The clavichord represented in intarsia in the study of Federigo da
Montefeltro (1422-1482) in the Ducal Palace, Urbino evidently had listing.
Except for those of the unfretted bass notes, the inlaid metal strings
are interrupted by a strip of dark brown wood (approximately in line with
the seventh rack slot) which, exceptionally in the midst of an otherwise
smooth surface, is deeply and irregularly gouged in imitation of the weft
of narrow cloth strips. The listing of the bass strings, which presumably
would have been confined to the part nearest to the hitchpins, is not
visible as it would have lain behind the upstanding case wall.
Lewis Jones.
--
Lewis Jones
School of Computing and Digital Media
Research Degrees Coordinator, Sir John Cass School of Art, Architecture &
Design
London Metropolitan University
16 Goulston Street
London E1 7TP
On Tuesday, 6 June 2017, Shields, Michael <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am curious whether there is evidence that 15th-century clavichords had
> listing cloth or in fact possibly did not use damping, inconceivable as
> this might seem. Presumably, in the absence of any damping system the
> player of an early clavichord could damp selected strings with the left
> hand, while playing with the right, and allowing secondary resonances to
> persist where they were wanted. However, the Minden clavichord player
> ("Goldene Tafel" reredos, ca.1425, now in the Bode Museum in Berlin) is
> playing with the lid closed, so could not have damped by hand. (The
> perspective of the Urbino intarsia does not let one see any listing cloth,
> but it is generally assumed it was there.)
>
>
> Why this question? In the earliest clavichords, all of whose strings were
> the same length and pitch and fretted along Pythagorean lines without
> foreshortening, the (normally damped) segment of the string to the left of
> the tangent would produce a complementary "inverse" pitch that might be
> interesting for, say, players of 15th-century monodic music (which is my
> specific interest in it, for German song melodies, some of which are
> strikingly off kilter).
>
>
> Does anyone have an earliest known date for the documented use (or visual
> depiction) of listing cloth, rails or other system, and has anybody tried
> playing tunes on their Arnaut von Zwolle clavichord without listing cloth,
> using hand damping, light damping or none at all? I know that several list
> members have built and/or played such instruments. I would also be grateful
> for general impressions of them as I don't have access to an instrument
> myself.
>
> Michael Shields, Galway
>
>
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