Italian folk dance has been an integral part of Italian culture for centuries. Dance has been a continuous thread in Italian life from Dante through the Renaissance , the advent of the tarantella in Southern Italy , and the modern revivals of folk music and dance.
96-497: Tarantella ( Italian pronunciation: [taranˈtɛlla] ) is a group of various southern Italian folk dances originating in the regions of Calabria , Campania , Sicilia and Puglia . It is characterized by a fast upbeat tempo, usually in 8 time (sometimes 8 or 4 ), accompanied by tambourines . It is among the most recognized forms of traditional southern Italian music. The specific dance-name varies with every region, for instance Sonu
192-536: A 440 Hz A , standard in most parts of the western world. Some players use an A up to 10 Hz above or below a 440, mainly outside the United States. [REDACTED] Other tunings exist, including cross-tunings , in which the usually doubled string runs are tuned to different pitches. Additionally, guitarists may sometimes tune a mandolin to mimic a portion of the intervals on a standard guitar tuning to achieve familiar fretting patterns. The mandolin
288-473: A bass guitar . These were made by the Gibson company in the early 20th century, was also never very common. A smaller scale four-string mandobass, usually tuned in fifths: G 1 –D 2 –A 2 –E 3 (two octaves below the mandolin), though not as resonant as the larger instrument, was often preferred by players as easier to handle and more portable. Reportedly, however, most mandolin orchestras preferred to use
384-505: A violin (F-5 and A-5), or a single oval sound hole (F-4 and A-4 and lower models) directly under the strings. Much variation exists between makers working from these archetypes, and other variants have become increasingly common. Generally, in the United States, Gibson F-hole F-5 mandolins and mandolins influenced by that design are strongly associated with bluegrass, while the A-style is associated with other types of music, although it too
480-618: A "modified x-bracing" that incorporates both a tone bar and X-bracing. Numerous modern mandolin makers build instruments that largely replicate the Gibson F-5 Artist models built in the early 1920s under the supervision of Gibson acoustician Lloyd Loar . Original Loar-signed instruments are sought after and extremely valuable. Other makers from the Loar period and earlier include Lyon and Healy , Vega and Larson Brothers . The ideal for archtops has been solid pieces of wood carved into
576-519: A Kalamazoo, Michigan, luthier who founded the "Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Manufacturing Co., Limited" in 1902. Gibson mandolins evolved into two basic styles: the Florentine or F-style, which has a decorative scroll near the neck, two points on the lower body and usually a scroll carved into the headstock; and the A-style, which is pear-shaped, has no points and usually has a simpler headstock. These styles generally have either two f-shaped soundholes like
672-667: A ballu in Calabria, tammurriata in Campania, and pizzica in Salento . Tarantella is popular in Southern Italy , Greece , Malta , and Argentina . The term may appear as tarantello in a linguistically masculine construction. The nowadays southern part of Italy was not part of a single country until the mid to late 19th century. The place was a colony of ancient Greece , and even Napoli ("Naples") comes from
768-867: A bowl. The archtop, also known as the carved-top mandolin has an arched top and a shallower, arched back both carved out of wood. The flat-backed mandolin uses thin sheets of wood for the body, braced on the inside for strength in a similar manner to a guitar. Each style of instrument has its own sound quality and is associated with particular forms of music. Neapolitan mandolins feature prominently in European classical music and traditional music . Archtop instruments are common in American folk music and bluegrass music . Flat-backed instruments are commonly used in Irish, British, and Brazilian folk music, and Mexican estudiantinas . Other mandolin variations differ primarily in
864-504: A circle or chain dance which incorporates singing, was the dominant Medieval dance form in Europe from at least the 12th through the 14th centuries. This form of dance was found in Italy as well and although Dante has a few fleeting references to dance, it is Dante's contemporary Giovanni del Virgilio (floruit 1319-1327) who gives us the earliest mention of Italian folk dance. He describes
960-713: A dance with Arab influence and movements from Malta, the Sfessania . Some decades later we find Villanella , and once again Ruggiero , Sfessania and Spagnoletta in Giambattista Basile 's collection of Neapolitan fairy tales, the Pentameron (published 1634-36). No reference is made in either work to the name which would later be the definitive dance of Naples, the Tarantella , but Bragaglia thinks that
1056-509: A fingerboard with frets . The action of the strings on the bridge causes the soundboard to vibrate, producing sound. Like any plucked instrument, mandolin notes decay to silence rather than sound out continuously as with a bowed note on a violin , and mandolin notes decay faster than larger chordophones like the guitar. This encourages the use of tremolo (rapid picking of one or more pairs of strings) to create sustained notes or chords. The mandolin's paired strings facilitate this technique:
