> > Better: change to gut and start playing lute. > > David > >
I'll email Paul O'Dette and Hoppy Smith right away and tell them that, so they can finally start playing the lute and not the funny toy they've been using for ages. I'll forward the info to Eugène Ferré, who's also quite naive and seem to be very bad informed. Bruno, We've been here before. Nylgut are more flexible in terms of what you can do with them. They're reasonable stable, and last quite a lot. For my taste, the best synthetic option. Carbon are difficult to deal with for people with oversensitive skin, but their sound can be very interesting. It is always difficult to be conclusive, as some people make an excellent sound with every type of string, and some other would blame the string and wouldn't question themselves. There're cases of people satisfied with a mediocre and poor sound claming how good they and their strings are, but I wouldn't worry about them. As carbon and nylgut are affordable, try both, play them for a while, and you will make your choice. While it is true that different strings feel different and of course sound different, it is mostly the plucking technique what defines your sound quality. Working on tone production is the answer. Then you can make your choice. I guess you know all this. Some player will say that there's a difference in developing a sound for gut or for synthetic, but this is not fully correct. I've used both, and they both require serious and constant training. There're no different techniques for one and the other. Hear someone like O'Dette playing a gut strung instrument and then a synthetic one. Leaving apart the taste, there will be no difference in the technique used. For a 6 course (or even a 8 course) lute or vihuela I'd choose gut basses, or at least try to avoid overspun strings, but again I wouldn't claim that's the only option to make things work properly. You can always train your fingers so they do exactly what you want to hear. Ariel. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
