Hello,
in the "Krünitz" (Oekonomische Encyklopädie oder allgemeines System der
Staats- Stadt- Haus- und Landwirthschaft = economical encyclopedy or
common system of the economy of State, town, house and agriculture -
1773 - 1858) there are descriptions how they used to make strings.
But probably these descriptions are from the 19th century already; and
he also mentions that the string makers made a secret of their
procedures (Article on strings, "Saiten" - Volume 130, p. 633ff).
"
Zu den feinsten Mandolinsaiten werden nur zwei Därme zusammengedreht; zu
den Primviolinsaiten drei Stück; zu den letzten Violinsaiten sieben
Stück, zu den dicksten Kontrabaßsaiten dreht man wohl hundert und
zwanzig ineinander.
"
-> they used 2 guts for mandolin strings, 3 for prime violin, 7 for the
thickest violin strings, and for the thick strings of the contra bass
they used 120 guts.
If you also take into consideration, that the guts also differ in
thickness etc. - there is still much room for different sizes.
But I'm pretty sure the makers then knew what they did and selected them
maybe even manually and by sight.
BTW - it is written there, that the best strings are made of at least
7-8 months young animals (sheep, goat, calves and cat).
Best regards
Markus
Am 18.05.2015 um 22:36 schrieb Lex van Sante:
Hi all,
This contraption was said to be invented by the 19th century
violinist and composer Louis Spohr. But you could be right in that it
was already in existence and Spohr made it famous.
Lex
Op 18 mei 2015, om 22:26 heeft Miles Dempster het volgende
geschreven:
Hi Sean,
A 'V' shaped notch formed by two straight edges set at a small
angle to eachother can measure small thicknesses very accurately.
The thickness of the string is measured by how far you can put the
string into the notch. It wouldn't surprise me if something like
this could have used.
Miles
On May 18, 2015, at 4:15 PM, Sean Smith <[email protected]> wrote:
Thanks, Martin. The idea that in a bundle you'll have an average
and outliers makes sense.
...if you're going to make a homemade roped string (3 strands)
the second course is what you use to make a 5th course and the
3rd is what you use to make a 6th course, but I don't think
anybody did this in the 16th century.
What then would have been the procedure instead? The stringmaker
has a better finished product (as nowadays) perhaps using custom
diameters? Or maybe the lengths sold would not have been
conducive to amateur stringbuilding? Solid gut? If it was indeed
more springy then solid may have been more acceptable.
The nice thing about the roped strings is that while they can be
expensive they do last well. If they sound _too_ dead, it's time
to change the octave.
The reason I bring this up is that I'm pretty parsimonious when
it comes to strings and that would have been an issue for many
lutenists without a supportive patron. Would there have been some
players who had a deal w/ the local butcher for materials and
made their own?
There's an old Japanese saying that when the winds come up the
cats disappear!
Sean
On May 18, 2015, at 12:42 PM, Martin Shepherd wrote:
Hi Sean,
Your friend was right - if you're going to make a homemade roped
string (3 strands) the second course is what you use to make a
5th course and the 3rd is what you use to make a 6th course, but
I don't think anybody did this in the 16th century.
My suspicion is that they bought a bundle of strings labelled
"3rd course" or whatever, then selected their 3rd course strings
from amongst them. The bundle would have included strings of
various diameters, around a mean which was determined by the way
they were made (how many guts, how they were twisted etc). This
kind of system persisted until the 20th century for violin
strings.
If I'm right, this also means that when Dowland says use a 4th
course string for the first two frets he doesn't necessarily mean
two frets of exactly the same diameter. He could have graded all
the frets very precisely by choosing slightly bigger or smaller
strings from each bundle.
M
On 18/05/2015 21:18, Sean Smith wrote:
In buying and using our lute strings we place an awful lot of
faith in our micrometers. I see people changing strings for
going up or down a tone or even a semitone. Yes, I think I can
feel the tension change and hear it to some degree but we're
often talking a difference of microns in string difference.
For example, a change of .42 to a .43 is 10 microns which is
not repeatable on my smaller micrometers (even digital) but is
on the 6" digital micrometer. For rougher measurements, say,
between 1st, 2nd and 3rd courses, the delta is easily seen/felt
and I think that even I could make a measurement device for
that for further refinement.
In the 16th century, of course, there were no micrometers
although I'm sure there were fairly accurate (and perhaps,
secret?) methods of fine measurement. I'm wondering how they
worked out the diameters. Any place I could read up on this?
Years ago, a friend did some experiments in roped bass strings
and found that 5th and 6th courses could be made from
combinations of the 1st, 2nd or 3rd courses. From this we
concluded that nearly all sizes of 6c instruments could be
strung with a total of 3 diameters of strings. The 4th course
is a little iffy in that it could be made from a thicker 4th
size or possibly a combination of 2 chanterelles.
I'm just thinking that by keeping the choices fewer they were
able to be more efficient in string technology. On the other
hand, I wonder if this tended to keep the lute technology at a
halt: ie, you can play anything you want as long as it has the
6 courses of those sizes.
No, nothing was published and the theories are not ready for
primetime but I was wondering what other string scientists have
come up with. I realize there are the notes in Capirola but I'm
thinking by mid-century there had to have been a larger
industry at work, judging from the number of books being
published and lute inventories.
Sean
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