Treble Vihuela de Arco based on the Goldegg Castle wall painting.

This is a treble viol or vihuela de arco based on a wall painting in Knights' Hall of Goldegg Castle in the Pongau area (1536).


These paintings are atributed to Hans Bocksberger the older together with other painters. His style contains German elements (A. Dürer) as well as Italian characteristics (Renaissance, Mannerism).
He might have learned with his father and perhaps made some learning years in Italy, anyhow had he exact knowledge of Italian style elements of the time.
His style points both German elements (Albrecht Dürer), and Italian elements (Renaissance and Mannerism).

One of the characteristical features of this instrument is the bridge.


The treble leg goes down (we suppose) on to the back trough a hole on the soundboard. This makes the sound closer to an instrument with a soundpost (sth like a viol or a violin) even though the treble string is slightly unbalanced, gives a weaker sound than the rest (At least in this case, where there is no longitudinal bar or thickening of the soundboard).

This kind of bridge/soundpost is also depicted 'on the title pages of the superius, altus and bassus part books of the copies in theBasel Universitätsbibliothek of 'Reutterliedlin' printed by Christian Egenolph in Frankfurt am Main (1535)' (below) according to E. Segerman in his article The development of European bowed instruments










foto: Heinz Kaiser, Kulturverein SCHLOSS GOLDEGG

This instrument shares some features with the vihuela de mano.



It has been built on a board using no mould.
The ribs are inserted in the neck, which goes inside the body and works as a top block.
It has no corner blocks and the joints are reinforced with linen strips. Soundboard is glued on ribs using no linings at all.




The neck in not angled backwards, it is in the same plane as the soundboard. To get the string height, the fingerboard is wedge shaped, giving a thick neck close to the body joint as we can see in the painting.




The soundboard is flat with two small transversal bars aligned with the corners.

Dimension of the instrument have been taken based on a reference, in this case the distance between the eye centers (or interpupillary distance). This way measuring can be 'accurate' providing that the reference measure and the object to be measured are on the same plane. In this case they are not on the exact same plane, so the size of the instrument is not exactly what it is represented on the painting. There is also the fact of the 'loose' accuracy when depicting this instrument. We can see much greater detail on the instrument on the right than on the rest.


The tuning choosen for this instrument has been g c' e' a' d'' taken from the Munich University Library 4º Cod, ms. 718 dated (1523/4) which comes to be the same as Gerle gave in his Musica Teusch (Nuremberg 1532).

Doublebass Violone bow and a tenor viol bow, based on Praetorius. Arco de violone contrabajo y un arco de viola tenor, basados en Praetorius.

This is the bow we made when turning into baroque a modern doublebass. It is looselly based on Praetorius Gross Contra Bas Geig. For this bow length is 870 mm (hair length 670 mm) while the one depicted on Praetorius book is around 940mm

Arku hau kontrabaxua barrrokizatzean egin genuen. Praetoriusen Gross Contra Bas Geig ean oinarrituta dago. Arku honek 870 mm luzeera du, (zurden luzeera 670 mm) eta Praetorius ek bere liburuan agertzen duena 940 mm dituen.

Este es el arco está basado (diriamos inspirado) en el Gross Contra Bas Geig de Praetorius. La longitud total es de 870mms y la longitud de cerdas es de 670 mms.














This is a bow for tenor viol. It looks closer to the Praetorius engravings.
Total length is 690 mm and hair length: 580 mm.

Biola tenore batendako arkua. Arku honek Praetoriousen grabatuetan oinarriturik dago.
Luzeera: 690 mm. Zurden luzeera: 580 mm.

Arco para viola tenor. Easte sí basado en los grabados de Praetorius. Longitud totla: 690 mm. Longitud de cerdas:580 mm.

Reseting fingerboard projection on a seven string Bass viol. III. Rehaciendo el ángulo de un batidor en una gamba bajo de siete cuerdas. III.

As said on previous postings, reseting the fingerboard angle needs adjusting the bridge. This time we are making a new bridge, following the same design.


Lehenago esan bezala, batidorearen angulu aldatze honek zubia doitzea edo berria jartzea esan nahi du. Oraingoan berria jarriko dugu, ezkerreko argazkian ageri den bezala.



Como hemos dicho anteriormente, la operación de cambiar el ángulo del batidor implica ajustar el puente o hacer uno nuevo. En este caso hemos optado por esto último.



The picture on the left shows, vaguely, (I´m not a very good photographer) the wedge between fingerboard and neck.

Eskumako argazkian, nahiko txarto, ikus daiteke batidorea eta mastilaren artean pegatu den egur zatia.

En la foto de la derecha podemos ver (con alguna dificultad, que uno no es buen fotógrafo) la cuña que se ha encolado entre el batidor y el mástil.

Reseting fingerboard projection on a seven string Bass viol. Rehaciendo el ángulo de un batidor en una gamba bajo de siete cuerdas.

On this instrument strings were a bit far off the fingerboard, making it difficult to play chords on the second possition, mainly on the middle strings.

En este instrumento las cuerdas estaban demasiado lejos del batidor dificultando la ejecución de acordes en la segunda posición sobre todo en las cuerdas del medio.

Instrumentu honetan sokak altuera handiegia zuten "batidorearen" gainean. Honek akordeak jotzea asko zailtzen zuen, batez ere bigarren posizioan eta erdiko soketan.