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#17327825985751152-502: A group of men and women have traveled to a countryside villa to escape the Black Death and they tell a series of stories to while away the time. There are also social activities before and after the stories which include song and dance. After breakfast at the beginning of the first day: For each of the ten days, song and dance are part of the storytellers' activities - at the end of the sixth day: And further after storytelling on
1248-553: A group of women leaving a church in Bologna at the festa of San Giovanni; they form a circle with the leader singing the first stanza at the end of which the dancers stop and, dropping hands, sing the refrain. The circle then reforms and the leader goes on to the next stanza. However, it is Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375) who illustrates the social function of dance in the Decameron (about 1350-1353). In Boccaccio's masterpiece,
1344-678: A kingdom of the Austrian Empire in the 19th century. Later, the Dalmatian city of Zara with other small local territories belonged to Italy from 1920 to 1947. During the World War II , from 1941 to 1943, Italy annexed a large part of Dalmatia, including it in the Governorate of Dalmatia . Dalmatia, especially its maritime cities, once had a substantial local ethnic Italian population ( Dalmatian Italians ), making up 33% of
1440-525: A majority German-speaking population. The dance culture is similar to that of Southern Germany and the Austrian state of Tyrol with such typical dances as Ländler , Schuhplattler , Dreirtanz , Schustertanz , Bregenzer and Masolka . Central Italy refers to the areas of Tuscany , Marche , Umbria , Lazio , Abruzzo and Molise . Southern Italy refers to the regions of Campania , Apulia , Basilicata and Calabria . Insular Italy refers to
1536-485: A mandocello tuning using fifths C 2 C 2 G 2 G 2 D 3 D 3 A 3 A 3 (E 4 ) (E 4 ). The mandobass is the bass version of the mandolin, just as the double bass is the bass to the violin. Like the double bass, it most frequently has 4 single strings, rather than double courses—and like the double bass, it is most commonly tuned to perfect fourths rather than fifths like most mandolin family instruments: E 1 –A 1 –D 2 –G 2, —the same tuning as
1632-565: A member of the mandolin family, has a reasonable resemblance and similar range to the octave mandolin. It derives from the Greek bouzouki (a long-necked lute), constructed like a flat-backed mandolin and uses fifth-based tunings, most often G 2 –D 3 –A 3 –D 4 . Other tunings include: A 2 –D 3 –A 3 –D 4 , G 2 –D 3 –A 3 –E 4 (an octave below the mandolin—in which case it essentially functions as an octave mandolin), G 2 –D 3 –G 3 –D 4 or A 2 –D 3 –A 3 –E 4 . Although
1728-835: A new organization, the Ente Nazionale Assistenza Lavoratori (ENAL), headquartered in Rome. In partnership with the International Folk Music Council , ENAL sponsored a Congress and Festival in Venice September 7–11, 1949 which included many of the outstanding researchers in Italian folklore as well as folk dance and music groups from various Italian regions. ENAL was dissolved in late 1978 but earlier in October 1970,
1824-586: A scheme which became common in Renaissance dance. One of the earliest known depictions of Italian folk dance is part of a set of frescoes at the Palazzo Pubblico in Siena by Ambrogio Lorenzetti (about 1285-1348). Part of his Allegory of Good Government (Effetto del Buon Governo) painted about 1338-40 shows a group of nine dancers, all women and accompanied by another woman singing and playing on
1920-410: A shorter-scaled Irish bouzouki as a cittern, irrespective of whether it has four or five courses. Other relatives of the cittern, which might also be loosely linked to the mandolins (and are sometimes tuned and played as such), include the 6-course/12-string Portuguese guitar and the 5-course/9-string waldzither . The mandocello is classically tuned to an octave plus a fifth below the mandolin, in
2016-456: A sound that is less full than a well-made, carved-top mandolin. Flatback mandolins use a thin sheet of wood with bracing for the back, as a guitar uses, rather than the bowl of the bowlback or the arched back of the carved mandolins. Like the bowlback, the flatback has a round sound hole. This has been sometimes modified to an elongated hole, called a D-hole. The body has a rounded almond shape with flat or sometimes canted soundboard. The type
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#17327825985752112-486: A style developed by Seiffert, with a larger and rounder body. Japanese brands include Kunishima and Suzuki. Other Japanese manufacturers include Oona, Kawada, Noguchi, Toichiro Ishikawa, Rokutaro Nakade, Otiai Tadao, Yoshihiko Takusari, Nokuti Makoto, Watanabe, Kanou Kadama and Ochiai. Another family of bowlback mandolins came from Milan and Lombardy . These mandolins are closer to the mandolino or mandore than other modern mandolins. They are shorter and wider than
2208-713: A sword fight. The confusion appears to derive from the fact that the spiders, the condition, its sufferers ( tarantolati ), and the dances all have names similar to the city of Taranto. The dance originated in the Apulia region, and spread throughout the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies . The Neapolitan tarantella is a courtship dance performed by couples whose "rhythms, melodies, gestures, and accompanying songs are quite distinct" featuring faster more cheerful music. Its origins may further lie in "a fifteenth-century fusion between
