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Renaissance and baroque music

lute

Member
Hello.

I'm a student of Western European music of the 16th-18th centuries. I'm in school learning the lute and viola da gamba.

I've been a believer in PL since I read Yogananda, Michael Newton, and Brian Weiss.

This last week I was at my friend's apartment. He's the other lute student at my conservatory. I was sitting in his spartan bedroom listening to him play the 18th century German baroque lute.

This late form of the lute (the last!) has so many strings it resonates sympathetically like a sitar, creating an aura of sound like a harp.

I'm in the middle of an emotional breakthrough, a powerful shedding of fear during a full moon in Scorpio, and his soul is shining through his lute. I look up at his bare white walls and dormer ceiling and I realize this is the reliving of an old monastic scene. I live the same way.

I think we were renunciants and students of the lute, under the same mentor, probably during the Renaissance as well.

Our mentor and I listen to the Hindu gurus, and my friend and colleague believes in nothing.

I live as a sad, frustrated hermit now, and can easily see myself having been a renunciant before. My mother wanted to be a nun as a child but chose to be a musician, and my father is a musician and astrologer.

I have a similar feeling of "fitting in" with the rest of my colleagues, and I suspect we're a soul group.

There's more. I had a dream of playing in a traditional Japanese orchestra. My present mentor was playing a string instrument, maybe a biwa or shamisen. He was a respected elder and I was a green student. I had another dream where I was sleeping with him.

There are old souls in the early music revival community (a professor remembers being a female musician in 18th century Siena, having had to perform behind a screen. She came back as an effeminate man). We're trying to piece together musical scenes without recordings to work from. We have scores and documents and we're doing the best we can.

Jordi Savall, famous violist da gamba, helped put together an exquisite film called Tous les matins du monde. I highly recommend it to anyone who resonates with such times. The soundtrack is authentic as can be presently recreated and the costumes are authentic reproductions.

I want to remember the old music through altered states so I can perform it correctly, and hopefully trigger old memories for as many people as possible.

I can't state that as a professional goal, but it's a secret mission!

Thank you for reading and namaste.
 
Hi Lute,


Welcome to the forum.


What a fascinating experience! Yes, I'm sure a lot of people who study history, play traditional instruments, belong to re-enactment societies and all kinds of things like that, are reliving past life experiences.


Everyone is an 'old soul' in my view. I know some people think of old and young souls, but the soul is eternal, and therefore doesn't have an age. But, that said, there do seem to be some people who are more enlightened, or wise, or something than others don't there?


What a great idea to try to use an 'altered state' to recreate the music of the period perfectly.


Do you get the feeling that you knew any of your other fellow students before?
 
Thank you for the nice welcome!


The people I get close to are usually historians, classicists, traditional musicians et al. I'm sure you're right that we're reliving old times.


I think you're right about souls too. It seems to me that linear time is a projection of the mind. Saints and mystics say everything happens now, and scientists are beginning to cast out linear time as an a priori condition of life.


I feel connections with my lute teacher and colleague, but also with the other musicians in my department, especially the singers whom I accompany. The group energy as a whole seems inviting and friendly. I fit. I'll keep tuning.
 
lute said:
We're trying to piece together musical scenes without recordings to work from. We have scores and documents and we're doing the best we can.
Thank you for this. I spent a crazed day last December looking for . . . something I could not quite put my finger on. Probably older than your current focus.


I settled for This Yol (wind ensemble) and Ther is no rose of swych vertu (voice), but neither was just right.
 
Blueheart said:
Thank you for this. I spent a crazed day last December looking for . . . something I could not quite put my finger on. Probably older than your current focus.
I settled for This Yol (wind ensemble) and Ther is no rose of swych vertu (voice), but neither was just right.
Give me some leads and I might be able to help you.
 
Thanks! But I am afraid that is the problem. I'm not sure what I really wanted, but I thought I'd know it when I heard it. What was missing, perhaps, was the fire popping, the smoke, the pine, the murmur of talking, the dogs chewing under the table, etc.
 
Blueheart said:
Thanks! But I am afraid that is the problem. I'm not sure what I really wanted, but I thought I'd know it when I heard it. What was missing, perhaps, was the fire popping, the smoke, the pine, the murmur of talking, the dogs chewing under the table, etc.
Yes, ambiance. I understand - it's hard to play the quiet lute in an era of road noise and electric appliances.


Do you live near a college or university? If so, see if they have an early music ensemble. Free concerts and glimpses of the past.
 
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