Taner - Im-posibles (2021)

The two-order harp and the baroque guitar were two instruments that had great sovereignty in the Iberian Peninsula during the seventeenth century. Without forgetting the wonderful legacy left to us by Antonio de Cabezón and the great vihuelists of the 16th century (Alonso Mudarra, Miguel de Fuenllana, Diego Pisador, Luys de Milan, Luis de Narváez ...), the extensive musical heritage that these two have to their credit. instruments in the seventeenth century, speaks for itself of its practice. Although their main role was to accompany the voice, even the instrumentalists themselves accompanied themselves to the song, there are numerous treatises with instrumental music that contain songs, dances, fantasies, tientos, parades ...
In the case of percussion, we have less treatise information regarding its practice and way of playing, but the pictorial works and the references to its use in the verses of the works of our Golden Age theater strongly argue the importance of its presence in this period, as also happens with the harp and the guitar:
… When I see a great noise coming from guitars. Cheer me up a little. They all played parades and cows. What kill me if they are not barbers? They entering. There was not much ability to get it right, that these people have infused parades and free guitar data. It was from
see some plucking and others ripping!
(Dream of Death, Francisco de Quevedo)

… And if ever, to recreate the spirit, these exercises left me, I embraced the entertainment of reading a devout book or playing a harp, because experience showed me that music composes the decomposed spirits and alleviates the works that are born of the spirit.
(Don Quixote I, XXVIII, Miguel de Cervantes)

When Presiosa the tambourine plays
And the sweet hurts are the vain airs
Pearls are that she spills with her hands,
Flowers are bouncing from the mouth.
(La Gitanilla, Miguel de Cervantes)

Music invaded the streets, enlivened the parties and shone in religious services and theaters. The comedy corrals were the favorite places for this casual and creative repertoire where everyone could participate, improvise and vibrate as if it were a “jam session”.
The dances had a common denominator; the bass, and the different instrumentalists, who were mostly composers, made differences about the famous melodies of the dances. In fact, on many occasions, as happens for example in the numerous Compendium of harmonic zifras with theory and practice, for harp of one order, two orders and organ of the Castilian harpist (1702), Diego Fernández de Huete, or in Instrucción de Música on the Spanish guitar (1674) by Gaspar Sanz, the differences appear as an example in a few bars, an indication that clearly indicates that the continuation of the pieces had to be improvised.