2304-494: A violin (G3, D4, A4, E5). Also, like the violin, it is the soprano member of a family that includes the mandola , octave mandolin , mandocello and mandobass . There are many styles of mandolin, but the three most common types are the Neapolitan or round-backed mandolin, the archtop mandolin and the flat-backed mandolin. The round-backed version has a deep bottom, constructed of strips of wood, glued together into
2400-509: A woman on tambourine. It can be seen in Simone Prodenzani's Liber Saporecti (or Il Saporetto ), published 1415, which describes music and dance at an imaginary court, and from other works, that in the early 15th century the direction of transmission of dance forms was from the popular folk dances of the towns and countryside to the courts of the nobility. But a new attitude appears at court which elevates dance to an art form. In
2496-413: Is a stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally plucked with a pick . It most commonly has four courses of doubled strings tuned in unison , thus giving a total of eight strings. A variety of string types are used, with steel strings being the most common and usually the least expensive. The courses are typically tuned in an interval of perfect fifths , with the same tuning as
2592-545: Is a movable length of hardwood. A pickguard is glued below the sound hole under the strings. European roundbacks commonly use a 13-inch (330 mm) scale instead of the 13 + 7 ⁄ 8 inches (350 mm) common on archtop Mandolins. Intertwined with the Neapolitan style is the Roman style mandolin, which has influenced it. The Roman mandolin had a fingerboard that was more curved and narrow. The fingerboard
2688-499: Is a survival from a " Dianic or Dionysiac cult", driven underground. John Compton later proposed that the Roman Senate had suppressed these ancient Bacchanalian rites . In 186 BC, the tarantella went underground, reappearing under the guise of emergency therapy for bite victims. The stately courtship tarantella danced by a couple or couples, short in duration, is graceful and elegant and features characteristic music. On
2784-404: Is most frequently played with a mandolin , a guitar, an accordion and tambourines ; flute , fiddle , trumpet and clarinet are also used. The tarantella is a dance in which the dancer and the drum player constantly try to upstage each other by playing faster or dancing longer than the other, subsequently tiring one person out first. Tarantism, as a ritual, is supposed to have roots in
2880-458: Is most often used for and associated with bluegrass. The F-5's more complicated woodwork also translates into a more expensive instrument. Internal bracing to support the top in the F-style mandolins is usually achieved with parallel tone bars, similar to the bass bar on a violin. Some makers instead employ "X-bracing", which is two tone-bars mortised together to form an X. Some luthiers now using
2976-471: Is normally tuned like a viola (perfect fifth below the mandolin) and tenor banjo: C 3 –G 3 –D 4 –A 4 . The octave mandolin (US and Canada), termed the octave mandola in Britain and Ireland and mandola in continental Europe, is tuned an octave below the mandolin: G 2 –D 3 –A 3 –E 4 . Its relationship to the mandolin is that of the tenor violin to the violin, or the tenor saxophone to
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3072-401: Is similar to a mandocello, ordinarily tuned C 3 /C 2 –G 3 /G 2 –D 3 /D 3 –A 3 /A 3 with half of each pair of the lower two courses being tuned an octave high on a lighter gauge string. The body is a staved bowl, the saddle-less bridge glued to the flat face like most ouds and lutes, with mechanical tuners, steel strings, and tied gut frets. Modern laoutos, as played on Crete, have
3168-399: Is the soprano member of the mandolin family, as the violin is the soprano member of the violin family . Like the violin, its scale length is typically about 13 inches (330 mm). Modern American mandolins modelled after Gibsons have a longer scale , about 13 + 7 ⁄ 8 inches (350 mm). The strings in each of its double-strung courses are tuned in unison, and the courses use
3264-401: Is the usual Greek bouzouki scale, are not unknown. In modern usage, however, the terms "octave mandolin" and "Irish bouzouki" are often used interchangeably to refer to the same instrument. The modern cittern may also be loosely included in an "extended" mandolin family, based on resemblance to the flat-backed mandolins, which it predates. Its own lineage dates it back to the Renaissance . It
3360-418: Is typically a five course (ten-string) instrument having a scale length between 20 and 22 inches (510 and 560 mm). The instrument is most often tuned to either D 2 –G 2 –D 3 –A 3 –D 4 or G 2 –D 3 –A 3 –D 4 –A 4 , and is essentially an octave mandola with a fifth course at either the top or the bottom of its range. Some luthiers, such as Stefan Sobell, also refer to the octave mandola or
3456-571: Is used in Algeria and Morocco. The instrument can be tuned as a guitar, oud , or mandocello, depending on the music it will be used to play and player preference. When tuning it as a guitar the strings will be tuned (E 2 ) (E 2 ) A 2 A 2 D 3 D 3 G 3 G 3 B 3 B 3 (E 4 ) (E 4 ); strings in parentheses are dropped for a five- or four-course instrument. Using a common Arabic oud tuning D 2 D 2 G 2 G 2 A 2 A 2 D 3 D 3 (G 3 ) (G 3 ) (C 4 ) (C 4 ). For
