Keyboard fingering in early Spanish sources

Abstract

Of the primary sources that shed light on the performance practice of keyboard music before the mid17th century, those from Spain are among the most numerous and detailed. Six writers on the performance of Spanish keyboard music from the time of Antonio de Cabez6n (1510-1566) to that of Juan Cabanilles (16441712) discuss keyboard fingering (in addition to ornamentation, rhythmic alteration and other aspects of musical performance): Juan Bermudo,1' Luis Venegas de Henestrosa,2 Tomas de Santa Maria,3 Hernando de Cabez6n,4 Francisco Correa de Arauxo5 and Pablo Nassarre.6 The first four wrote in the 16th century, Correa is the single representative of the 17th, and Nassarre's treatise did not appear until the end of this era of Spanish keyboard music, in the first quarter of the 18th century. No other Iberian sources reveal how keyboard music was fingered before the 18th century, since the music itself contains no fingerings at all (this is hardly surprising in the case of the anthology by Venegas, Hernando de Cabez6n's edition of his father's works and Correa's Libro de tientos, where the use of Spanish number tablature would make the addition of fingering numbers at the very least impractical). The length of time that separates Bermudo's treatise (1555) from Nassarre's (1723) might suggest that the six sources would be unlikely to reflect a continuous tradition of uniform practice. But in fact all six show a remarkable consistency of approach, perhaps because of the conservative nature of early Spanish keyboard literature in general and of Nassarre's book in particular. It is paradoxical, therefore, that the Spanish writers were the first to use the modern system of numbering the fingers (illus.2), which was not adopted elsewhere until the middle of the 17th century. None of them claims to have laid down an exhaustive list of rules to deal with all possible circumstances, though