Angelica (musical instrument)

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The Angelica or French Angélique is a plucked instrument from the Baroque period with 16 strings . It is similar in appearance to the theorbo . In the manuscripts and lexicons of the 18th century, only the French “Angélique” is used; it was not until the 20th century that she was also called Angelica or Angelika .

Musician playing an Angélique

Like the lute , it has a semi- pear-shaped sound body with a tailpiece ( bridge ) attached to the sound cover and a neck attached to the sound body.

The vibrating string length ( scale length ) of the fingerboard strings is between 54 and 70 cm in the preserved instruments. Unlike the lute, the Angélique is strung with individual strings.

Above the first pegbox there is a second pegbox, to which bass strings are attached as drones that can not be grasped .

The type with ten strings on the fingerboard and six drones is the so-called German type. In the German type, the two peg boxes are connected with the so-called gooseneck.

In addition, instruments with eight strings on the fingerboard and eight drones, whose peg boxes are connected by a straight extension, have also been preserved in Paris. The music preserved, however, assumes the German type throughout.

The strings of the Angélique are tuned diatonic : C - E - F - G - A - B - c - d - e - f - g - a - h - c ′ - d ′ - e ′. From the fourth to the 15th string, the strings are retuned depending on the key, the lowest string is retuned to D or Bb, depending on requirements.

The few surviving music for Angélique (one print, five manuscripts) and the few surviving instruments point to the second half of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th century when the instrument was at its heyday.

The statement that Angélique comes from England is based on a misinterpretation of her name by M. H. Fuhrmann ( Musicalischer Trichter , Frankfurt / Spree 1706, p. 91). Correct is the interpretation as "angel lute" (wrongly also called "angel guitar") because of its lovely sound ("angel lute" in James Talbot, manuscript Oxford 532, 1685-1701).

Music for Angélique is notated in French tablature , although the names of the basses vary depending on the author.

Well-known composers for the Angélique were Michel de Béthune (16th / 17th century), the lutenists Jakob Kremberg (around 1650–1718), Valentin Strobel (1611 - after 1669) or Johann Valentin Strobel (1643–1688) and Nicolas -François Vignon. Anonymous compositions can be found in a Schwerin tablature collection published around 1700 by Bernardina Charlotta Trezier.

Preserved instruments include at least two from Joachim Tielke's workshop and one from Johann Christoph Fleischer .

literature

  • Angelica. In: Carl Dahlhaus , Hans Heinrich Eggebrecht , Kurt Oehl (eds.): Brockhaus-Riemann Musiklexikon. Vol. 1. 2nd edition. Mainz 1995, p. 42.
  • Friedemann Hellwig, Barbara Hellwig: The instruments of the lute family. In: Same: Joachim Tielke . Ornate baroque musical instruments. Berlin / Munich 2011, pp. 107–143.
  • Emanuel Winternitz: Theorbo. In: Music in the past and present . Vol. 13. Kassel 1986, pp. 323-328, here: p. 327.
  • Ernst Pohlmann: Lute, theorbo, chitarrone: the instruments, their music and literature from 1500 to the present. Bremen, 1968, (5/1982), pp. 394-397.
  • Emil Vogl: Angelika and her music. HV, xi, 1974, pp. 356-371.

swell

  • Jakob Kremberg: Musical emotions or arias… Dresden 1689 (in tablature)
  • Adalbert Quadt (ed.): Guitar music of the 16-18. Century. Volume 2: after tablatures for Colascione, Mandora and Angelica. Leipzig 1971.
  • Johann Mattheson: The newly opened orchestra. Hamburg 1713 (at Internet Archive )
  • Hans Radtke (Ed.): Selected pieces from an angelica and guitar tablature , Musik Alter Meister booklet 17, Graz 1967

Web links

Commons : Angélique (instrument)  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Josef Zuth : Handbook of the lute and guitar. Publisher of the magazine for the guitar, Vienna 1926, p. 16 ( Angelique ).
  2. ↑ worldcat.org: Béthune, Michel de 1607-16.? .
  3. ^ Adalbert Quadt (ed.): Guitar music of the 16-18. Century. Volume 2: after tablatures for Colascione, Mandora and Angelica. Leipzig 1971, pp. 1–5 ( Folies d'Espagne , Sarabande and Gavotte and Suite (C major) ) and 66 ( Bethune, le cadet in M. Monien: Pièces en tablature d'angélique from 1691).
  4. ^ Adalbert Quadt (ed.): Guitar music of the 16-18. Century. Volume 2: after tablatures for Colascione, Mandora and Angelica. 1971, pp. 6-39.