3552-594: The National String Instrument Corporation ) to make a resonator mandolin , and amplifying electric mandolins through amplifiers. A variety of different tunings are used. Usually, courses of 2 adjacent strings are tuned in unison. By far the most common tuning is the same as violin tuning, in scientific pitch notation G 3 –D 4 –A 4 –E 5 , or in Helmholtz pitch notation : g–d′–a′–e″. The numbers of Hz shown above assume
3648-478: The Opera Nazionale Dopolavoro (OND) or National Recreational Club as a means of promoting sports and cultural activities and one of its accomplishments was a wide survey of folk music and dance in Italy at that time. The work was published in 1931 as Costumi, musica, danze e feste popolari italiane ("Italian popular customs, music, dance and festivals"). In September 1945 OND was replaced by
3744-401: The Sfessania can be regarded as the ancestor of that dance. Even by the late Renaissance and the elaborate choreographies of Caroso, a link between court dance and country or folk dance can be seen. Elements of folk dance invigorate courtly dances and folk dances take over movements and styles from courtly dance. The difference between the two forms was likely one of style and elegance. By
3840-634: The Tarantella as a solo. But the Tarantella as a couple dance telling a story of love in mime does appear in a description by Orgitano in the middle of the 19th century. Also appearing in illustrations and texts is the Saltarello as a rustic dance of Romagna in Central Italy. This is a name which also appears in the earliest Italian dance music and throughout the Renaissance. It is not clear, however, that these various mentions represent
3936-459: The bassadanza and the ballo , possibly related to the earlier simple dance forms of Boccaccio's time. The bassadanza , allied to the similar French basse dance , is a slow dignified dance without leaps or hops, while the ballo was a livelier dance often containing pantomimic elements. The terms saltarello or piva were sometimes used for more sprightly versions of the ballo . The dances are for couples, holding hands or in lines. Dances in
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4032-751: The pavana . The faster, athletic gagliarda often followed the pavana but was also done as a separate dance. Other similar fast afterdances were the tordiglione and the saltarello (another term seen more often in music than dance descriptions). Further types were the Spagnoletta and the canario with its unique stamping patterns. Some of these names are seen again in the 1588 poem about life in Naples , Ritratto ... di Napoli by Gian Battista del Tufo (about 1548-1600) where dances like Spagnoletta or Tordiglione , and Rogier , Lo Brando and Passo e mezzo are mentioned but not described. But he does tell of
4128-527: The soprano saxophone . Octave mandolin scale length is typically about 20 inches (510 mm), although instruments with scales as short as 17 inches (430 mm) or as long as 21 inches (530 mm) are not unknown. The instrument has a variant off the coast of South America in Trinidad, where it is known as the bandol , a flat-backed instrument with four courses, the lower two strung with metal and nylon strings. The Irish bouzouki , though not strictly
4224-483: The tambourine , executing a "bridge" figure where dancers go under the joined hands of the two lead dancers. Another 14th-century illustration comes from the Florentine painter Andrea Bonaiuti (1343–1377). One of his series of paintings The Church Militant and Triumphant (Chiesa militante e trionfante) done in 1365 at a chapel in the church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence also shows women dancing accompanied by
4320-512: The "potato bug" , " potato beetle ", or tater-bug mandolin. The Neapolitan style has an almond-shaped body resembling a bowl, constructed from curved strips of wood. It usually has a bent sound table , canted in two planes with the design to take the tension of the eight metal strings arranged in four courses. A hardwood fingerboard sits on top of or is flush with the sound table. Very old instruments may use wooden tuning pegs , while newer instruments tend to use geared metal tuners . The bridge
4416-642: The 18th century, the name Tarantella does appear in illustrations and travelers's accounts in Southern Italy. When the German writer Goethe describes the Tarantella which he saw performed in Naples during his trip to Italy in 1786-87, it appears as a dance for women only, two girls dancing with castanets accompanied by a third on the tambourine. Madame de Staël had also traveled in Italy and in her 1817 novel Corinne, or Italy , she has her heroine dance
4512-678: The Cremonese instrument, which were tuned the same as the Neapolitan. Like the Lombard mandolin, the Genoese mandolin was not tuned in fifths. Its 6 gut strings (or 6 courses of strings) were tuned as a guitar but one octave higher: e-a-d’-g’-b natural-e”. Like the Neapolitan and unlike the Lombard mandolin, the Genoese does not have the bridge glued to the soundboard, but holds the bridge on with downward tension, from strings that run between
