The viol, viola da gamba, or informally gamba, is any one of a family of bowed, fretted, and stringed instruments with hollow wooden bodies and pegboxes where the tension on the strings can be increased or decreased to adjust the pitch of each of the strings. Frets on the viol are usually made of gut, tied on the fingerboard around the instrument's neck, to enable the performer to stop the strings more cleanly. Frets improve consistency of intonation and lend the stopped notes a tone that better matches the open strings. Viols first appeared in Spain in the mid-to-late 15th century, and were most popular in the Renaissance and Baroque (1600–1750) periods. Early ancestors include the Arabic rebab and the medieval European vielle, but later, more direct possible ancestors include the Venetian viole and the 15th- and 16th-century Spanish vihuela, a six-course plucked instrument tuned like a lute that looked like but was quite distinct from the four-course guitar.
Pizzicato is a playing technique that involves plucking the strings of a string instrument. The exact technique varies somewhat depending on the type of instrument :
In music for bowed string instruments, col legno, or more precisely col legno battuto, is an instruction to strike the string with the stick of the bow across the strings.
John Jenkins (1592–1678), was an English composer who was born in Maidstone, Kent and who died at Kimberley, Norfolk.
The year 1607 in music involved some significant events.
John Playford (1623–1686/7) was a London bookseller, publisher, minor composer, and member of the Stationers' Company, who published books on music theory, instruction books for several instruments, and psalters with tunes for singing in churches. He is perhaps best known today for his publication of The English Dancing Master in 1651.
William Lawes was an English composer and musician.
Thomas Morley was an English composer, theorist, singer and organist of the Renaissance. He was one of the foremost members of the English Madrigal School. Referring to the strong Italian influence on the English madrigal, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians states that Morley was "chiefly responsible for grafting the Italian shoot on to the native stock and initiating the curiously brief but brilliant flowering of the madrigal that constitutes one of the most colourful episodes in the history of English music."
Thomas Ford was an English composer, lutenist, viol player and poet.
Robert Jones was an English lutenist and composer, the most prolific of the English lute song composers.
John Bartlet, also John Bartlett, was an English Renaissance composer. He was employed as a musician by Sir Edward Seymour, Earl Hertford (1539–1621) and accompanied him on a diplomatic visit to Brussels in 1605.
John Ward (1590–1638) was an English composer. He trained as a singer in Canterbury and moved to London where he produced religious and secular works. Ward's compositions, some of which were published in his lifetime, consist of madrigals, works for viol consort and Anglican church music. His madrigals are remarkable for their fine texts, broad melodic lines and originality.
The lyra viol is a small bass viol, used primarily in England in the seventeenth century.
John Amner (1579–1641) was an English composer.
Martin Peerson was an English composer, organist and virginalist. Despite Roman Catholic leanings at a time when it was illegal not to subscribe to Church of England beliefs and practices, he was highly esteemed for his musical abilities and held posts at St Paul's Cathedral and, it is believed, Westminster Abbey. His output included both sacred and secular music in forms such as consort music, keyboard pieces, madrigals and motets.
Nicola Matteis (Matheis) was the earliest notable Italian Baroque violinist in London, whom Roger North judged in retrospect "to have been a second to Corelli," and a composer of significant popularity in his time, though he had been utterly forgotten until the later 20th century.
Lachrimæ or seaven teares figured in seaven passionate pavans, with divers other pavans, galliards and allemands, set forth for the lute, viols, or violons, in five parts is a collection of instrumental music composed by John Dowland. It was published by John Windet in 1604. It consists of a set of seven slow pieces which the composer calls tears plus other pieces including some livelier numbers.
John Windet was an English printer, notable for his music publications. He was a close business associate of fellow printer John Wolfe. After 1591, Wolfe ceased printing the lucrative metrical psalter of Thomas Sternhold and John Hopkins, and Windet succeeded him in becoming the sole printer of the work for patent-holder Richard Day. At some point, Windet succeeded Wolfe as London's City Printer. Wolfe passed on some of his printing ornaments to Windet after he decided to stop printing and focus solely on publishing in 1594. On Wolfe's death in 1601, Windet was appointed administrator of his estate.
Elway Bevin (c.1554-1638) was a Welsh-born organist and composer.
