08Jun24: Started a reworking of Robert Ballard “Premier Livre de Tablature de Luth” (1611). Actually, the title page is missing, so the title is a guess. Others have guessed that the title might be the same as that of the 1614 volume, which is “Diverses Pièces mises sur le luth”. However, the latter volume is not specified as a volume 2, so that seems unlikely. I am therefore going with the more generic title. Editions on my site from before were previously incomplete, error prone, and mixed up because of the confusions with the titles. I have completed the first two parts of “Premier Livre”: the entrées and the ballets. These are charming and very simple pieces for ten-course lute. Apparently, the ballets and other dances in this volume were not originally composed by Ballard but intabulated from popular court dances of the time. Ornaments are not written in, but one imagines that they could be added. The entrées do appear to be composed by Ballard. Oddly, Ballard rarely makes use of the 9th course. This means that most pieces could be played on a 9-course lute.
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