"First part of the answer: I'm not Nigel North ;-)" Nigel is playing thumb out, which does enable the middle-index finger runs at high speed a bit easier. I can play middle index runs fairly well thumb in, but not as fast, easily- or naturally- as thumb out.
The eternal conundrum of which way to tune/string the 7th course. A good reason- if one cannot afford to have two identical 7 course lutes for both stringings- to have an 8 course lute, however momentarily transitional it may have been in its own day. Reversing the F and D for the reachability necessary for the really difficult chromatic notes on the low D makes it possible to call this configuration, "Not an eight-course lute; It is a double-seven." There are, in fact, plenty of pieces requiring a fingered, 3rd fret A-flat on a 7th in F, (one of the reasons- I read somewhere- for the 7th was to make some of those notes accessible as much for the convenience of not retuning the 6th to F) but these are easier to negotiate on an 8th course, fingering over the 7th, than the other way around- although just such examples do exist in the literature. Additionally, there are some pieces- I'm thinking Laurencini- in which an open F is the only way to get that note, the key and/or left hand position making a fingered low F impossible. Dan > Thank you for that answer, David. Thinking about what you said, I see > now that I was not thinking clearly about how one tunes a 10-course > lute. I was thinking that one could tune the 7th course as D, and then > just add the bass tunings for courses 8, 9, and 10 however they're > commonly tuned. In such an instance, one would just ignore the courses > 8, 9, and 10. But I see that - by having to find the notes assigned > to the 7th course on different lower bass courses - a great > complication is added! > > > > I really should have thought of this, since I do tune the 7th course of > my 8 course instrument to F, with the 8th course being D. I have been > considering reversing them, and tuning the 7th to D, and the 8th to > F. But it's easier, I'm sure, to reach down and strike the bottom > course, than it is to reach down and distinguish the 7th from the 8th > course. I'm rather looking forward to the arrival of the 7 course > instrument I have on order! > > > > Ned > > -- > > >To get on or off this list see list information at >http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- Rachel Winheld 820 Colusa Avenue Berkeley, CA 94707 [email protected] Tel 510.526.0242 Cell 510.915.4276
