Dear Craig, Strictly speaking the 16th-century guitar does not have a re-entrant tuning. The 4th course is tuned in octaves, but the presence of the lower octave means that the tuning is not re-entrant.
Perhaps one of the most surprising re-entrant tunings is one for the violin used by Heinrich Biber in his Mystery Sonatas. There are fifteen sonatas, and each one requires a different tuning. The tuning for No. 11, The Resurrection, is d", d', g', g. In other words, starting with the normal violin tuning of e", a', d', g, you lower the first two strings by a tone, giving d", g', d', g, and then the 2nd and 3rd strings swap places. Apparently it means you can play parallel tenths without too much difficulty. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Craig Robert Pierpont" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "bill" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "lute society" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, June 06, 2004 11:59 PM Subject: Re: reentrant tuning > I know that reentrant tuning is common for 16c guitars and citterns. Sometimes it is somewhat camoflaged by the use of a bourdon which makes the course both lower and higher than the next course. > Craig > > Craig R. Pierpont > Another Era Lutherie > www.anotherera.com > > bill <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > re: reentrant tuning - > > i read recently that reentrant tuning is probably more authentic for > the playing of very early music, particularly rustic. any comments on > this? i've tried it once but didn't like it; pavanes, gavottes, etc., > sounded like they all came from hawaii or peru. > > chow - bill > > > > > --------------------------------- > Do you Yahoo!? > Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger > --
