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Thread: Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

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    Registered User Richard Carver's Avatar
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    Default Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

    More Telemann! This time my own arrangement, for mandolin and guitar continuo, of three movements from the Wedding Divertissement. (John Goodin arranged two of these three for solo mandolin - my plan is to do the entire suite for the two instruments.)


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    Registered User Simon DS's Avatar
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    Default Re: Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

    Thanks again Richard, really nice playing and the TAB’s great!

    I just had a go at Passepied, and reasonably happy with my humble efforts.

    What’s the deal with guitar continuo? I’ve often heard this in the background of Classical music. Is it always in regular/straight rhythm with little emphasis? Variations with different countries?

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    Registered User Richard Carver's Avatar
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    Default Re: Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

    Thank you, Simon. I knew you'd appreciate the tab! As I say in the YouTube intro, I think these work as mandolin solos (which is how John Goodin presented two of them). The guitar continuo is basically just the bass line from the original score. I think it adds something - fills out the sound, adds some harmony and the occasional melodic filler - makes a simple tune a bit more complex. It would have to be in a regular rhythm otherwise the harmonies would go astray. I debated how loud to make it and went with something fairly quiet. Too quiet, perhaps?

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    Registered User Simon DS's Avatar
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    Default Re: Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

    Sounds great as is, I was just wondering how the rhythms work in Classical music.

    Is the continuo like playing a bodhran with a fiddle, that it follows the rubato of the melodic phrases?
    Or is it like a conductor for the rest of the group who are playing?

    And I noticed what looks like 7 different dances, do these all have different rhythms?
    -which would seem to make the whole piece like an assortment of rhythms.

    Sorry, lots of questions. I may try some of the other parts too.

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    Registered User Richard Carver's Avatar
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    Default Re: Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

    I think I may have misunderstood your original question, Simon.

    The continuo originated as a sort of conductor, holding the whole thing together. That certainly isn't the way I used it here (because I recorded it the other way round), nor was it how I experienced my disastrous spell in a Renaissance group (which I described on the SAW thread). I suppose to do it properly I should record the guitar first - I guess I am too familiar with the idea of the accompanist, which is not really what this is.

    Yes, the seven dances have a variety of rhythms. Three different time signatures in these three here, and also a sarabande in 3/2 and a loure in 6/4 (plus rigaudon 4/4 and gigue 6/8). These originated as dances, so had different tempos and steps. By Telemann's time they were largely stylised (no one put on their dancing shoes for a Bach violin partita, say) but since this was fairly simple stuff written for a wedding, I'm guessing that these were indeed for dancing.

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    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

    Quote Originally Posted by Simon DS View Post
    Sounds great as is, I was just wondering how the rhythms work in Classical music.

    Is the continuo like playing a bodhran with a fiddle, that it follows the rubato of the melodic phrases?
    Or is it like a conductor for the rest of the group who are playing?

    And I noticed what looks like 7 different dances, do these all have different rhythms?
    -which would seem to make the whole piece like an assortment of rhythms.

    Sorry, lots of questions. I may try some of the other parts too.
    Hi Simon,

    That's a pretty big topic. The WIkipedia entry on "basso continuo" (usually shortened to "continuo") may be helpful:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basso_continuo

    Basically, the concept is similar to a lead sheet in modern popular styles: unlike in the later classical and romantic eras, baroque composers didn't fully compose the accompaniment parts but left that to the discretion of the performers. What they provided was a single bass line, notated in bass clef, from which a practised accompanist could semi-improvise a suitable accompaniment in the desired style, in much the same way that a decent guitarist (or jazz band for that matter) will be able to come with an accompaniment from the chord symbols written on a lead sheet. Sometimes, the composer also added small numbers to the bass notes. This is called "figured bass" and denotes the intervals of the chord above the notated bass note.

    Converting this shorthand notation into a fully-composed accompaniment is called "realisation". You will often find piano or harpsichord parts published for baroque pieces that include a lot of notes that aren't in the composer's original score but were added by the editor of the score to make the implied chords and harmonies explicit. Many experienced early music performers frown on that as they prefer to improvise their own continuo realisations.

    Professional early music ensembles usually allocate at least two instruments to the continuo part, a melody intrument (usually a cello or a bass viol) plus a chordal instrument (usually a harpsichord or a theorbo -- that's a type of bass lute with a ridiculously long neck). The harpsichordist often doubles as the conductor of the ensemble.

    For us poor mandolinists, we can play simple baroque pieces consisting of a single melody line plus continuo as a fairly bare-bones duets with the mandolin playing the original melody and either a guitar or a mandocello playing the single note bass line. That would use only the notes actually written by the composer and can be very effective. However, actual baroque musicians would have included a chordal instrument of some sort to fill in the harmonies. In the absence of a harpsichord or theorbo, a strummed guitar is a good choice. The chords are implied by the bass line, but there is a range of possible choices. The rhythms would come from an understanding of the genre. For this Telemann dance suite, each movement has the title of one of the standard French court dances of the time. Each of them has a highly-characteristic rhythm, stress pattern and approximate tempo, although those evolved continuously through the Baroque period and by the time of Bach and Telemann had split into music for actual dancing and music intended for listening vaguely based on those dance styles. Again, not that dissimilar to Irish fiddle tunes, which may be played for actual dancing or (quite differently) in a session or a concert.

    Martin

    [Edit: My post crossed with Richard's who said much the same in a less verbose manner...]

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    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Telemann Menuet, Bourée, and Passepied

    Further to our discussion on this Telemann suite here and in the SAW group, here is another of the seven movements, the rigaudon.

    Georg Phillip Telemann: Hochzeit-Divertissement, TWV 11:21
    3. Rigaudon


    I'm playing this as a trio of two mandolins and mandocello. Second mandolin coming in on the repeats for each section, based on a harpsichord realisation of Telemann's continuo, from IMSLP. I've attached the score for easy reference.

    1898 Giuseppe Vinaccia mandolin
    1915 Luigi Embergher mandolin
    Suzuki MC-815 mandocello


    https://youtu.be/iKUN1QoVIyE

    Martin
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails IMSLP492363-PMLP797137-Telemann-Rigaudon_(Wedding_Divertissement).pdf  

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