4608-417: The Cremonese mandolin, which had four single-strings and a fixed bridge, to which the strings were attached. Bortolazzi said in this book that the new wire-strung mandolins were uncomfortable to play, when compared with the gut-string instruments. Also, he felt they had a "less pleasing...hard, zither-like tone" as compared to the gut string's "softer, full-singing tone." He favored the four single strings of
4704-545: The English writer and politician Horace Walpole dated 1740 from Florence declares "The Italians are fond to a degree of our country dances" One of the earliest attempts to systematically collect folk dances is Gaspare Ungarelli's 1894 work Le vecchie danze italiane ancora in uso nella provincia bolognese ("Old Italian dances still in use in the province of Bologna") which gives brief descriptions and music for some 30 dances. In 1925, Benito Mussolini 's government set up
4800-620: The Greek word "Neapolis," which means "New City." Before the Unification of Italy , it was part of the Kingdom of Naples and the Kingdom of Sicily ("Sikelia" is the original name of this island as a colony of Ancient Greece), and later the Kingdom of Two Sicilies when the two reigns merged. Before the Unification of Italy, it was ruled by Spain and briefly by Austria. There was the ancient Greek city of Tarantas found by Spartans. In
4896-484: The Irish bouzouki's bass course pairs are most often tuned in unison, on some instruments one of each pair is replaced with a lighter string and tuned in octaves, similar to the 12-string guitar . While occupying the same range as the octave mandolin/octave mandola, the Irish bouzouki is theoretically distinguished from the former instrument by its longer scale length, typically from 24 to 26 inches (610 to 660 mm), although scales as long as 27 inches (690 mm), which
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#17327825985754992-399: The Italian province of Taranto (taking its name from Tarantas), Apulia , the bite of a locally common type of wolf spider ("Lycos" in Greek means "wolf"), named "tarantula" after the region, was popularly believed to be highly venomous and to lead to a hysterical condition known as tarantism . This type of dance became known as the " tarantella ". R. Lowe Thompson proposed that the dance
5088-685: The Italian folklore groups who had been members of ENAL set up a separate organization, which in 1978 became the Federazione Italiana Tradizioni Populari (FITP). The FITP publishes a newsletter and a scholarly publication Il Folklore D'Italia . Some prominent 20th-century Italian folk dance researchers are Anton Giulio Bragaglia, Diego Carpitella, Antonio Cornoldi, Giuseppe Michele Gala, Bianca Maria Galanti, Giorgio Nataletti, Placida Staro and Paolo Toschi. (see Bibliography) An interest in preserving and fostering folk art, music and dance among Italian Americans and
5184-488: The Leland brand. A handful of contemporary luthiers build piccolo mandolins. The mandola , termed the tenor mandola in Britain and Ireland and liola or alto mandolin in continental Europe, is tuned a fifth below the mandolin, in the same relationship as that of the viola to the violin . Some also call this instrument the "alto mandola". Its scale length is typically about 16 + 1 ⁄ 2 inches (420 mm). It
5280-415: The Lombard mandolin in 1893 as wider and shorter than the Neapolitan mandolin, with a shallower back and a shorter and wider neck, with six single strings to the regular mandolin's set of 4. The Lombard was tuned C–D–A–E–B–G. The strings were fastened to the bridge like a guitar's. There were 20 frets, covering three octaves, with an additional 5 notes. When Adelstein wrote, there were no nylon strings, and
5376-621: The Medieval period, no writer describes dance steps or figures, it being assumed that everyone knew how to dance. By the early Renaissance the simple circle and chain dances of the earlier centuries still exist - there are references to the round dance ( ridda ) and dancing in circles as late as the early 16th century in Straparola 's Le piacevoli notti ( The Facetious Nights of Straparola ). But we also find that couple dances and mimetic elements now appear and formal choreographies emerge for
5472-419: The Neapolitan mandolin and the Lombard mandolin. The Neapolitan style has spread worldwide. Mandolins have a body that acts as a resonator , attached to a neck . The resonating body may be shaped as a bowl ( necked bowl lutes ) or a box ( necked box lutes ). Traditional Italian mandolins, such as the Neapolitan mandolin, meet the necked bowl description. The necked box instruments include archtop mandolins and
5568-695: The Spanish Fandango and the Moresque ballo di sfessartia ". The " magico-religious " tarantella is a solo dance performed supposedly to cure through perspiration the delirium and contortions attributed to the bite of a spider at harvest (summer) time. The dance was later applied as a supposed cure for the behavior of neurotic women ( carnevaletto delle donne ). There are several traditional tarantella groups: Cantori di Carpino, Officina Zoé, Uccio Aloisi gruppu, Canzoniere Grecanico Salentino, Selva Cupina, I Tamburellisti di Torrepaduli. The tarantella
5664-567: The United States, when the bowlback was being made in numbers, Lyon and Healy was a major manufacturer, especially under the "Washburn" brand. Other American manufacturers include Martin , Vega, and Larson Brothers. In Canada, Brian Dean has manufactured instruments in Neapolitan, Roman, German and American styles but is also known for his original 'Grand Concert' design created for American virtuoso Joseph Brent . German manufacturers include Albert & Mueller, Dietrich, Klaus Knorr, Reinhold Seiffert and Alfred Woll. The German bowlbacks use
