John Griffiths | University of Melbourne (original) (raw)

John Griffiths

AFFILIATIONS • Professorial Fellow, School of Languages and Linguistics, The University of Melbourne • Membre associé, Centre d’Etudes Supérieures de la Renaissance (Tours)

HONORARY POSITIONS • Vice-President, International Musicological Society

CAREER • John Griffiths’ work revolves around Renaissance music and culture, especially solo instrumental music from Spain and Italy. He is both a performer and a scholar and actively maintains a close connection between research and practice. He is best known for his work on the Spanish vihuela and its music. His 1983 PhD on the vihuela fantasia remains a seminal work in its field. At the same time, his publications show broad interests in diverse areas of renaissance music, Spanish music, and Hispano-Italian cultural exchange. He has contributed notably to areas including renaissance music pedagogy, style studies, organology, music printing, music in urban society, connections between written and oral traditions, music in Spanish Naples, and digital humanities.

Griffiths holds a PhD degree from Monash and Doctor of Music from the University of Melbourne. From 1980 to 2011 was director of early music studies and taught music history and theory of music at the University of Melbourne. He was appointed to a chair in 1994, and served as head and deputy head for eight years. He was responsible for substantial teaching reforms and was the founder of both the Early Music Studio and the Lyrebird Press, the latter to continue the long-standing association between the university and Editions de l’Oiseau Lyre. At Monash, he served as Head of the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music in 2015-2016. He is a past president of the Musicological Society of Australia (2007-2009), an honorary life member of the Sociedad de la Vihuela in Spain, and a Corresponding Member of the American Musicological Society. In 1993 he was appointed an Officer of the Orden de Isabel la Católica for his contribution to Spanish culture and in 2019 was made a Member of the Order of Australia

He has published extensively and has collaborated in music reference works including The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart and the Diccionario de la música española e hispanoamericana. Current projects include an encyclopaedia of Tablature, 1450-1750 and a comprehensive study of the vihuela jointly in electronic and conventional print format. He also performs and records on historical plucked instruments: lute, vihuela, and early guitars. His most recent recording of vihuela music by Enríquez de Valderrábano, "Silva de Sirenas" is available from Contrastes Records and draws from his latest research on this enigmatic composer.
Phone: +61421644911

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Papers by John Griffiths

laguitarra-blog.com

... se dedicó a estudiar a fondo ni la música de estos autores, ni sus biografías, hasta la tesis... more ... se dedicó a estudiar a fondo ni la música de estos autores, ni sus biografías, hasta la tesis monumental de John Ward leída en ... el libro de Valderrá- bano en 1547, sus familiares vendieron o arrendaron los tipos de tablatura —muy escasos en España— al salman-tino Diego ...

works 80 fantasia/ ricercar (58), toccata (17), preludio (5) Intabulations 76 madrigal (26), chan... more works 80 fantasia/ ricercar (58), toccata (17), preludio (5) Intabulations 76 madrigal (26), chanson (25), motet (5), etc Variations 28 passamezzo, pavana, pavaniglia, folia, romanesca, monaca, Didactic works 18 Passaggio, Clausula, Dirata, Passos Cantus firmus settings 9 Table 2. Compositional genres in the Barbarino lute book Composer works Composer works Orlando de Lassus 26 Josquin des Près 2 Giovanni Pierliugi da Palestrina 8 Giaches de Wert 2 Thomas Crecquillon 6 Clemens non Papa 1 Cipriano de Rore 4 Noel Faignient 1 Domenico Ferrabosco 3 Nicholas Gombert (?) 1 Philippe de Monte 3 Pierre Sandrin 1 Alessandro Striggio 3 Philippe Verdelot 1 Clément Janequin (?) 2 Adrian Willaert (?) 1 Table 3. Composers of vocal music intabulated in the Barbarino lute book The importance of the Barbarino lute book is due to two principal factors, that it was compiled by a castrato and its probable provenance. If our deductions are correct concerning its Neapolitan origins, then it fills an impor...

Musicology Australia, 1997

Only a small portion of the music produced in Spain during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuri... more Only a small portion of the music produced in Spain during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries has been revived either in modern editions, live performances, or recordings. There is little Spanish music—apart from the works of the immigrant Domenico Scarlatti—between the generations of Tomis Luis de Victoria and Isaac Alb4niz that has gained prominence. Superficially, this might seem due to

People with unusual names often turn out to be unusual customers. In the 2008 film “The curious c... more People with unusual names often turn out to be unusual customers. In the 2008 film “The curious case of Benjamin Button” the fictitious protagonist with the unusual name turned out to be an elusive figure who enters this world as a newborn old man and who regresses, bit by bit, from old age to infancy. He is a mirage brought into conscious reality by cinematic magic and whose story seeks to change the course of history by reversing our understanding of the human lifecycle. Benjamin Button was a maverick.

