John Dowland's Lute Songs: Third and Fourth Books with Original Tablature (Dover Song Collections)

More music to keep me busy learning during Covid. Can’t go wrong with Dowland for classical guitar music.

These Dowland books are ideal: complete, accurate, and inexpensive.The only problem is a random editorial decison by which a few of the songs are notated "at pitch", which means the editor has arranged the music for guitar rather than writing it as it would lie on lute. This means a guitarist interested in maintaining Dowland's fingerings would have to redo the transcriptions. Still, a very valuable resource to own!!!

This review applies to both the first volume (which contains Dowland's books 1 and 2) and the second volume (Dowland's books 3, 4 and some odds & ends).These book can be used in a couple different ways. It's written in systems of 3 clefs - lute tablature, the same notes written in standard musical notation for classical guitar, and a vocal melody. The material can be performed on a 7-course lute, or a modern guitar, or a modern guitar tuned like a lute.Dowland's works require intermediate to advanced skill level to perform. To play them on classical guitar you'll need a couple years experience. To play them on lute you'll need to have mastered a good portion of Poulton's "Tutor for Renaissance Lute".These books are a great idea, unfortunately the lute tablature is simply too small to read at arms length (i.e. on a music stand). This is a pretty serious shortcoming. In order to read the tab I had to scan the pages and enlarge it.However, I still have to recommend it. Between the 2 volumes you get Dowland's complete works, along with modern transcriptions. At the price it's really hard to go wrong.

Very good book, the symbols for lute tablature are very clear, and of course the music of John Dowland is the most delightful.It is very easy to read the melody aswell. The guitar musical staff on top of the lute tablature helps a lot when trying to understand the rhythm.

After purchasing these books (1/2 & 3/4) I immediately got use of the convenience of its page lay-out. Playing both Lute and Guitar this book is easy to understand with the Guitar notations. My favorite thing about this book is that it's printed with a few extra pages to guarantee that a two-page song is always on two adjacent pages instead of back-to-back. The only thing I didn't like was in comparison to the Stainer & Bell edition. Having Voice on top, Grand Staff realization, and then Lute; the grand staff let's you see exactly where your lower courses are tuned to. Not that its hard to figure out with standard tunings but Dowland did use a few kinds of Lutes through-out the compositions in these books. I definately recommend them for anybody studying Guitar, Lute, or Voice.

I absolutely love John Dowland and was so excited to find this book and it's accompanying book as my dad plays the guitar so it just works!It comes w/the vocal line, guitar and original lute tablature.

Nice guitar arrangements of the original lute music. Some fingering indications to indicate which voices to sustain would be helpful as in many cases it is impossible to sustain full note values indicated in the standard notation.

Good edition of these lesser known songs of this outstanding composer. The Pilgrim's Solace section is particularly fine.

Ottimo libro con le tablature, un aiuto per chi non sa leggere la musica proprio bene.

Había estado buscando algo así por muchos años. Muchas de las canciones de Dowland requieren varias voces y/o varios instrumentos; de esta manera se pueden disfrutar para un instrumento melódico soprano (flauta, voz, violín) y guitarra (o laud).

Highly recommend this book to anyone interested in Dowland transcriptions and lute music. Well laid out and mot difficult to follow.

David Nadal hat mit seinen Werken (Lute Songs of John Dowland: The Original First and Second Books Including Dowland's Original Lute Tablature) und (John Dowland's Lute Songs: Third and Fourth Books with Original Tablature) ein fantastisches Werk geschaffen! Dowlands Lieder für Gitarre und Stimme in erstaunlicher Qualität und zu einem ansprechendem Preis. Viele Verlage geben Dowlands Bücher einzeln für einen unverschämt teuren Preis heraus, und hier sind jeweils zwei Bücher zusammengefasst. Es finden sich hier nicht nur einfache Lieder für Gitarre und Stimme, sondern auch Stücke für zwei Gitarren und zwei Stimmen, Gitarre + Melodieinstrument + Bass + Stimme bzw. für Gitarre und Chor. Allein das Lied "Flow, my tears" ist ein Schatz, den es hier zu heben gilt! Die technischen Anforderungen für Gitarristen sind allerdings schon recht hoch und verlangen den Umgang mit Lautenstimmung (zumeist: g = fis, manchmal: E = D) und Capodaster sowie ein gutes Mittelstufen- bis eindeutig Oberstufenniveau.

Great idea to have all of Dowland's songs in one place (if you buy the two books), and the price is perfect. However, the tablature font is too small for my taste, and the editor neither correct nor footnoted even the most basic errors from the original edition. Some pieces like 'Sorrow, stay' are spread through five pages, which makes it not very functional as a performing edition... so I still use the original edition for the longer pieces (the facsimile is only two pages long). It is very handy to be able to quickly check a piece, and if you are on a budget this is the edition to get. One more thing, the transcriptions are for guitar players so they assume an E instrument, and the counterpoint is wrong in various instances (though I have not checked very thoroughly). Happy playing!