Gaspar Sanz

Sanz obtained a bachelor’s degree in theology at Salamanca University and then traveled to Italy for further musical training under Caresana, Benevoli, Ziani and Colista. His principal publication took shape as the three-volume “Instruccion de musica,” a treatise that supplied detailed directions for tuning, stringing, fretting and both strumming and plucking the five-course guitar while presenting roughly ninety compositions graded in progressive difficulty. The set remains the period’s most extensive guitar method. Individual pieces from the volumes later surfaced in six additional manuscripts and printed sources, including French and Spanish editions that continued to circulate as late as 1763. Sanz endorsed the tuning a/a-d'/d-g/g-b/b-e'.