Espana En La Musica De Occidente Actas Del Congreso Internacional Celebrado En Salamanca 29 De Octubre 5 De Noviembre De 1985 Ano Europeo De La Musica Vol 1 1987 Isbn 84 505 5050 5 Pags 323 324, 1987

Encomium Musicae Essays in Memory of Robert J Snow 2002 Isbn 0 945193 83 1 Pags 321 340, 2002

Hispanica Lyra Revista De La Sociedad De La Vihuela, 2013

Explores the periods that precede and follow the years of the vihuela's written repertoire, ... more Explores the periods that precede and follow the years of the vihuela's written repertoire, ca. 1465–1535 and 1575–1625. In the half-century preceding the 1536 publication of Luis de Milán's El maestro, vihuelas were used in diverse strata of society by amateurs and professionals, were made by the same makers who made lutes, harps, rabeles, and monacordios, and were used to play a variety of musical styles. In most cases the music was improvised. There is documentation about some 50 vihuelists of the period, and 16 makers. The nature of the early vihuelas has not been resolved. Later categorizations, such as the division of the instruments into plucked and bowed, seem not to apply. Ian Woodfield's account of the early vihuela in The early history of the viol (RILM [ref]1984-05302[/ref]) needs revision, especially his exclusion from consideration of instruments played on the shoulder. Woodfield relies too exclusively on iconographical materials, without invoking literary or documentary sources, and outlines a naively linear process of development for the vihuela de mano. Evidence suggests, on the contrary, that the standard 16th-c. pattern of the vihuela de mano emerged from multifaceted experimentation. No scholarly study has been directed toward the question of how and why the vihuela was supplanted in popularity by the guitar in the years around 1600. The sources of evidence are outlined, particularly the late MS repertoire. In the marketplace, copies of 16th-c. vihuela books continued to be traded during the first decades of the 17th c., and instrument makers were able to satisfy both ends of the market with vihuelas and guitars built essentially to the same patterns, but strung and played according to different needs.

La Guitarra En La Historia Volumen Vi 1995 Pags 69 88, 1995

Goldberg Early Music Magazine Revista De Musica Antigua, 2005

Cuadernos De Musica Iberoamericana, 2010

Scherzo Revista De Musica, 2000

Hispanica Lyra Revista De La Sociedad De La Vihuela, 2010

Políticas y prácticas musicales en el mundo de Felipe …, 2004

... siglo XVI / coord. por Javier Suárez Pajares, John Griffiths, 2004, ISBN 84-89457-33-6 , págs... more ... siglo XVI / coord. por Javier Suárez Pajares, John Griffiths, 2004, ISBN 84-89457-33-6 , págs. 415-448. Fundación Dialnet. Acceso de usuarios registrados. Acceso de usuarios registrados Usuario. Contraseña. Entrar. Mi Dialnet. ...

Nassarre: Revista aragonesa de musicología, 1996

... Poco a poco el tenor logra su independencia melódica y, en este contexto, von Fischer concluy... more ... Poco a poco el tenor logra su independencia melódica y, en este contexto, von Fischer concluye que la caccia "no era al principio nada canónica y originó no de un canon con la adición de un parte inferior, sino de una composición a dos, con la voz canónica ... NASS-XII.2 143 ...

me.com

... Esta fuente contiene una fantasía por un vihuelista identificado como López, y que creo ser u... more ... Esta fuente contiene una fantasía por un vihuelista identificado como López, y que creo ser un coetáneo de Narváez. La obra está atribuida a Fabricio, cuya identidad es mucho más probablemente el italiano Fabricio Dentice que Fabrizio Filli-marino, sugerido por Juan José ...