5760-475: The ancient myths. Reportedly, victims who had collapsed or were convulsing would begin to dance with appropriate music and be revived as if a tarantula had bitten them. The music used to treat dancing mania appears to be similar to that used in the case of tarantism though little is known about either. Justus Hecker (1795–1850), describes in his work Epidemics of the Middle Ages : A convulsion infuriated
5856-492: The bottom and neck of the instrument. The neck was wider than the Neapolitan mandolin's neck. The peg-head is similar to the guitar's. At the very end of the 19th century, a new style, with a carved top and back construction inspired by violin family instruments began to supplant the European-style bowl-back instruments in the United States. This new style is credited to mandolins designed and built by Orville Gibson ,
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#17327825985755952-528: The dance forms are given no distinctive description, but others take these to mean separate dances and trace the names forward to the Renaissance dances bassadanza and ballo . These descriptions from Boccaccio are, of course, all of townsfolk dancing but the Decameron also gives at least a glimpse at peasant dances as well. In the second story of the Eighth Day about the priest and Monna Belcolore, of
6048-601: The dedication and leadership of Elba Farabegoli Gurzau led to the formation of the Italian Folk Art Federation of America (IFAFA) in May 1979. The group sponsors an annual conference and has published a newsletter, Tradizioni , since 1980. Northern Italy refers to the regions of Aosta Valley , Piedmont , Liguria , Lombardy , Veneto , Emilia-Romagna , Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Trentino-Alto Adige . Several types of weapon dances are known from Italy,
6144-450: The entire lower course tuned to C 3 , a reentrant octave above the expected low C. Its scale length is typically about 28 inches (710 mm). The Algerian mandole was developed by an Italian luthier in the early 1930s, scaled up from a mandola until it reached a scale length of approximately 25 to 27 inches. It is a flatback instrument, with a wide neck and 4 courses (8 strings), 5 courses (10 strings) or 6 courses (12 strings), and
6240-493: The estampie / istanpitta was actually a dance or simply a musical form. Curt Sachs in his World History of the Dance believes the strong rhythm of the music, the name, which he derives from a term "to stamp", and literary references point to the estampie definitely being a dance. Vellekoop, on the other hand, looks at the evidence and concludes that estampie was simply a name for early instrumental music. The other seven dances in
6336-420: The fingers or with a quill. However, modern instruments are louder, using metal strings, which exert more pressure than the gut strings. The modern soundboard is designed to withstand the pressure of metal strings that would break earlier instruments. The soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections. There are usually one or more sound holes in
6432-422: The first eight of which are labeled istanpitta . Of the next seven pieces, 4 are called saltarello , one trotto , one Lamento di Tristano , and the final one is labeled La Manfredina . These are the only known examples of instrumental dance music from Italy in the Middle Ages and all of them have similarities to earlier French dance pieces called estampie . There is divided opinion on the question of whether
6528-406: The first time. This new Art of the Dance can especially be seen at the major courts of Milan , Padua , Venice , Florence , Bologna , Pesaro , Urbino and Naples . With dancing elevated to new heights, dancing masters make their appearance at court and the first dance manuals are known from the middle of the 15th century. The three 15th century treatises divide their dances into two types,
6624-411: The flatback mandolins. Strings run between mechanical tuning machines at the top of the neck to a tailpiece that anchors the other end of the strings. The strings are suspended over the neck and soundboard and pass over a floating bridge . The bridge is kept in contact with the soundboard by the downward pressure from the strings. The neck is either flat or has a slight radius, and is covered with
6720-477: The gut and single strings "do not vibrate so clearly and sweetly as the double steel string of the Neapolitan." Brescian mandolins (also known as Cremonese) that have survived in museums have four gut strings instead of six and a fixed bridge. The mandolin was tuned in fifths, like the Neapolitan mandolin. In his 1805 mandolin method , Anweisung die Mandoline von selbst zu erlernen nebst einigen Uebungsstucken von Bortolazzi , Bartolomeo Bortolazzi popularised
6816-432: The human frame [...]. Entire communities of people would join hands, dance, leap, scream, and shake for hours [...]. Music appeared to be the only means of combating the strange epidemic [...] lively, shrill tunes, played on trumpets and fifes, excited the dancers; soft, calm harmonies, graduated from fast to slow, high to low, prove efficacious for the cure. The music used against spider bites featured drums and clarinets ,
