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A medieval-style illuminated manuscript illustration with five young angels playing musical instruments, surrounded by a green background with decorative foliage.

The Organetto

A man playing an organetto during a performance.

Tasto Solo’s Guillermo Pérez and his organetto

Also known as a portative organ, the organetto was one of the most popular instruments of the 13th and 14th centuries. It is typically played on the musician's lap with one hand operating the bellows and one on the keyboard.

Without any surviving historical examples, today’s organettos are largely based on historical iconography—medieval paintings, illuminated manuscripts etc. These images represent some extant examples we still have.

A medieval manuscript illustration of a hare with a violin body, standing upright, holding a bow, and playing a musical instrument.

An illustrated figure of a person carrying a large harp and standing on a ball or rounded object, with text in a medieval style script on the left side.

An angel with golden hair and white wings holding a harpsichord against a golden background with cracks, in a religious artwork.

Medieval illustration of a seated man in a red cloak and crown, holding a building model, framed with ornate gold and blue decorative elements.

A person standing on a decorated surface, holding a box with a cat inside, next to a large decorative plant or vine with colorful leaves.

One unique interpretation comes from the manuscripts of Leonardo da Vinci, whose sketch shows an unusual orientation of the pipes. Tasto Solo’s director Guillermo Pérez took part in an interpretive construction of an organ from this sketch.

Sketch of a camera on a tripod with handwritten notes around it.

A tall, wooden chair with a unique design featuring a conical base, a round seat, and a backrest made of multiple vertical wooden slats.

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The Manuscripts

Montpellier Codex

“The most comprehensive and lavishly appointed motet book to survive from the thirteenth century. It contains more than three hundred motets of every description, ranging in date over the whole century.”
- Richard Taruskin, The Oxford History of Western Music

Codex Las Huelgas

An illuminated medieval manuscript page featuring a portrait of a knight in armor, a large decorated initial letter, and handwritten musical notation on red-lined staves.

The Cistercian convent of Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas in Burgos (Spain) preserves one of the most significant medieval music manuscripts: the Codex Las Huelgas. Dating back to around 1300, this manuscript is an important part of European cultural and spiritual heritage, the convent once being closely linked to the royal family of Castile… The music in the Codex Las Huelgas was intended for performance within the convent, which boasted a choir of 100 women during the 13th century. Interestingly, and despite Cistercian regulations against polyphonic music, it appears that two-part polyphony was permitted, as evidenced by two-part solfège exercises within the manuscript.
- Daniel Esparza, from Aleteia.org

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Le Manuscrit du Roi

Manuscript of Gregorian chant music with Latin lyrics, featuring ornate initial letters and musical notation on a parchment background.

“The Manuscrit du Roi or Chansonnier du Roi ("King's Manuscript" or "King's Songbook") is “a huge codex copied in the mid-thirteenth century, that contains songs of the troubadours alongside those of the trouvéres, along with dances in mensural notation (that is, notation prescribing rhythm).”
- Richard Taruskin, The Oxford History of Western Music

ne of the most important forms of polyphonic music from about 1220 to 1750. No single set of characteristics serves to define it generally, except in particular historical or regional contexts. It developed into the pre-eminent form of secular art music during the late Middle Ages.

Decorative illuminated letter "O" with intricate blue and orange floral design, surrounded by a pink border and gold accents, with trailing branches and colorful flowers.

What is a motet?

The medieval motet was a polyphonic composition in which the fundamental voice (tenor) was usually arranged in a pattern of reiterated rhythmic configurations, while the upper voice or voices (up to three), nearly always with different Latin or French texts, generally moved at a faster rate. The word ‘motet’ itself has a vernacular French etymology – ‘little words’.