Anuario Musical, 2014

En este artículo se examina el lugar de la vihuela en las Obras para tecla arpa y vihuela de Cabe... more En este artículo se examina el lugar de la vihuela en las Obras para tecla arpa y vihuela de Cabezón. En primer lugar se examina el tema en términos estilísticos, la adaptabilidad de la notación de Cabezón, y el alcance de las modificaciones necesarias para lograr una adaptación satisfactoria para un instrumento de cuerda pulsada. En segundo lugar, se examinan las circunstancias que rodean la publicación de las Obras y la influencia del Libro de cifra nueva de Venegas de Henestrosa en determinar su notación, diseño y contenidos. El estudio muestra que sólo una pequeña proporción de la música de Cabezón es fácilmente transferible a la vihuela, y que la evidencia tiende hacia la conclusión de que la vihuela no forma parte del pensamiento de su autor, sino que la inclusión de la vihuela fue apropiado del libro de Venegas, quizás con la idea de ampliar la circulación de un libro que tendría una clientela bastante restringida.

Janus Estudios Sobre El Siglo De Oro E, 2014

laguitarra-blog.com

Musicology Australia, 1997

Espana En La Musica De Occidente Actas Del Congreso Internacional Celebrado En Salamanca 29 De Octubre 5 De Noviembre De 1985 Ano Europeo De La Musica Vol 1 1987 Isbn 84 505 5050 5 Pags 323 324, 1987

Encomium Musicae Essays in Memory of Robert J Snow 2002 Isbn 0 945193 83 1 Pags 321 340, 2002

Hispanica Lyra Revista De La Sociedad De La Vihuela, 2013

La Guitarra En La Historia Volumen Vi 1995 Pags 69 88, 1995

Goldberg Early Music Magazine Revista De Musica Antigua, 2005

Cuadernos De Musica Iberoamericana, 2010

Scherzo Revista De Musica, 2000

Hispanica Lyra Revista De La Sociedad De La Vihuela, 2010

Políticas y prácticas musicales en el mundo de Felipe …, 2004

Nassarre: Revista aragonesa de musicología, 1996

me.com

Anuario Musical, 2014

Janus Estudios Sobre El Siglo De Oro E, 2014

Less familiar to contemporary musicologists than Benjamin Button, Heteroclito Giancarli might be ... more Less familiar to contemporary musicologists than Benjamin Button, Heteroclito Giancarli might be poised to do more for music than Benjamin Button did for the science of ageing. A Venetian patrician, amateur singer and author of a collection of Compositione musicali published in 1602, Heteroclito Giancarli might be just the man to unsettle one of the pivotal foundation stones of Western musical culture concerning the genesis of opera. He is the tip of an iceberg that offers an alternate history to the modern myth starring Florentine nobleman Giovanni Bardi and his Camerata of monody co-conspirators, Girolamo Mei, Vincenzo Galilei and Jacopo Peri. Instead, the Giancarli story tells of a hundred years of singing to the lute, of a much more realistic and subtle development and reshaping of existing practices, and of Baroque styles that grew from renaissance traditions rather than as reaction against them. It therefore questions whether it was really the Bardi Laboratories that killed off polyphony in order to reinvent monody, and that acted to enable the Ancient World to triumph over Modernity. My research suggests a less theatrical scenario that recognises the presence of singer-songwriters throughout the sixteenth century, musicians usually omitted from general histories of sixteenth-century music, and suggests a series of continuities that link Giulio Caccini and other early baroque monodists to the lutenist songsters who flourished throughout the sixteenth century.

Pietrobono di Burzellis (1417-1497) was the most renowned lutenist performer of his day and, desp... more Pietrobono di Burzellis (1417-1497) was the most renowned lutenist performer of his day and, despite the fact that none of his music survives, he remains the figure who epitomises the improvisatori whose music resonated through the courts of northern Italy in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. In contrast to the fame that such improvisors enjoyed during their own lifetime, they remain marginalised in contemporary scholarship largely due to the absence of notated relics of their musical practice. In a musical historiography built on philological foundations, they have been considered by default as the inferiors of the Franco-Flemish polyphonists and theorists who came to Italy in the decades around 1500 to service the chapels of the northern courts. Close examination of the lute books published in Venice by Ottaviano Petrucci in the early sixteenth century, particularly the work of Francesco Spinacino, provides evidence of a more central role not only in musical practice, but also in the intellectual debates concerning music that were percolating in these culturally rich centres.