6912-440: The ideal thickness, produce the sound consumers expect. Not carving them correctly dulls the sound. The sound of a carved-wood instrument changes the longer it is played, and older instruments are sought out for their rich sound. Laminated-wood presstops are less resonant than carved wood, the wood and glue vibrating differently than wood grain. Presstops made of solid wood have the wood's natural grain compressed, typically creating
7008-626: The larger towns and some villages in the western part of Istria. Dances done by both the Croatian and the Italian communities include Molferina or Mafrina and Kvadrilja . Dances specific to the Italians include La Veneziana , Bersagliera , Denci , and more importantly the very similar dances Vilota and Furlana . Dalmatia is today part of Croatia but belonged to the Republic of Venice ( Venetian Dalmatia ) from 1409 to 1797, and became
7104-558: The latter the story says: The two terms for dance that Boccaccio uses, ridda and ballonchio , both refer to round dances with singing. Another variant of the round dance with song is the Righoletto, known from Florence and the surrounding countryside in the 14th and 15th centuries In a 14th-century Italian manuscript in the British Library (Add. 29987), folios 55v-58r and 59v-63v, contain 15 monophonic pieces of music,
7200-407: The mandola. Bowlback mandolins (also known as roundbacks), are used worldwide. They are most commonly manufactured in Europe, where the long history of mandolin development has created local styles. However, Japanese luthiers also make them. Owing to the shape and to the common construction from wood strips of alternating colors, in the United States these are sometimes colloquially referred to as
7296-414: The manuscript have the same general musical structure as those labeled "istanpitta" but are simpler and probably more suitable for dancing. Saltarello is a dance name found in later centuries as well but the later examples may not refer to the same dance as these 14th-century pieces. The last two dances in the manuscript, Lamento di Tristano and La Manfredina are notable as being pairs of related dances,
7392-462: The manuscripts were often given rather fanciful names, e.g. Lioncello , Gioioso and Rosina , which are often found in more than one work and occasionally as dance names in later times as well. In the late 16th and early 17th century manuals of Caroso and Negri, a variety of dance types can be seen: slow processional dances, longways, various dances for single couples and even a few for trios or five dancers. All are social dances for both sexes with
7488-401: The men's steps being more athletic than the women's. In all the dances the upper body is kept erect, the arms are quiet and there is little movement above the waist. Dance suites usually started with a walking sequence, pavana , a term often found in the music of the time but almost never in dance manuals. The passo e mezzo (literally step-and-a-half) seems to have been a faster variant of
7584-476: The mock battle ( Moresca ), sword dances and stick dances. A number of these are from the Piedmont region of Northern Italy: The region of Friuli has been a crossroads for different cultures throughout the centuries. The inhabitants are mostly Italian speaking as well as the local Friulan language but German and Slovenian are also spoken in some areas. South Tyrol is an autonomous province of Italy with
7680-604: The number of strings and include four-string models (tuned in fifths) such as the Brescian and Cremonese; six-string types (tuned in fourths ) such as the Milanese, Lombard, and Sicilian; six-course instruments of 12 strings (two strings per course) such as the Genoese; and the tricordia , with four triple-string courses (12 strings total). Much of mandolin development revolved around the soundboard (the top). Early instruments were quiet, strung with gut strings, and plucked with
7776-429: The ordinary double bass , rather than a specialised mandolin family instrument. Calace and other Italian makers predating Gibson also made mandolin-basses. The relatively rare eight-string mandobass, or "tremolo-bass", also exists, with double courses like the rest of the mandolin family, and is tuned either G 1 –D 2 –A 2 –E 3 , two octaves lower than the mandolin, or C 1 –G 1 –D 2 –A 2 , two octaves below
7872-417: The other hand, the supposedly curative or symptomatic tarantella was danced solo by a victim of a Lycosa tarantula spider bite (not to be confused with what is commonly known as a tarantula today); it was agitated in character, lasted for hours or even up to days, and featured characteristic music. However, other forms of the dance were and still are dances of couples usually either mimicking courtship or
7968-439: The plectrum (pick) strikes each of a pair of strings alternately, providing a more full and continuous sound than a single string would. Various design variations and amplification techniques have been used to make mandolins comparable in volume with louder instruments and orchestras, including the creation of mandolin-banjo hybrids with the drum-like body of the louder banjo , adding metal resonators (most notably by Dobro and
8064-404: The regions of Sicily and Sardinia . The peninsula of Istria , today part of the countries of Croatia and Slovenia , belonged to the Republic of Venice ( Venetian Istria ) from the 13th century to 1797, and became a margraviate of the Austrian Empire in the 19th century. Later, Istria belonged to Italy from 1919 to 1947. Local ethnic Italians ( Istrian Italians ) were more than 50% of
