Leonardo Da Vinci: Musician

Someone searched today using the term: "Did Leonardo play a musical instrument?". Knowing the answer, I thought I would reply to them, lest they visit this site, again.

Leonardo da Vinci, 1452 - 1519, had many gifts, but one of them was for music. He composed music, spontaneously, improvising freely as he went - and presumably he recorded some of this. However, no written record of his music survives. So we may never know whether he was, in fact, a good composer, to add to all his other wonders.

We do know however that he had a great reputation for being able to play ANY stringed musical instrument, at first sight, even if he had never encountered the particular type of instrument before. Though, his official instrument was the lyre, he was able to play others, too. Presumably, he was physically dextrous and so comfortable with music as an art, that he could respond to the opportunities and constraints of a new instrument well enough to coax adequate music from it.

So, not only could Leonardo da Vinci play an instrument - he had shown himself able to play any stringed instrument of his time.