Intabulation

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Intabulation, from the Italian word intavolatura, refers to an arrangement of a vocal piece for keyboard, lute, or other plucked string instrument, written in tablature. Intabulation generally refers to music from the 14th-16th centuries. The earliest intabulation is from the mid-14th century Robertsbridge Codex. The exception is the 16th and 17th century Italian keyboard pieces which included both vocal and instrumental music. Intabulations contain all the vocal lines of a polyphonic piece, for the most part, although they are sometimes combined or redistributed in order to work better on the instrument the intabulation is intended for, and idiomatic ornaments are sometimes added. Other important manuscripts containing intabulations are the Faenza Codex and Buxheimer Orgelbuch.

Intabulations are an important source of information for historically informed performance because they show ornaments as they would have been played on various instruments, and they are a huge clue as to the actual performance of musica ficta, since tablature shows where a musician places their fingers, which is less up to interpretation than certain staff notations.

[edit] Reference

• Howard Mayer Brown. "Intabulation", Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (accessed August 11, 2006), grovemusic.com (subscription access).