When Giulio Caccini published Le nuove musiche in Florence 1602 he was probably unaware that his ... more When Giulio Caccini published Le nuove musiche in Florence 1602 he was probably unaware that his songs would achieve lasting fame as one of the foundation stones of an entire period of Western music. The same year in neighbouring Venice, another lutenist singer, Heteroclito Giancarli, published a book of comparable songs under the title Compositioni musicali, that differ in format from Caccini inasmuch as the lute accompaniments of the songs are notated in tablature rather than Caccini’s innovative figured bass. While Caccini’s name is one that it is probably known to millions today, Giancarli’s has been completely forgotten, not even being named in modern reference works such as The New Grove. This paper makes the first initial exploration of Giancarli’s works, examining their musical style, comparing some of their features with Caccini’s songs, and contextualisng them in terms of the radical musical developments in contemporary Venice.

An exploration of the history of vihuela construction since the first reproductions were made som... more An exploration of the history of vihuela construction since the first reproductions were made some 80 years ago. The paper traces the instruments made initially for Emilio Pujol and the what we might call the first period when makers applied the construction principles of the modern classical guitar to vihuela reproductions. The second phase, from the early 1980s saw makers apply construction techniques derived from lute building. Recent vihuela construction is starting to absorb the new information that has come to light as a result of detailed study of the recently found surviving instruments in Paris and Quito, and the realisation that the Belchior Dias instrument in London is also likely to have been originally a vihuela.

Old Spanish ballads have survived extensive travels through time and space in the hearts of Sepha... more Old Spanish ballads have survived extensive travels through time and space in the hearts of Sephardic Jews. The songs are part of a cultural memory that has remained with these people for more than 500 years since they were banished from the land they had inhabited and loved for centuries before that. This talk explores some of the ramifications of these observations, especially from the viewpoint of contemporary performance.

ESPAÑOL • El renacimiento musical del siglo XVI, según la musicología tradicional, ha estado l... more ESPAÑOL • El renacimiento musical del siglo XVI, según la musicología tradicional, ha estado ligado intrínsecamente al humanismo, sobre todo a la expresividad musical nacida de una nueva complicidad entre música y texto. Paralelamente, los humanistas valoraban el equilibrio pitagórico del universo y la concordancia que resultó de las proporciones que gobernaban el movimiento planetario. Este estudio explora la proporcionalidad de las estructuras musicales de Victoria y sus contemporáneos, los paralelos entre música y las otras artes, y la interdependencia de proporción arquitectónica y la retórica narrativa que define el carácter musical de una época.
ENGLISH • The musical renaissance of the sixteenth century, according to traditional musicology, has been intrinsically linked to humanism, above all to the musical expressiveness that sprang from the newfound complicity between words and music. At the same time, humanists valued the Pythagorean balance of the universe and the concordance that emanated from the proportions that governed planetary motion. This study explores the proportionality of the musical structures of Victoria and his contemporaries, the parallels between music and the other arts, and the interdependence between architectonic proportion and rhetorical narrative that define the musical character of the age."

Recently published studies of literary anonymity have variously challenged scholars of Renaissanc... more Recently published studies of literary anonymity have variously challenged scholars of Renaissance literature, history, and music to rethink how they use and interpret the early modern Anon. This new rethinking can assist literary scholars, musicologists and historians in comprehending premodern anonymity. In this paper I aim to broaden the debate around anonymity beyond the confines of English literature and to establish a common ground within Renaissance studies. The central question addressed in this paper is whether the attention of scholars facing early modern anonymity should be placed on the concealed name, and whether their energies are best served by trying to unmask its concealment. I suggest that the challenge is not to ask what early modern Europeans kept secret, but rather to investigate the communicability of these anonymous acts.

Everything about the Vihuela. Instruments, music, people, documents, bibliography, recordings. ... more Everything about the Vihuela. Instruments, music, people, documents, bibliography, recordings.
The Vihuela Database a complete research tool that can be used for simple searches or complex relational questions. It is conceived as a self-contained complete habitat. It covers the approximate period from 1470 to 1630, and aims to gather together in one place all that is known about the vihuelas its music and its players.
• Enter via https://www.lavihuela.com/vihuela-database to see a map of the structure

According to the Oxford dictionary, Melancholy is a feeling of pensive sadness, typically with no... more According to the Oxford dictionary, Melancholy is a feeling of pensive sadness, typically with no obvious cause. Melancholy can be seen as a positive feeling, a moment of self-reflection, allowing us to be sad. It is also often seen as a culturally endorsed performance of narcissism. In many contexts melancholy is understood as a mental condition, a form of major depressive disorder. So what is exactly melancholy? Is melancholy the right word for what most of us are feeling during the pandemic?

