Johnnyboy
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How to clean the strings?
Good day to you all fellow oud players,
I'm having this problem ever since I've been playing the oud.
When playing for a while, the strings on the fingerboard get more and more dirty from my fingers which is inevitable. This dirt makes it hard to slide
your fingers easily along the strings. This is usually the case with the lower 3 strings.
I was wondering what the best option is to clean them. What do you guys use or do?
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Brian Prunka
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I don't have this problem. The best way to clean the strings is to wash your hands before you play 
Usually a set of strings last about 3-5 months for me if I'm playing a lot.
Sliding your fingers on the strings is more about the pressure of your left hand than anything, perhaps you need to just lighten your touch when you
slide?
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Johnnyboy
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Quote: Originally posted by Brian Prunka  | I don't have this problem. The best way to clean the strings is to wash your hands before you play
Usually a set of strings last about 3-5 months for me if I'm playing a lot.
Sliding your fingers on the strings is more about the pressure of your left hand than anything, perhaps you need to just lighten your touch when you
slide?
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Thanks for your answer. I always do wash my hands but it's inevitable. When playing for a while, the strings would always scratch dead skin cells etc.
Pressing lightly in my case makes the sound very shallow which I'm not used to unfortunately.
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Brian Prunka
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How lightly you press depends on the technique desired and how hard you are playing in the picking hand.
Lightening your touch should never change the sound. Everything has to work together. If you are having trouble sliding, you are pressing harder
than necessary. That is a simple fact. The dirt on the strings is not significant enough to impede slides unless you are pressing too hard.
Most people have trouble with this, because they have a near-binary approach (i.e., on/off). They are either pressing hard or barely touching the
string. It's imperative to develop the ability to exert very fine gradations of pressure, exactly the minimum amount necessary at any given time.
If you devote some time to fine-tuning the pressure of your fingers, you will find that you have much more control over the sound and slides and
ornaments become much easier.
An exercise I make all my students do is start with the finger touching (but not pressing down) the string. Then, start plucking. At first will just
be a percussive noise, because the finger is stopping the string without pressing down. Gradually press the finger down (slowly) and listen for how
the note slowly comes into focus. Try to observe where the note finally achieves fullness. Then keep pressing harder (all of this without changing
the dynamic level of the picking). Notice that the sound doesn't get any more full as you push harder than necessary. Then gradually begin releasing
the finger, again noting the point where it's just enough pressure to get the full sound. Do this whole exercise many times, very
slowly. Try it with different dynamic levels, picking harder and softer (but always the same dynamic all the way through). Note that the
required pressure is slightly different depending on how hard you are picking.
If you do this, you will refine your finger pressure. Both the vibrato technique and slides used in Arabic/Turkish music require the ability to
delicately vary the pressure in this way.
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norumba
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wash your hands , as mentioned... after playing take a small thin microfiber cloth -- like you get with glasses or cell phone screen protectors --
and wipe down the strings, both on top and then underneath by threading the cloth between the strings and finger board . run the cloth with upward
pressure to clean the strings, then some passes to wipe down the fingerboard. Do this every time youre done playing, it helps.
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gwvt
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I discovered a cleaning method somewhere online that works great. Add a little bit of ammonia to a small dish of lukewarm water. Wrap the fingerboard
in cellophane so it doesn't get wet, dip a small rag in the solution and squeeze it out so it's not dripping, then grip each of the wound strings with
the rag and slide it up and down. It squeaks a lot (that's how you know it's working). Repeat with just water to rinse, let dry, and retune. Remove
the cellophane if you want a traditional sound, or leave it on for a more avant-garde experience. Presto! It's like you just put on new strings. The
little bit of ammonia gets all that gunk out from between the windings that deadens the sounds and gives that rubbery feel of old strings. I refreshen
strings with this method every month or two and keep a set sounding and playing great for six months.
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Johnnyboy
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Thank you so much for the advice. I think it has indeed something to do with me pressing too hard on the fingerboard. Especially because I easily get
grooves in it, even though my fingerboard is made of ebony 
I'll definitely be practicing your advice. Question, if I press more lightly do I have to pick the string harder to get the same sound quality?
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Johnnyboy
Oud Maniac
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Registered: 7-1-2007
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| Quote: Originally posted by gwvt | | I discovered a cleaning method somewhere online that works great. Add a little bit of ammonia to a small dish of lukewarm water. Wrap the fingerboard
in cellophane so it doesn't get wet, dip a small rag in the solution and squeeze it out so it's not dripping, then grip each of the wound strings with
the rag and slide it up and down. It squeaks a lot (that's how you know it's working). Repeat with just water to rinse, let dry, and retune. Remove
the cellophane if you want a traditional sound, or leave it on for a more avant-garde experience. Presto! It's like you just put on new strings. The
little bit of ammonia gets all that gunk out from between the windings that deadens the sounds and gives that rubbery feel of old strings. I refreshen
strings with this method every month or two and keep a set sounding and playing great for six months. |
Thanks a lot for the extensive info! I do recall oud sellers having these small bottles of some liquid that they dip a cloth in and when they slide
with it along the strings you could see the cloth actually getting all black from the dirt. It could be ammonia but I'm not sure.
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