The rabeca or rabeca chuleira is a fiddle originating in

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, In recognized minority languages of Portugal: :* mwl, República Pertuesa is a country located on the Iberian Peninsula, in Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Macaronesian ...

, commonly used in Portugal, Northeastern Brazil, where it is most commonly used in Brazilian

forró The term forró (*) refers to a musical genre, a rhythm, a dance and the event itself where forró music is played and danced. Forró is an important part of the culture of the Northeastern Region of Brazil. It encompasses various dance typ ...

music, and Cape Verde. It is descended from the medieval rebec.

History

The rabeca is thought to have originated in the Entre-Douro-e-Minho region of northern Portugal, especially in the areas around Amarante during the 18th century. Rabeca have also sephardic origins. In the Portuguese tradition, the ''rabeca chuleira'' is a short-scale variation played in village bands alongside

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected string ...

s or '' viola braguesa'', drums,

triangle A triangle is a polygon with three edges and three vertices. It is one of the basic shapes in geometry. A triangle with vertices ''A'', ''B'', and ''C'' is denoted \triangle ABC. In Euclidean geometry, any three points, when non- colli ...

and, now occasionally, the '' gaita transmontana'' or the galician bagpipe. The repertoire consists of the 2/2 '' chula'' and 3/4 '' chamarrita''. In Portugal, the ''rabeca chuleira'' (also known as ''rabeca rabela'', ''chula de Amarante'', ''chula de Penafiel'' or ''ramaldeira'' depending on the region it is played with very little variation) is still widely associated with the people of Minho, Douro Litoral and, to some extent,

Beira Litoral Beira Litoral is a former province (''província'') of Portugal, formally instituted in an administrative reform of 1936. It was abolished with the 1976 Constitution of Portugal. The province was bordered on the north by Douro Litoral Province, ...

. However, it doesn't have an important popularity in the rest of the country and it has been slowly replaced by the violin in Portuguese folklore. In the Brazilian tradition, the ''rabeca chuleira'' is simply called ''rabeca'' and is not a short-scale instrument unlike its Portuguese cousin. The Portuguese ''viola braguesa'' finds a counterpart in its Brazilian cousin, the '' viola caipira''. In forró music, the rabeca is typically accompanied by accordion, zabumba drum, and triangle. The three primary dance rhythms of forró are the 4/4 '' xote'', '' baião'', and ''arrasta-pé''.

Tuning

The short-scale rabeca chuleira from Portugal is tuned an octave above the

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

. The Brazilian rabeca, on the other hand, plays in the same range as a violin, but may be tuned in fourths or fifths.

References

{{reflist Bowed string instruments Brazilian musical instruments

History

Tuning

See also

References