (‘to try out’, ‘to attempt’, ‘to test’), and applied exclusively to instrumental music from the mid-15th century onwards, first in the Iberian peninsula and then in Latin America. Until the mid-16th century tientos were played on various instruments (ensembles, plucked strings, keyboard); from the end of the 16th century they were written chiefly for keyboard instruments, particularly the organ. 20th-century composers revived the form, writing tientos for ensembles or orchestras. The plural, tientos, also designates a flamenco genre for solo guitar.
Alfonso de Palencia provided the first documented example of the practice of ‘trying out’ (tentar) a keyboard, string or wind instrument (Batalla campal entre perros y lobos, c1550): this piece, now lost, served as prelude to another work. The earliest tientos to have survived independently are the 13 for solo vihuela in Luys Milán’s El maestro (1536). They do not differ in formal respects from his fantasías but introduce certain characteristic technical and expressive devices (dedillo, dos dedos) and contrasting tempos (tañer de gala) designed to enable the performer or pupil to try out the vihuela (‘tentar la vihuela’). These features were new in European composition, but the tiento’s improvisatory nature and free form link it to the Italian Tastar de corde or Ricercare. After Milán, no other work was given the title ‘tiento’ or ‘tento’, but the introduction of technical features remained a function of many vihuela fantasías (see Fantasia).
Alonso Mudarra (Tres libros de musica e cifra para vihuela, 1546) and Miguel de Fuenllana (Orphenica lyra, 1554) both composed a series of eight tientos for vihuela in each of the ecclesiastical modes. These are short homophonic compositions (not exceeding 68 semibreves) that serve as preludes to the following suite of pieces. They also have a didactic aspect, providing a practical realization of the theoretical parameters of each mode. Works of this type no doubt continued to be performed, but without being written down. They thus constituted an ‘underground’ genre in transmission, of which a postlude from the end of the 16th century (Ramillete de flores, 1593) is possible evidence. The last piece in Mudarra’s volume is a tiento for harp and organ.
By the time of the appearance of Juan Bermudo’s theoretical treatise Declaración (1555) and Luis Venegas de Henestrosa’s Libro de cifra nueva (1557), the term seems to have lost its earlier significance as a preliminary or introductory piece: Venegas used the term synonymously with fantasía. Keyboard instruments, particularly the organ, were now preferred to the vihuela, harp or ensembles, according to archival evidence. The tiento adopted the polyphonic ‘motet style’, which is also seen in the fantasia and the ricercare, (the terms were interchangeable at this period), and made free use of fugal entries and imitative counterpoint. Apart from two impressive tientos by Pere Vila (whose Libro de tientos is lost), one by Pedro Soto, three by F.F. Palero, some anonymous pieces, and ricercares and tientos by Julio Segni (three taken from Musica nova, 1540), the main body of tientos in Venegas’s collection are contributed by ‘Antonio’, the blind court organist Antonio de Cabezón, who perhaps carried the tiento to its highest level of inspiration. Cabezón composed 29 tientos, 12 of which were published by his son Hernando in Obras de música para tecla, arpa, y vihuela (1578). Their range is impressive, and makes difficult any clear cut definition of the form. They combine the rigour of imitative writing with the freedom offered by diminution devices (glosa, llano and glosada), and are some of Cabezón’s finest works; all have the expressiveness and intensity characteristic of his music. His melodic motifs are often inspired by Gregorian chant and are sometimes used as a cantus firmus so that the pieces can be performed during the liturgy. They may be defined as ‘modal organ’ tientos or even as ‘psalmodic’ tientos, and make clear use of compositional techniques such as troping. The same imitative structure and modal organization are found in the tentos of the Portuguese composers Antonio Carreira, Heliodoro de Paiva and, at the beginning of the 17th century, Manuel Rodrigues Coelho, who took the tento to its peak in the 24 examples in his Flores de musica (1620).
The tiento for organ, which continued to use parody technique, flourished until the early 18th century, modified and enriched by various practical and stylistic developments. The creation of the organ de medio registro at the time of Cabezón’s death prompted the tientos de medio registro, showcases for instrumental virtuosity, by composers including Francisco de Peraza, Francisco Correa de Arauxo (1626), Sebastián Aguilera de Heredia (1627) and Pablo Bruna. Correa de Arauxo’s Libro de tientos y discursos de música práctica (1626) for organ includes 62 tientos, graded by mode and difficulty. Apart from its didactic function, the tiento here serves as a vehicle of great affective power: phrases are still imitated between parts in the manner of the traditional tiento, but the mood is increasingly disturbed by sudden changes of timbre and improvisatory effects, in addition to the use of dissonance and ornamentation.
Similarly, the appearance around 1660 of the expressive órgano de ecos led to the appearance of tientos by Miguel Lopéz, Andrés Lorente and Antonio Martín y Coll that explored the new dynamic contrasts. These instrumental innovations, and the introduction of trumpet stops such as the trompetería horizontal, were combined with harmonic developments to give rise to the tiento de falsas that explored false relations (parallel with the durezze works that appeared in Italy), by composers from Aguilera de Heredia to J.B.J. Cabanilles. Cabanilles exploited fully the resources of the instrument and the new methods of writing; maintaining a balance between old and new styles, his tientos crowned the evolution of a form that had many ramifications. In his Tiento de batalla, for example, imitative phrases serve as illustrations of the rival trumpet-calls of conflicting factions (vividly portrayed by brash trumpet stops: the purely tactile quality of the tiento (‘trying out the instrument’) is seen raised to its highest degree.
In the first half of the 18th century tientos were written chiefly by Mediterranean composers (Llusa, Clausells), who moved away from the modal organ tiento, developing tonal and formal structures that tended towards the prelude and fugue. Thereafter, the tiento, like other early genres, did not attract composers until the second third of the 20th century. Examples are found in works by Rodolfo and Cristobal Halffter, Maurice Ohana and Manuel Castillo.
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BEN RIDLER/LOUIS JAMBOU