David: You would do well to contact Alexander Rakov, the silk string specialist who contributes regularly to this list. I've tried his silk strings on my six-course lute and found the trebles to be, well, silky and also clear and strong. They are remarkably consistent and the basses far more responsive than gut basses I have used. Best wishes, Ron Andrico www.mignarda.com > Date: Sat, 26 Dec 2009 09:49:26 +0100 > To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu > From: davidvanooi...@gmail.com > Subject: [LUTE] Re: Q on odd tunings for plucked instruments > > On Sat, Dec 26, 2009 at 7:18 AM, David Tayler <vidan...@sbcglobal.net> wrote: > > David--I'm sorry if I asked you this before, but can the silk koto > > strings be adapted for lute trebles? > > Koto strings are too thick, I should think. Perhaps one can get a > thinner set, but that would still be too thick. It's one size fits > all, as the movable bridges decide the pitch. > Shamisen (three strings) uses thinner gauges. These strings are > stretched very easily, quite the opposite from gut, and are used at > different pitches over quite a range. One even has to tune to a > different tuning during a piece quite frequently. For my shamisen I > have some silk strings - nylon too, big difference! - but never tried > these on a lute. > California has a lively community of koto and shamisen players, it > shouldn't be too difficult to find some thinner gauges, silk strings > for shamisen to try out on your mandolin or lute. > > David > -- > ******************************* > David van Ooijen > davidvanooi...@gmail.com > www.davidvanooijen.nl > ******************************* > > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html __________________________________________________________________
Your E-mail and More On-the-Go. Get Windows Live Hotmail Free. [1]Sign up now. -- References 1. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/171222985/direct/01/
