Frank A. Gerbode Wed, 12 Jan 2000 13:40:37 -0800 (PST) ---------------- Hi, everyone. I'm a 59 y/o semi-retired psychiatrist who began playing lute in 1963, dropped out in 1970, then returned in 1993, to find that the thumb-under revolution had run its course, and it was now OK to play thumb-out again. Whew! I started out by being a failure at the piano in the 2nd grade. When I was 11, I learned ukulele from some beach boys in Hawaii, then graduated to baritone uke, then tenor guitar, and finally regular guitar. I played rhythm guitar in a high school band, then classical guitar, then ren lute, then, more recently, baroque lute. I got turned on to early music while I was playing on a peg-board in my high school gym, and I suddenly heard the most beautiful sound I had ever heard: a local girl's high school chorus singing madrigals. Shortly afterward, two things happened that Changed the Course of History (mine, anyway): 1. An English friend gave me a copy of Noah Greenberg's small paperback edition of English lute songs (in staff notation, of course). 2. I heard a record of Karl Scheidt: "Music for Lute and Guitar" I didn't know how to read music, so I learned some pieces by Johann Anton Logy and Weiss by ear I also loved the music of Bach, so I got hold of a book called "Das Bach Buch", Vols. 1 and 2, learned to read the notes, and started chunking through them on my steel-stringed guitar. Then I got a classical guitar, which was a lot easier to play. I took lessons for about 6 months from a jazz/classical guitarist in Berkeley called Harry Mordecai and learned Carcassi and Villa-Lobos stuff. I found myself playing early music transcribed for guitar almost exclusively, including Purcell, Dowland, and I played Handel trio sonatas, Dowland lute songs, Luis Milan pieces, etc. In my senior year of college, I decided I should play these on the original instrument, so I walked into a music shop in Berkeley and said, "Have you got any lutes?" They happened to have one hanging on the wall, a marginally playable Heinrich lute. I bought it for $250.00. I tried stringing it like a guitar, but that didn't work well and didn't do good things to the instrument. Then, in 1962, I went to Cambridge University to study philosophy, and there (well, actually, in Ely) I encountered Ian Harwood, who was duly horrified at what I had done to my lute, taught me how to string it properly, and gave me a little pamphlet on how to play the lute, I think by Diana Poulton. I became disenchanted with philosophy and returned to the US to make up on my missing pre-med requirements. During that year (1963-64), I became friends with George Houle, then head of early music at Stanford. When he discovered I played the lute, he forthwith signed me up to do a concert with Alfred Deller, who had arrived for a concert, in need of a lutenist. I agreed, though I had only been playing for 6 months. The concert went OK, despite the fact that at the 11th hour, Deller decided to do the lute song ("A Shepherd in a Shade") in a different key, and despite the near unplayability of my lute (I had found that surgical gut was the only thing that could make it sound halfway decent). Things went better when my Harwood 9-course arrived. Now I was beginning to have a really good time with my lute playing. I did a benefit concert with Joan Baez, in which I played (not well) the King of Denmark Galliard, Forlorne Hope, etc., as well as several other concerts arranged by George Houle. George offered me a job with the NY Pro Musica, but I decided to go to medical school instead. During my four years of medical school and four years of post-medical training, I tried to keep up my lute work. When I had evening duty on psychiatric words, I used to play my favorite pieces. It seemed to have a calming effect on the patients (and on me). During this period, I had some lessons in New Haven from Stanley Buetens and a few from Joe Iadone, but it was hard to find the time, and when, in 1970, I returned to complete my psychiatric training in Palo Alto, I finally gave up on it. I dropped out for over 20 years. Finally, in 1993, I was trying to get a life after the breakup of my marriage, so I started playing again, and by now, I have more than recovered my skill of 25 years ago. I've been to several week-long workshops, with Paul O'Dette, Jacob Heringman, and received a couple of lessons from Toyohiko Satoh, and Pat O'Brien, all of which I found very helpful. I've also been attending monthly lute seminars by Franklin Lei -- also very helpful. I'd say I was an "advanced amateur" on ren lute, a beginner on baroque lute, and intermediate on doing continuo on archlute. I do concerts whenever I can and otherwise just play for fun. I am building up quite a collection of fronimo files, including a number of figured bass realizations (I like having tab when I do concerts), arrangements of stuff, and a few compositions. One of these days I will get a web site up. I've really enjoyed being on this lute list. I get a lot out of it. --Frank BTW, my nickname is "Sarge", a name my father (Frank Gerbode, senior) gave me after returning from WW II as a Colonel. I got a lower rank. I seems to have stuck. I only use "Frank" for my official identities when I'm trying to impress people with how professional I am, and in order not to have to tell this story over and over again. -- Frank A. Gerbode, M.D.