Neil:
I have been following this thread intently and find your solution most
interesting!
It tends to follows a general principal I discussed with a high end violin
builder in Arkansas last year.
I asked him: "If a violin player wants the best tone, what is the optimum
bow placement in relationship to the bridge"?
"It all depends", he replied, The best players are right next to the
bridge and this produces more "core" which he defined as power and fullness of
tone. However, he explained that it requires the most careful bow pressure to
have it work well. It seems that his concept is instructive for us HG
builders. String pressure becomes more critical as we move the wheel very close
to the bridge and producing a quality sound becomes more difficult.
Neil, it seems that you were able to functionally change the string contact
point as it relates to the bridge by creative cotton placement. I just love
simple solutions like this and I say "well done".
Thanks for sharing
Mel
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Hi Arle
Pleased to report a bit of a breakthrough re. the low d chanter. I still
have not found the make of the string I have that works best but a major
improvement in harmonic resistance is gained by only applying cotton at the
keybox edge of the wheel. This effectively bows the string further away from
the bridge. It also imparts a more mellow tone.My first tentative
scratchings can be seen here :
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=35597142
I'm sure I've heard this tune somewhere, does anyone have a title or
discography for it?
Cheers
Neil
http://www.hurdy-gurdy.org.uk
----- Original Message -----
From: "Arle Lommel"
To:
Sent: Wednesday, May 28, 2008 8:08 PM
Subject: Re: [HG] Chanterelle string for low D
> Hi Neil,
>
> How do you define "limited success"? What hasn't worked with what you've
> tried? I admit that I can't help you here since I play in C/G with an
> octave chanter using viola strings with no problem, but you want to go a
> fourth lower and there I have no success. But in any event it would help
> to know what the problem you've faced is exactly.
>
> Part of the problem may be that you're really quite low. Balázs Nagy
> experimented with chanterelles in the range you suggest for a bass
> instrument and found that below a certain pitch (somewhere near where
> you're talking about, if I remember correctly), the vibrational envelope
> of the string gets too big for the tangents to effectively stop the
> string (the string bounces off them or something like that), so you end
> up with unclear intonation and other related problems. I don't remember
> all the details, but he ran into these problems when trying to pitch a
> Hungarian instrument down an octave, which would put it right near the
> range you're talking about.
>
> -Arle
>
>
> On May 28, 2008, at 2:50 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
>> Hi all
>> I'm not usually one to plead for help but this problem is costing a lot
>> of time and money so any help will be greatly appreciated.
>>
>> I've just built a three chantrelle gurdy 345mm scale length and am
>> tuning it to normal D/G tuning . The third chanterelle is to be the next
>> octave D down.
>>
>> Has anyone found a string to achieve a reasonable result at this pitch ?
>> I've tried a lot of viola C strings with limited success.
>>
>> Regards
>>
>> Neil Brook
>>
>
>
>
> --
> No virus found in this incoming message.
> Checked by AVG. Version: 7.5.524 / Virus Database: 269.24.1/1470 - Release
> Date: 28/05/2008 07:20
>