8160-423: The right shape. However, another archtop exists, the top made of laminated wood or thin sheets of solid wood, pressed into the arched shape. These have become increasingly common in the world of internationally constructed musical instruments in the 21st century. Pressed-top instruments are made to appear the same as carved-top instruments but do not sound the same as carved-wood tops. Carved-wood tops when carved to
8256-569: The same or even related dances. In the North, in Venice , there was the "wild courtship dance", known as Furlana or Forlana which was danced by Casanova in 1775. References to figure dances similar to English country dances and French Contradanses also appear as early as the first part of the 18th century. Dances of this type from the 18th and 19th centuries in Italy include La Contraddanza , Quadriglia and Il Codiglione . A letter from
8352-455: The same relationship as that of the cello to the violin, its strings being tuned to C 2 –G 2 –D 3 –A 3 . Its scale length is typically about 26 inches (660 mm). A typical violoncello scale is 27 inches (690 mm). The mandolone was a Baroque member of the mandolin family in the bass range that was surpassed by the mandocello. It was part of the Neapolitan mandolin family. The Greek laouto or laghouto (long-necked lute)
8448-475: The same tuning as the violin: G 3 –D 4 –A 4 –E 5 . The piccolo or sopranino mandolin is a rare member of the family, tuned one octave above the mandola and one fourth above the mandolin (C 4 –G 4 –D 5 –A 5 ); the same relation as that of the piccolo (to the western concert flute ) or violino piccolo (to the violin and viola ). One model was manufactured by the Lyon & Healy company under
8544-414: The seventh day: The dance passages in the Decameron show that the carol was always sung but could be accompanied by instrumental music as well, both men and women danced though women seem to dance more often than men, and all knew how to dance. Boccaccio also uses two other terms besides carola to describe the dances done, danza and ballo . Some scholars assume that all the terms are synonymous since
8640-478: The soundboard, either round, oval, or shaped like a calligraphic f (f-hole). A round or oval sound hole may be covered or bordered with decorative rosettes or purfling . Mandolins evolved from lute family instruments in Europe. Predecessors include the gittern and mandore or mandola in Italy during the 17th and 18th centuries. There were a variety of regional variants, but the two most widespread ones were
8736-489: The standard Neapolitan mandolin, with a shallow back. The instruments have 6 strings, 3 wire treble-strings and 3 gut or wire-wrapped-silk bass-strings. The strings ran between the tuning pegs and a bridge that was glued to the soundboard, as a guitar's. The Lombard mandolins were tuned g–b–e′–a′–d″–g″ (shown in Helmholtz pitch notation ). A developer of the Milanese style was Antonio Monzino (Milan) and his family who made them for six generations. Samuel Adelstein described
8832-461: The total population for centuries, while making up about a third of the population in 1900, number that decreased further after the Istrian–Dalmatian exodus (1943–1960). Italian cultural influence has resulted in the resemblance of many Istrian dances to those of Northern Italy. This applies to dances done by the modern day Croatian population and by the Italian national minority found today in
8928-495: The total population of Dalmatia in 1803, but this was reduced to 20% in 1816. According to Austrian censuses, the Dalmatian Italians formed 12.5% of the population in 1865, but this was reduced to 2.8% in 1910, number that decreased further after the Istrian–Dalmatian exodus (1943–1960). Mandolin A mandolin ( Italian : mandolino , pronounced [mandoˈliːno] ; literally "small mandola ")
9024-603: Was lengthened over the sound hole for the E strings, the high pitched strings. The shape of the back of the neck was different, less rounded with an edge, the bridge was curved making the G strings higher. The Roman mandolin had mechanical tuning gears before the Neapolitan. Prominent Italian manufacturers include Vinaccia (Naples), Embergher (Rome) and Calace (Naples). Other modern manufacturers include Lorenzo Lippi (Milan), Hendrik van den Broek (Netherlands), Brian Dean (Canada), Salvatore Masiello and Michele Caiazza (La Bottega del Mandolino) and Ferrara, Gabriele Pandini. In
9120-432: Was matched to the pace of the victim, and is only weakly connected to its later depiction in the tarantellas of Chopin , Liszt , Rossini , and Heller. While most serious proponents speculated as to the direct physical benefits of the dancing rather than the power of the music, a mid-18th century medical textbook gets the prevailing story backwards, describing that tarantulas will be compelled to dance by violin music. It
9216-571: Was thought that the Lycosa tarantula wolf spider had lent the name "tarantula" to an unrelated family of spiders , having been the species associated with Taranto , but since L. tarantula is not inherently deadly, the highly venomous Mediterranean black widow, Latrodectus tredecimguttatus , may have been the species originally associated with Taranto's manual grain harvest. Italian folk dance The carol or carole ( carola in Italian),
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