The rabeca, also known as rabeca chuleira, is a type of

fiddle A fiddle is a Bow (music), bowed String instrument, string musical instrument, most often a violin or a bass. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including European classical music, classical music. Althou ...

originating in

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

. It is commonly used in Portugal,

Northeastern Brazil The Northeast Region of Brazil ( ) is one of the five official and political regions of the country according to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. Of Brazil's twenty-six states, it comprises nine: Maranhão, Piauí, Ceará, R ...

—where it is especially prominent 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 Brazil, Northeastern Region of Brazil. It encompasses ...

music—and in

Cape Verde Cape Verde or Cabo Verde, officially the Republic of Cabo Verde, is an island country and archipelagic state of West Africa in the central Atlantic Ocean, consisting of ten volcanic islands with a combined land area of about . These islands ...

. It is descended from the medieval

rebec The rebec (sometimes rebecha, rebeckha, and other spellings, pronounced or ) is a bowed stringed instrument of the Medieval era and the early Renaissance. In its most common form, it has a narrow boat-shaped body and one to five strings. Origins ...

History

The rabeca is thought to have originated in the

Entre-Douro-e-Minho Entre Douro e Minho () is one of the historical provinces of Portugal which encompassed the country's northern Atlantic seaboard between the Douro and Minho rivers. Contemporaries often referred to the province as simply "Minho". It was one of s ...

region of northern Portugal, especially in the areas around Amarante during the 18th century. Rabeca have also

sephardic Sephardic Jews, also known as Sephardi Jews or Sephardim, and rarely as Iberian Peninsular Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population associated with the historic Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) and their descendant ...

origins. In the Portuguese tradition, the ''rabeca chuleira'' is a short-scale variation played in village bands alongside

guitar The guitar is a stringed musical instrument that is usually fretted (with Fretless guitar, some exceptions) and typically has six or Twelve-string guitar, twelve strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming ...

s or ''

viola braguesa Viola braguesa is a stringed instrument from Braga in northwestern Portugal. It has 10 strings in 5 courses. The strings are made of steel. It is tuned C4/C3–G4/G3–A4/A3–D4/D4–G4/G4. The scale length is about . Requinta Many , such as t ...

'',

drum The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, it is a membranophone. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a ...

triangle A triangle is a polygon with three corners and three sides, one of the basic shapes in geometry. The corners, also called ''vertices'', are zero-dimensional points while the sides connecting them, also called ''edges'', are one-dimension ...

and, now occasionally, the ''

gaita transmontana The gaita de foles mirandesa is a type of bagpipe native to the Trás-os-Montes (region), Trás-os-Montes region of Portugal. Etymology There are different theories regarding the origins of the name . It bears similarities with eastern Europea ...

'' or the

galician bagpipe The Galician gaita (, , ) is the traditional instrument of Galicia and northern Portugal. The word is used across northern Spain as a generic term for "bagpipe", although in the south of Spain and Portugal it denotes a variety of horn, flute ...

. The repertoire consists of the 2/2 '' chula'' and 3/4 ''

chamarrita ''Chamarrita'' can refer to two different types of music and dance, one from the Azores in Portugal and one from the Rio de la Plata littoral region in northern Argentina, Uruguay, and southern Brazil. Azorean ''Chamarrita'' The ''chamarrita'' from ...

''. 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 Minho or Miño may refer to: People * Miño (surname) * Choi Min-ho, South Korean singer and actor known mononymously as Minho Places * Minho (river) or Miño, in Portugal and Spain Jamaica * Rio Minho, a river Portugal * Minho Province ...

Douro Litoral Douro Litoral () is a historical province of Portugal. It is centered on the city of Porto, now the capital of the Norte Region. Other important cities in the province are Vila Nova de Gaia, Matosinhos, Maia, Póvoa de Varzim, and the historical ...

and, to some extent, Beira Litoral. 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 The viola ( , () ) is a string instrument of the violin family, and is usually bowed when played. Violas are slightly larger than violins, and have a lower and deeper sound. Since the 18th century, it has been the middle or alto voice of the ...

''. In forró music, the rabeca is typically accompanied by

accordion Accordions (from 19th-century German language, German ', from '—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a Reed (mou ...

zabumba A zabumba () is a type of bass drum used in Brazilian music. The player wears the drum while standing up and uses both hands while playing. The zabumba generally ranges in diameter from 16 to 22 inches, and is 5 to 8 inches tall. The shell is mad ...

drum, and triangle. The three primary dance rhythms of forró are the 4/4 ''

xote Xote () is a Brazilian music genre and dance with a binary or quaternary rhythm. It is the local equivalent of the German schottische. Xote is a common type of forró dancing. The word ''xote'' is a corruption of the German word ''schottisch'' mea ...

'', '' baião'', and ''arrasta-pé''.

Tuning

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

violin The violin, sometimes referred to as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone, and is the smallest, and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in regular use in the violin family. Smaller violin-type instruments exist, including the violino picc ...

. 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