On Feb 16, 2009, at 2:10 PM, Martyn Hodgson wrote: > A small theorbo is called a 'toy' theorbo when, because of its > relatively small size
As I recall, "toy" is your own appellation, rather than some general historical definition. > which only really requires the first course to be > at the lower octave, the second is also unnecessarily lowered: > it's > all down to how the individual player strings it, not some > inherent > characteristic of the instrument itself. You're saying that size brings about the necessity to use double reentrant tuning. But that's not to say that people with smaller instruments do it "unnecessarily." I'm sure many of us (myself included) do it because of the way double reentrant tuning sounds. My theorbo is small enough at 79cm on the fretboard to use single reentrant tuning, but I personally prefer the sound of double reentrant over single. With single reentrant there's too much second- string sound, at least in my mind anyway. Besides, double reentrant provides the characteristic uniqueness of the theorbo! It's what makes a theorbo a theorbo, regardless of size. I can tune my 10- course in double reentrant if I want to. That would truly be a "toy" theorbo! Davidr dlu...@verizon.net -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
