Hi Joshua, I have a 7-course lute and I usually tune the 7th course to D. However, I keep an extra 7th course in the case, and if I'm playing lots of music where I need the 7th course in F I simply change it over. It takes about 5 minutes to change the course, and if you use plain gut strings they tune up and keep their tuning (more or less) in a matter of minutes. I'm fussy about string tensions, so I wouldn't attempt to retune the same strings.
Good luck with your lute playing - I think a 7-course instrument is a great place to start! Sam On 2 May 2012 17:39, Joshua Burkholder <[email protected]> wrote: > Dear lute-listers, > > A question from a beginner: > > First to introduce myself, my name is Joshua and I've been playing the lute > for several months now; I have been on the list for a couple weeks and am > really enjoying following your discussions. I have a rental 7-course and I am > now in the process of taking the plunge and buying a lute of my own. After > much reading, pondering and agonizing over the best number of courses to > start with, I've come to the conclusion that a 7-course best suits my needs. > So onto to my question: > > I know that some people re-tune the 7th course from D to F as needed, but on > my rental lute this seems quite impossible. The diapason is stung to F and if > I drop it down to D it becomes far too wobbly and flabby. From this I assume > that if I were to restring it to D, which I'd prefer on the whole, it would > likewise be impossible to raise it to F. Currently the lute is strung with > Pyramid strings so the basses are metal wound. Is it only possible to change > from D to F on the same string if one uses gut strings (Poulton remarks to > this effect in her tutor that if it's strung to be tuned at D "it will only > be possible to raise it to F if gut strings are used")? Otherwise I have to > re-string? Or does someone use some other stringing solution, besides just > keeping it D and fingering the third fret for F (or buying an 8-course > lute...)? I've read enough about stringing lutes to understand that it will > be a while before I understand anything about stringing lutes... > > Thank you for taking the time to help out a newcomer. > > Best wishes, > > Joshua > > > > > > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html -- Sam Chapman Oetlingerstrasse 65 4057 Basel (0041) 79 530 39 91
