> How is the 7th course on the lute like a drone? Bad wording on my part, Ed. My thinking, if there was any, was that it is a course mainly used when it fits the "chord", as one has only four fingers to fret with and it is the seventh string - and is pitched quite close to the sixth string. The assumption being that it is played "open" more often than not. That, of course, doesn't constitute a drone. There is a parallel, in a distant sense, with the Appalachian dulcimer. The "good old boys" play it with a "noter" (a stick of wood) and let two of the strings be drones, the better techniques (both older and newer) fret those strings also - or finger pick so the strings are harmonic.
Best, Jon
