This Franscisco [Corbetta, a very important early guitarist] had just composed a sarabande which so charmed or desolated everyone, that all the guitar players in the court set about learning it, and God knows the strumming that ensued everywhere.
- William Turner, describing the guitar scene in Charles II’s court in 1697. Basically the story of my life.
Meanwhile, Samuel Pepys was “mightily troubled that all that pains should have been taken upon so bad an instrument.” Opinions were about as strong about guitars then as during the Worship Wars.