How it began
The predecessor of the cuatro is the four-string Spanish Renaissance guitar. A study by Oscar Battaglini Suniaga indicates that the first four-stringed guitarrillas arrived in 1529 at Cubagua, a Venezuelan city that no longer exists, sent from Seville by Italian merchants. There is no exact date for the creation of the cuatro itself. It is described as heir to the Renaissance guitar and as already formed by the end of the eighteenth century, so it is a Venezuelan development of a Spanish instrument.
How it works
The cuatro has four single strings, today of nylon, tuned A, D, F sharp and B, with the B an octave lower than would be expected, which gives each chord a different inversion from the same fingering on a ukulele. It is built for strumming. The fingerboard ends flush with the top of the body, and the upper half of the soundboard is often covered with a hardwood scratch plate. Variants add a fifth or sixth string or double the courses.
How it spread
The first direct references to the cuatro date from the second half of the nineteenth century. Between 1852 and 1854 the painter Camille Pissarro made a watercolor titled Tocador de cuatro, now in the collection of the Central Bank of Venezuela. The instrument is used across Venezuelan genres, including joropo in the Llanos, gaita in Zulia and galerón in the east, and it accompanies parang singers in Trinidad and Tobago.
What lasted
In the 1950s Jacinto Pérez became known for varying the tuning and developing solo playing, and Fredy Reyna documented the evolution from the Renaissance guitar and presented the cuatro as a solo instrument able to play both Venezuelan music and Renaissance pieces. Later players such as Hernán Gamboa continued to expand the technique.
Where it stands today
The cuatro is considered the national instrument of Venezuela. Instruments range from rustic, inexpensive models to custom-built concert cuatros. Players now perform solo parts with melody and harmony, and the instrument has traveled with Venezuelan migrants to other countries.
