Playing the Lisbon Portuguese Guitarra by
Ronald Louis Fernandez (continued)
Section 12a. Fado
Corrido by João Victoria--in Método de Guitarra
In 1999 Luís Penedo, my friend in
Lisbon, gifted me several originals of the João Victoria's
method books parts 1 to 4. This Fado Corrido is the first of 5
pieces in Primeira Parte
(First Part) for the Portuguese Guitarra. I should note here
that Fado Corrido is the same song form as Fado Maior and Fado
Corrido Maior--these are just different names for the same
thing.
See below
music sheet for more commentary.
Amigo Luis told me that these books had
been useful for him when he started to play in
the 1950's. These booklets were sold for a long time and there were
many reprintings. My copy of the first part was from the 12th
edition. We are lucky for the kindness of Luís Penedo in
sharing these booklets and also that Senhor Victoria used
good paper. My copies are about 100 years old and yet they
are in fairly good condition. The pages have changed color
but they are not falling apart. The full title of the method is: A Guitarra sem Mestre, O
Verdadeiro Método de Guitarra para aprender por música ou de
ouvido (The Guitarra without Teacher, the True Guitar
Method for learning by music or by hear). The title page goes on
to say that it is the King of the Methods! (É O Rei dos
Métodos!)--with an exclamation point. We will just use its
short title: Método de Guitarra.
There is no date on these books so for a long time I did not know
when they were published. I looked for clues in the booklet. Were
they from 1940? 1920? 1900? Eventually I I have learned from A
Guitarra: Bosquejo Histórico by Armando
Simões (1974,
page 172) that they were first published around
1920. Accurate dating of this work seemed
important to me because the tuning systems were
obsolete yet the musical pieces had some modern aspects.
There are 4 parts to his method. Part 1 includes music theory,
chromatic scale a notes and
symbols of written music, tuning the guitarra, exercises for
learning intervals, the scale of F major, location of notes on
the fingerboard, and then the 5 pieces which I am presenting in
Sections 12a to 12e.
Part 2 (16 pages) is a booklet about chords and accompanying
fado in fado tuning.
Part 3 is "a continuation of the part 2" (16 pages) and has more
about accompanying in fado tuning. Next, the "natural" tuning is
introduce along with a fingerboard chart, the rest of the book
shows chord patterns on the fingerboard for natural
tuning (note that natural tuning was used by the 18th
century English Guittar (spelled with 2 t's). The natural
tuning is essentially obsolete for playing the modern
Portuguese guitarra.
Part 4 (16 pages) presents the Mouraria tuning, then a page long
Fado da Mouraria (em Dó maior). Next is a special tuning for the
Fado de Setúbal followed by written music for this piece.
Following is a special tuning for Fado Ignez de Castro with a
written piece of music, then a special tuning for Fado da
Madrugada with a piece of written music. On page 10 he presents
a waltz called "Supplication" which is to be played with a pick,
it is in fado tuning. Page 12 contains the music for Fado de
Campolide which is also known as Fado Lopes. I love Fado
Lopes--I will have more to say about this piece in another
section. Page 13 is a version of Fado da Aguia ou Blak. Page 14
has a version of Fado do Conde d'Anadia--this is an interesting
fado and I intend to elaborate on it elsewhere. Page 15 includes
previews of 2 pieces (Fado Corrido Florido and Outro Fado em
Sib) which are both in 1º Album do Guitarrista. Page 16 includes
a chromatic scale in the "natural" tuning and a piece entitled
"O Cordelinho ou Garoto do Pião) to be played with a pick.
I have detailed the contents of the
Victória 4 booklets because they are hard to locate. From my
summary of the contents it will be obvious that some of the
material is of little interest for beginner players. Part 1 and
part 4 are the most important for modern players to understand and
build on--for a long time
these booklets were the basics for understanding the Portuguese
guitarra. Many of Victória's piece are very typical of
what Portuguese guitarists have played throughout the 20th
century. The main problems with his pieces are that they are all
written in obsolete tunings, they do not have a useful tablature
system and the accompaniment is not spelled out.
My versions solve this problem because I have transposed the
pieces, added modern tablature and added a written accompaniment.
