Music for the Baroque Guitar

About

Vermeer The Guitar Player

Compiled by Dr. Gary R. Boye
Music Librarian, Appalachian State University

There were two main styles of guitar music from the period between 1600 and 1750:

  • The Rasgueado Style—with mostly strummed chords
  • The Mixed Style—with a mixture of strummed chords and individually plucked notes

The former style is of mostly historical interest; the mixed style contains works more suitable for modern performers. Follow the links above for more thorough discussion of these styles and a detailed listing of guitar tablatures using them.

Complete Chronological List

Below is a complete chronological list of the published Rasgueado and Mixed Style books linked separately above.

Martin 1663
Carré 1671
Corbetta 1671
Corbetta 1674
Sanz 1674
Ribayaz 1677
Grénerin 1680
Matteis 1682
Visée 1686
Kremberg 1689
Derosier c1696
Nivers 1696
Sanz 1697
Michele 1698
Derosier 1699

Most of the information on this Web site was compiled during my research in Italy under a Fulbright Scholarship in 1991-1992. The information contained here is primary research; the result of my visits to over two dozen libraries in Italy, France, and Great Britain where I studied over 100 examples of printed guitar tablatures. My doctoral dissertation, "Giovanni Battista Granata and the Development of Printed Guitar Music in Seventeenth-Century Italy" (Duke University, 1995), resulted from this research.

I've started an additional list, incorporating manuscripts and printed sources up to 1800. See: Tablatures for the Lute, Guitar, and Vihuela (1470-1799)


© Copyright Gary R. Boye 1995–2024

© Copyright Gary R. Boye 1995–2022

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