Jon, I understand your point and, to a degree, agree with you. You are ahead of me as a musician, by the way. The lute is my first instrument at age 53, while you already play several other instruments. I agree that it is easily possible to get hung up on small things and ignore the main goal, which is gaining basic technical skills with the instrument. There are a lot of home handymen who are collectors of expensive power tools more than they are craftsmen, as a comparison. But part of what attracted me to the lute in the first place was the quality of the sound it makes. As I heard more recordings and live performances, I was particularly drawn to those instruments and musicians who used gut strings. The rationale behind HIP is that certain music sounds best when played on the instruments for which it was composed with the strings and playing techniques the composer would have used. That is a personal decision by a modern musician and not an ironclad rule. John Renbourn plays Renaissance music on steel-string guitars and it sounds great. But it's a philosophy I can buy in to without getting stressed out about it. I just think the music sounds more appealing that way. It's sort of like cooking. Why eat bad food when usually you can just as easily cook a delicious meal? Life is too short not to.
Another part of this, for me, is that as a rank beginner I'm playing a lot of scales and exercises to gain the technical skills. That could be maddeningly boring and could easily discourage me from continuing. So, with my teacher's encouragement I look for things within the exercises that give me some short-term rewards, and one thing is achieving a lovely sound each time I pluck a string. That also leads me to gut strings. As I've said in postings to the listserv, I don't play enough to go through gut chanterelles more quickly than I can afford, but I could see that another beginner might. So long-lasting alternatives that come close to the sound of gut might be a good thing for some other beginners to consider. Another small reward, by the way, is appreciating the dance of one's fingers on the strings as a pleasurable sensation quite apart from the music. I'm now doing things that a year ago I wouldn't have thought I was capable of. My fingers aren't as arthritic as I thought. And, to be honest, although I'm an art historian, I grew up in an engineering environment. Understanding what makes a lute a lute is just fascinating for me. Learning how to build (and string) lutes seems to complement my growing understanding of the music and the playing technique. In both cases it's a journey without end, but both are interesting journeys. And I'm getting to a point in my life where I can appreciate that. Tim On Saturday, February 5, 2005, at 02:46 AM, Jon Murphy wrote: > Caroline, and Timothy, > > I wonder at the concern for strings from rank beginners (as I am > also). The > lute is a subtle instrument, and I'm learning that in my play. But I > have a > very good ear for tone and pitch and have had to use nylon fishing > line for > my chanterelle to tune it up to g' without breaking as the lute is a > bit > long for that tuning (63.5). Since then I've found a nylon guage of > musical > string that holds the pitch. The rest of my instrument is nylgut. > > But here is my point, you are learning to play, and what you play > should > approximate the sound of the lute as it was (which no one, even on this > list, is quite sure of - unless they are either immortal or attuned to > the > music sent out into space 400 years ago - at very low volume). Any > instrument needs two things, the instrument itself and the player. I > have an > expensive penny whistle I bought a few years ago, but I can't match the > sound of a real player using a $5 store bought whistle. It is a > compromise. > A bad instrument will turn you off, but one that is too good will not > help > you, it will just cost you money. My "flat back", denigrated by some > here, > has the right string spacing and a sound that is "lutelike". So I'm > now in > the process of making a real one, but only as I've "found the joy of > the > lute". The difference between nylon, nylgut and gut is a matter of > detail. > Until you get the "attack" on the strings you probably won't notice it. > Learn your tool before you spend too much on the details. Drummers > often > practice on a "dead" piece of board. > > And for the purists, this is no suggestion that there isn't a > difference, > even for the beginner. It is just a matter of priorities. Where do you > spend > the money and time? To me it is learning the music. > > Best, Jon > > > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html >
