In my view a word of caution is advisable over parts of Eph's article on his NRI website. In particular, Eph was the inventor of modern 'roped' bass strings made by NRI and has an interest in their promotion and rather less enthusiam for the alternative loaded strings invented by Mimo Peruffo (who similarly is not keen on the alternative 'roped' option). There seems to be pros and cons about either and, indeed, some lutenists are now using just ordinary high twist gut at very low tensions but plucking especially close to the bridge. For what it's worth, when I tried roped strings I found the internal friction between the strands effectively eliminated any acoustic benefit they might theoretically have expected to have over plain high twist gut. In my view the solution is a combination of using low tension high twist strings in the bass (requiring close to bridge plucking) together with a moderate degree of string loading (see Mimo Peruffo's site) and, incidentally, avoiding the use of some toxic heavy metal compounds (eg of mercury) which the 'Old Ones' might have perhaps employed. MH
Ed Durbrow <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Thanks Gary and Wolfgang. > http://www.nrinstruments.demon.co.uk/Guide.html > Ed Durbrow Saitama, Japan [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www9.plala.or.jp/edurbrow/ -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --------------------------------- To help you stay safe and secure online, we've developed the all new Yahoo! Security Centre. --