To make them lie closer to the fingerboard we had to either rise it or lower the bridge height. In this case bridge height couldn´t be lowered ( if so we would hit the soundboard edges with the bow), so the only solution was to rise the fingerboard.

Para acercar las cuerdas al batidor teníamos que bajar la altura del puente o subir el batidor. En este caso se opta por esto último ya que si bajaramos el puente daríamos con el arco en el borde de la tapa al tocar las cuerdas de los extremos.

Sokak "batidorera" gerturatzeko, hau igotzen genuen edo bestela zubia piskat moztu.Kasu honetan "batidorea" igotzea pentsatu da, zubia mozteak arkuarekin instrumentuaren ertzak jotzea eragingo zuelako.

The fingerboard is detached from the neck and a piece of wood glued to it. Then this piece of wood is shaped to get the desired projection.

El batidor se despega del mástil y se le encola una pieza de madera. Se le dará forma de cuña para conseguir la proyección adecuada del batidor.

Batidorea biolaren lepotik despegatzen da eta egur xafla bat enkolatzen zaio azpikaldean. Honi behar bezalako forma emango zaio "batidorearen" proiekzioa

In this case a new bridge will be fitted to the instrument as the old one will not fit the new setting.

En este caso se pondrá un nuevo puente ya que el anterior no se ajustará al nuevo reglaje de las cuerdas.

Kasu honetan zubi berri bat jarri beharko da, zaharra ez baitu "batidorearen" proiekzio berriarekin bat egingo.

Turning a modern Doublebass into a 'Baroque' one. Convirtiendo un contrabajo moderno a 'Barroco'. Kontrabaxu moderno bat 'barrokizatzen'

This is a 3/4 size double bass the customer wanted it converted to a Baroque double bass, but without any irreversible change. That is, without changing the neck length nor projection and leaving the bass bar as it is now, a modern bass bar. Even though this is a common practice, at the end of the day, one has an instrument which is not a modern double bass nor a baroque one. Again, this "plastic surgery" is cheaper than resizing the neck and taking the sound board apart.

3/4 tamañako kontrabaxu modernoa. Bezeroaren eskaera izan da instrumentu hau "barroko" bihurtzea, hau da XVIII. mende erdialdean erabiltzen zirenak bezalakoa. Gauza da ez dizkiola bueltarik gabeko aldaketarik egin nahi, eta horrela ezinezkoa da instrumentua behar bezala "barrokizatzea".

Contrabajo tamaño 3/4, de origen "tiroles(?)" (al menos algunas partes), que el cliente quiere convertido a instrumento "barroco", pero sin ningún cambio irreversible. Esto es, sin cambiar la barra armónica ni cambiar la longitud y proyección del mango. "Operación estética" en definitiva que nos dejará con un contrabajo moderno, con trastes, cuerdas de tripa y con otro modelo de puente. Práctica esta bastante habitual, por otra parte...



Not a very well kept instrument, with many cracks, not too well repaired. You can see in the picture how well the soundpost was set...

Instrumentua ez dago ongiegi zaindua, arrakala asko hala nola konponduak eta argazki honetan ikusten da arima ahal den bezala jarrita...

Un instrumento cuidado con poco cariño por anteriores propietarios, con bastantes rajas, algunas de ellas no muy bien reparadas. En la foto podemos observar cómo está ajustado el alma...



This is the finished instrument, yet to fiddle a bit with the soundpost to get the right sound. Even that, it responds quite well to the new setting, but we wonder how would have it sound if it was set in the baroque manner...

Este es el instrument finalizado. Todabía faltan los ajustes de sonido, pero es así como queda. Es un instrumento que responde bien al nuevo montaje, pero nos queda la curiosidad de saber cómo hubiera sonado con un montaje barroco.La próxima vez quizá...

Eta hau da bukatutako instrumentua. Oraindik soinua piskat doitu behar da, hala ere ongi erantzuten du instrumentuak.Baina, galdetzen diogu gure buruari, nola erantzugo luke era "barrokoan" jarri izan bagenu? agian hurrengo batean...


Now the instrument is finished. It´s been a bit of a pain to set the sound properly. The customer wanted the bottom string tuned a tone lower, DD, so it is pretty difficult to make it speak. The rest of the strings have a very 'sweet' sound. We also made a bow, based on the Gross Contra Bas Geig from Praetorius Sintagma Musicum, but slightly shorter and with a lower nut than the one depicted.

Bukatu dugu instrumentoa. Nahiko lan eman digu laugarren sokari soinua ateratzea, jotzaileak soka tono bat beherago afinatua nahi zuelako, Re-n. Gainontzekoak oso soinu'goxoa' daukate. Arku bat ere egin dugu, Praetorius-en Sintagma Musicum liburuan agertzen den Gross Contra Bas Geig-arena. Guk egin duguna, piskat motzagoa da eta 'igela' baxuagoa da.

El instrumento está acabado. Ha sido bastante tedioso el ajustar el sonido ya que el cliente quería la cuarta cuerda afinada un tono por debajo, en Re, y no es fácil hacerla sonar con dignidad. El resto de las cuerdas tienen un sonido muy cálido. También hemos construido un arco basado en el de Gross Contra Bas Geig del libro Sintagma Musicum de Praetorius. El arco es algo más corto y tiene la nuez un poco más baja que en el del libro.