In this episode of 5 Things About we hear from four University of Melbourne scholars, Professor Véronique Duché, Dr Vivien Gaston, Professor John Griffiths and Dr Mark Nicholls. The Melbourne Melancholic team reflect on the changing nature of melancholy and how they understand the idea in literature, art history, music and film. Their discussion highlights keys theorists from the ancients to Freud and Kristeva, and a range of melancholic art works by artists such as Gérard de Nerval, Francisco de Goya, John Dowland and Alfred Hitchcock.

New Perspectives in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Music Notations, 2022

To coincide with the eightieth anniversary of Willi Apel’s The Notation of Polyphonic of Music, 2... more To coincide with the eightieth anniversary of Willi Apel’s The Notation of Polyphonic of Music, 2022 will see the publication of the first substantial study of tablature notation in early modern Europe since Apel’s book. The fruit of a decade’s work and the study of thousands of works for close to forty instruments, it extends far beyond the alphanumeric representation of sound that co-existed alongside mensural notation until its demise around the middle of the eighteenth century. This paper seeks to offer new ways of defining tablature, to reconsider its functions, and to propose a revision of the historiography that unconsciously marginalised one of the mainstream notational systems of the renaissance. More specifically, the paper explores the essence of the graphic systems of tablature and proposes numerous terminological changes. Tablature is shown as more than a simple notation for "playing by numbers,” instead an alternative way of thinking about music and transmitting it. In a musically bilingual society, tablature was the preferred notation for writing music in score, also the only renaissance notation to incorporate performance-related information that was impossible in conventional notation. The roles of tablature within the notational mainstream included it use as a compositional tool, for conducting scores, and for the transmission of elite repertoires into the urban sphere.

MSA Annual Conference, 2021

This paper was read at the 2021 annual conference of the Musicological Society of Australia. It i... more This paper was read at the 2021 annual conference of the Musicological Society of Australia. It is drawn from my forthcoming book, edited with David Dolata and Philippe Vendrix: "Tablature: Alternate notations 1350-1750" to be published by Brepols. It presents a new vision of tablature and its role in Western culture resulting from a ten-year study of tablatures, 1350-1750. The surviving repertoire of more than 70,000 works for more than forty instruments, including human voice, is preserved in a variety of notations that are alternatives to conventional mensural notation. We examined all kinds of tablatures, from the widely accepted mainstream forms to the more idiosyncratic and experimental varieties that gained little traction in the real world of musical practice. On the notational side, this paper explores the nature of tablature, the essence of its graphic system, the commonalities between systems and the contemporary challenges to renewing the associated terminology. From another perspective, it considers the marginalisation of tablature music in our cultural heritage, and the attendant historiographical deficiencies that result from the near-total exclusion of the repertoire from musicological thinking. Tablature can be revealed as more than a simple notation for "playing by numbers,” instead an alternative way of thinking about music and transmitting it. Tablature fulfilled special and necessary functions, not only as the first viable system of score notation, but also permitting the expression of dimensions of performance-related information that were impossible in conventional notation. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, tablature was a mainstream notation, essential to the social fabric of music, and important whether in their broader use as conducting scores, or in facilitating the popular transmission of elite repertoires.

Eva Esteve, John Griffiths y Francisco Rodilla (eds.). Kassel: Reichenberger, Iberian Early Music Studies 6. , 2023

Culture and Music on the Iberian Peninsula before c. 1650 This book highlights the cultural impo... more Culture and Music on the Iberian Peninsula before c. 1650

This book highlights the cultural importance of music on the Iberian Peninsula from the Middle Ages to the mid-seventeenth century. Musical events of various kinds are presented as the product of actions generated from within a dynamic and heterogeneous society. The kaleidoscopic vision of the volume aims to increase understanding of the ways that matters of power, gender, dissemination, reception, and musical composition operate in direct correspondence with the attitudes of the society that produced them.

Cultura y música en la Península Ibérica hasta 1650, Kassel: Reichenberger, Iberian Early Music Studies 6. , 2023, 2023

Este libro destaca la importancia cultural de la música en la Península Ibérica desde el medievo ... more Este libro destaca la importancia cultural de la música en la Península Ibérica desde el medievo hasta la primera mitad del siglo XVII. El hecho musical en sus diversas vertientes se presenta como producto de las múltiples acciones generadas por una sociedad dinámica y heterogénea. La visión caleidoscópica del volumen ayuda a comprender mejor las relaciones de poder, género, difusión, recepción y composición musical en correspondencia directa con el pensamiento y la sociedad que las produjo.