Michael, > I couldn't tell you the physical principles involved. Maybe it has to do > with friction and mass, and the fact they play with rest stroke. > All I can say is it true!.... and Paco plays 10 times as fast as any > of the guys you mentioned, and plays with nails... I know this because I saw > one of his nails ( a fake one ) explode into the sky above the audience at a > concert once.
I can't speak to the use of nails on guitar or lute, I've never used nails. But I've observed it on the harp (easier to see as the instrument is more open). The players of the wire strung harp (the Celtic Clearsach) use nails, the more modern gut or nylon players use finger pads. The "pluck" is a shorter stroke with nails on the wire harp, and the possibility of speed better. Your physical principles of friction and mass are correct. But there is also the matter of skills, a big man can hit a baseball (or golf ball) farther than a small man - unless that small man has exceptional "hand speed". So to say (as someone did) that there is one player who can play with fingertips as fast as others with nails is to compare apples and oranges. Any one individual may have an exceptional talent that overrides a perceived disadvantage. (As size, in the "hitter" - or nails in the player). To extrapolate the general from the specific is normally an error. The balalaika or mandolin player with a pick is probably going to make faster runs than the p/i player with nails, and the finger tip player will probably be a bit slower. Unless the finger picker is using all his fingers as a roll (that the nail player can also do). The issue is moot. The guitar is a higher tension, the nylon/gut guitar can be played with nails. The lute and harp have a bit less tension and the sound production is better with finger pads, except the wire strung harp (and I'm not sure about that, I've played them with fingertips). And since when did speed become music, a well paced piece is more enjoyable to me than a virtuoso race. I confess I took piano lessons 60 years ago until I could play Jack Fina's Bumble Boogie (a boogie woogie version of Flight of the Bumble Bee). In later years I've learned that music isn't meant to be a contest of speed, it is a matter of the appropriate pace, and the voices of the piece. Best, Jon To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
