| Summary: | In February 1820 Fernando Sor revealed his guitar works to be the product of a “system”,
which he explained in his Méthode pour la Guitare in 1830, also announcing his treatise On
Harmony Applied to the Guitar. Sor’s “system” may be imagined as an infinitely extensible
grammar for guitar, based on the alfabeto principle subjected to thoroughbass conventions.
His exploration of the harmonic resources and scordature of the new six-string guitar began
in 1796, generating exemplars that he continued to develop in his later works. The application
of thoroughbass conventions to alfabeto chords by Santiago de Murcia in his 1714 Resumen
de Acompañar la Parte Con La Guitarra, was a precedent for Sor’s “system”. Bordones on
the fourth and fifth courses are a defining characteristic of the Spanish guitar, traceable to the
vihuela de cinco ordenes of Miguel de Fuenllana in 1554 and continued by Murcia to satisfy
the ‘rigorous’ polyphonic style of the Spanish harp, organ and vihuela continuo. After 1750,
the exclusion of the harp from the church led to the development of a seven-course continuo
guitar (later the six-course guitar) as the Spanish concomitant of the archlute in Italian opera,
which used Murcia’s treatise for its grammar. Unaware of this tradition, Sor composed many
works for six-string guitar in Spain, including his Grande Sonata [Op. 22], first advertised in
June 1807. When the war in Spain drove him into exile, performing and publishing became
his profession. Notation in Sor’s “system” is critically important, as voice leading and note
durations are sophisticated indications of his intentions and fingering. The textual authority of
Sor’s editions increases when his authorial control over publication is likely, therefore
biographical information about his proximity to engravers must be correlated with
bibliographical data and an analytical study of his notational principles. Italians like Carulli,
Giuliani, and others operated a paradigm using the guitar’s three bass strings as harp-like
diatonic basses, which they combined with violin scales and arpeggios. When Sor introduced
his Spanish chord-based paradigm into Paris and London he caused a conflict that would only
be resolved in the following generation.
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