What is vihuela made of?
Vihuela bodies were lightly constructed from thin flat slabs or pieces of wood, bent or curved as required. This construction method distinguished them from some earlier types of string instruments whose bodies (if not the entire instrument including the neck) were carved out from a solid single block of wood.
What is guitarron and vihuela?
The guitarron is the bass of the mariachi and is the most important part of the mariachi. This six string bass guitar is played with two strings at the same time. The vihuela is a five string guitar with a hump back. The vihuela is part of the armonia section of the mariachi.
What is the guitarron made of?
The Guitarrón is a large bass guitar. Guitarrón translates to large guitar – the suffix means big or large. It has 6 strings – 3 that are nylon wound with a nylon monofilament core or nylon fibers, and 3 that are steel, bronze or copper wound with a single steel string core.
Where is vihuela used?
The vihuela, essentially a flat-backed lute, evolved in the mid-15th century Kingdom of Aragon and was in common use in Spain and Italy by the late 15th through to the late 16th centuries. The viol developed from the vihuela when players in the second half of the 15th century began using a bow instead of plucking.
How is a vihuela tuned?
Notes and tuning The vihuela has five nylon strings in reentrant tuning. Similar to the first five strings of a guitar, but with the third, fourth and fifth an octave above what one might expect. Tuning: A-D-G-B-E – The A, D, and G are tuned one octave above a guitar.
How many strings does a vihuela have?
5 strings
Viheula Tuning and Strings The Vihuela Mexicana has 5 strings and is tuned similarly to the guitar. How to tune the vihuela? The difference is the G, D, and A strings are tuned an octave higher than a guitar. Thus it gives the instrument a higher pitch.
Where did the guitarrón come from?
The guitarrón appeared in Mexico in the 17th century. At that time, several musical instruments of European origin became widely used in Central and South America. Subsequently, local makers produced instruments inspired by European instruments but integrating typical Latin American characteristics.
What was the vihuela tuned like?
vihuela, in full vihuela de mano, stringed musical instrument that in Spanish Renaissance art music held the popularity accorded the lute elsewhere in Europe. Built like a large guitar, it had six, sometimes seven, double courses of strings tuned like the lute: G–c–f–a–d′–g′. (The guitar then had four double courses.)
What is virginal mean?
1 : of, relating to, or characteristic of a virgin or virginity especially : pure, chaste a virginal young girl. 2 : pristine, unsullied a virginal snowfall. virginal. noun. Definition of virginal (Entry 2 of 2)