>A common tuning used today, and that is considered traditional, is Cc Dd >Ee Ff G'G gg dd g'g'. What I'm trying to represent here is that the >lowest pitched course is in the middle. > > Doc >From Roland Ferrandi's site: "... Citterns had 4, 5, 6, or 8 courses and, according to Marin Mersenne in his music treatise "traité d'harmonie universelle" published in 1636, "the Italians put as many as nine or ten courses of strings".
The Corsican cetera corse, which is probably related to the Tuscan cittern, usually has eight courses today ; depending on the string length, this enables it to be tuned identically to the European lute, i.e. : - working from the top to the bottom course : G, D, A, F, C, G, F, D... - or tuned very similarly to the modern guitar : E, B, G(or F#), D, A, E... Personally I use a five-course Cetera tuned as folllows : G, D, A, D, D at the octave There are also a great many other ways of tuning the cittern and although this constitutes one of the difficulties concerning the instrument, it also contributes to its rich sound. ....." RT To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
