13 Titles - Viola da Gamba Society

[61]DIATONIC FINGERING ON TREBLEAND PARDESSUS VIOLSCARL HUGO ǺGRENIntroductionFor the prospective student of the bass or tenor viol there is a fairlyextensive supply of good tutors. Both viol sizes use the same fingering,namely chromatic fingering or one finger to a fret. They can thus quiteeasily be combined into the same tutor, which is what most authors havedone. The beginner on the treble or pardessus is in a rather more difficultsituation however, because, with the exception of Cécile Dolmetsch'sexcellent 'Supplement', 1 all the existing tutors include the treble with thebass and tenor sizes, blithely assuming chromatic fingering for the trebleas well as for the others. At this point it might be a good thing to stop andconsider. Through the work of Adrian Rose 2 we know that the Frenchtreble and parde.uus players used diatonic fingering. In the case ofconsorts there does not seem to be any printed evidence as to what kindof fingering early English treble-players used. One fact that points in thedirection of diatonic fingering exists in the writings of ChristopherSimpson, who apparently changed to diatonic fingering when goingbeyond the octave on the bass viol. Undoubtedly a diatonic player canmanage both French solos and consort playing, whereas chromatic playershave often been observed to be in dire straits when attempting Frenchtreble music. There is also the question of how 'authentic' we should tryto be. Even if we wanted to adopt their fingering, we do not actually knowhow the early English players fingered their trebles, so at any rate we arefaced with the task of developing a fresh treble-viol technique, preferablyone that enables the player to face consorts, French solos and trio-sonataparts with confidence. There is no historical evidence that chromaticfingering was in universal use anywhere, and today most really good trebleand pardessus players use diatonic fingering ('treble fingering') likeviolinists. However, to my knowledge this fingering is not described inany available tutor. In her tutor Martha Bishop mentions the possibility inthree lines in the foreword, and Cécile Dolmetsch does recommenddiatonic fingering but only indirectly, although the fingering in her piecesis in fact diatonic. As I shall show, chromatic fingering often lands theplayer in difficult or even impossible situations when attempting moreambitious treble music, especially in the French literature, but also inmuch consort music. The following is an attempt to further theredevelopment of a viable treble-viol technique. A first step must besimply to describe what diatonic fingering is and how it works. This12Cécile Dolmetsch: Supplement for Treble Viol to Twelve Lessons for the Viola daGamba by Nathalie Dolmetsch (Schott Edition 10351)Adrian P. Rose: 'Some Eighteenth-Century French Sources of Treble Viol Technique',The Consort, xxxviii (1982), pp. 431-9