Richtig, gut, leicht und bequemer: Developing Practical Skills in Keyboard Notations from 1550–1650
Doctoral Research Project at the Uniarts Sibelius Academy

This doctoral research project investigates the capacity of the contemporary keyboard player to internalize historical notation systems that predate the hegemony of modern staff notation. The period under examination is 1550–1650, and the focus is on the New German Keyboard Tabla-ture (Neue Deutsche Orgeltabulatur, hereafter NDOT) and the so-called Italian Keyboard Partitura (hereafter simply partitura). Within their respective chrono-geographical cultures, both sys-tems were central to a keyboardist’s expertise, and widely used media tailored to the polyphoni-cally oriented musical practices of the time.

NDOT, consisting only of letters and lines, served both solo keyboard and ensemble music. Partitura, by contrast, was a staff notation for keyboard comprising one staff per part—usually four—and required mastery of seven distinct clefs. The project combines autoethnographic research applied to artistic practice, and historical content analysis. Across three concerts and the three peer-reviewed articles, the research will be pursued through the lens of Historically Informed Performance (HIP).

One strand of the project examines the triangular power dynamics between NDOT, partitura, and the increasingly popular intavolatura—i.e. music ‘intabulated’ onto two keyboard staves. Both the discourse among, and output of, musicians and theoreticians of the time will be investigated, and put together with autoethnographic data and practice-based reflection. In addition, the project analyzes how the extensive transmission of NDOT sources in areas such as Poland, the Baltics and Scandinavia can help us understand the dissemination of musical expertise from Germanic regions.

The overarching aim is to establish a more performer-oriented perspective on historical notations and to challenge their prevailing status as a primarily musicological concern. In recent decades, performing with facsimiles has become increasingly common—even normative in various contexts—but this progress has not yet extended to keyboard tablatures nor partiture. I argue that the next big step in the evolution of the HIP movement will lie in the cultivation of notational polymathy.