Damn it to hell Roman, this is getting annoying. > Not quite. Hooks and levers are NOT the same thing. I'm afraid you don't > know enough about hooked harps of the 18th century.
I know quite well that hooks and levers aren't the same thing, and I think I said that we now call hooks blades. But they serve the same purpose, the change of the pitch of the string. I know one harpist who plays "replica" music of the Middle Ages and is able to use her fingers to stop the string (as was done before the invention of hooks) to get an accidental - afraid I don't have that skill. Must I make everything as detailed as a primer, or can you just accept that I might know what I'm talking about? And BTW, her replica is wire strung (and don't give me any of that "new age" harpers crap, her qualifications are better than yours). To the members of the list, I promised some time ago not to get into contretemps like this, and I apologize for the strong language. I'm sure that if RT and I met over a beer in NYC we'd get along fine, but I'm getting tired of the nit picking. Need I say when I speak of tensile strength that it is a materials characteristic and that the thickness of the material (cross section, or guage) affects its actual resistance to fracture given the longitudinal tension applied to it? (steel bars will take a greater pull than steel wire, but the tensile strength of the material is the same). And that density affects the vibrating resonance? Or can I assume that you aren't all idiots who need every detail (an assumption I make, particularly given the intelligent conversations here). I'm tempted to say more, but I shan't. Enough. Best, Jon To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
