Tres

:"For the Italian commune, see Tres, Italy. Tres (Templi Resurgentes Equites Synarchici) is also the name of a fictional secret society in the novel Foucault's Pendulum. Tres means "three" in Spanish. Très means "very" in French."

The tres is a 3-course, 6-string chordophone which was created in Cuba. A later adaptation, the Puerto Rican tres, is a 3-course, 9-string instrument.

Cuban tres

In Cuba, among the "criollo " class, the son was created as a song and a salon dance genre. Originally, a guitar, tiple or bandola, played rhythm and lead in the son, but ultimately these were replaced by a new native-born instrument which was a fusion of all three called the Cuban Tres.

The Cuban tres has three courses (groups) of two strings each for a total of six strings. From the low pitch to the highest, the principal tuning is in C Major: G, C, E. However, today many treseros are playing a step up A, D, F# or D Major.

Further reading

* cite book
title = The Tres Cubano Chord Dictionary: C Major Tuning 648 Chords
first = Tobe A.
last = Richards
publisher = Cabot Books
location = United Kingdom
year = 2007
id = ISBN 978-1-906207-03-8 — A comprehensive chord dictionary instructional guide.
* cite book
title = The Tres Cubano Chord Dictionary: D Major Tuning 648 Chords
first = Tobe A.
last = Richards
publisher = Cabot Books
location = United Kingdom
year = 2007
id = ISBN 978-1-906207-04-5 — A comprehensive chord dictionary instructional guide.
* cite book
title = El Tres Cubano with CD (Audio) (Book & CD) (Paperback)
first = Jon
last = Griffin
publisher = Omnibus Press
location =
year = 2007
id = ISBN 978-0825633249 — An instructional guide (in Spanish and English)

See also

* Stringed instrument tunings

External links

* [http://salsablanca.com/ethno/tres Cuban Tres - The 3 string guitar instrument from Cuba]
* [http://www.concentric.net/~scushman The Cuban Tres]
* [http://www.cuatro-pr.org/Home/Eng/Instrmus/Instrmnts/Otherinst/tres.htm The Tres in Cuba and Puerto Rico]