jdowning
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Octave tuned ouds?
Lutes of the early 16th C and 17th C guitars, for example, were often fitted with the string pairs of the bass courses tuned an octave apart.
Is there any evidence - past or present - of this practice ever having been applied to ouds (or any other plucked stringed instrument of the Middle
East)?
My impression is that ouds have always been strung with unison tuned courses.
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Peyman
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I was recently listening to an Iranian oud player and it seemed like he had tuned his bass strings in octaves, but that's the only instance I have
heard this method being used (and in one song).
Most Turkish baglamas use an octave string for the first and the third course (usually one wound string and two steel strings). The Cretan Laouto
(lute) which is metal strung, also uses octave tuning. Not really middle Eastern but I like the sound of the Louto.
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Luttgutt
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Lebanese Bouzouk (two dable string long-neck luth) has always has (as far as I know) the base tuned in octave:
Gg-cc
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jdowning
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Thanks guys - I am curious because oud strings, historically made from either gut or silk were always - apparently (?) - tuned in unison pairs. Silk
strings can be made more uniformly than gut yet this does not seem to have been a problem as early ouds used either all gut, all silk or both in
combination. The Spanish vihuela of the early 16th C also used unison pairs (inherited from Moorish oud string technology?).
As early European lutes were, in all probability, identical to ouds - lutes most likely also used the same strings and were unison tuned like ouds. So
why did early
16th C lutes use octave tuning for the lower bass courses (the two lowest in the case of a five course lute or three in the case of a six course
lute)? It has been suggested that early European lute bass strings (made from gut) were inferior, technologically, to oud strings (?) and sounded dull
so that an octave string was needed to 'brighten' the sound of the basses. This is possible but unlikely (in my opinion) given the cultural
interaction between Moorish 'Spain' and Europe of the 15th and 16th centuries.
The octave tuning phenomenon in the early 16th C lute was short lived as unison tuning took precedence in the second half of the century.
So was this not a problem of string making technology but just a preference for a particular tone colour - like octave tuned '12 string guitars' have
a following in modern times?
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Luttgutt
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Hmm.. interresting..
I never thought of this before.
So, just a thought:
I am thinking that this fenomenom has more to do with what kind of music one plaid!
Folk music from many parts of the world use "under strings" (strings that lie under the main ones, so that they vibrate and give over tones when one
plays the main strings). The scandinavians has it on the fiddel. the east and far east has lots of instruments with under strings. They give a typical
"folk" sound!
The octave tuning has some similar effect, and sounds undoutably as "folk"-like!
While lutes to my knowledge, where never used to play folk music.
what do ou think guys?
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Peyman
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Interesting idea. Persian Tar and Setar have the bass strings doubled with a treble too. I know if you play the bass by itself, you only here a thump
and not much but with the treble they sound more interesting.
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suz_i_dil
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Leon (Ararat66) pointed me a record from Udi Hrant a few time ago, where he is using an octave stringing tuning:
http://rapidshare.com/files/238838194/16_Hicaz_Taksim__ifte_Kiris.w...
Take from the album " early records " volume 1
I don't have more information about, I mean if it was is own experiment or if he was trying to explore any kind of old way of tuning.
Hope this helps
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Ararat66
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Hi there
Yes this is true, Udi Hrant was one of those players who was endlessly curious, maybe as a result of his blindness, so he was innovative by nature -
many of his taksims sound like explorations of the modes as if each one has its own environment and microclimate to be explored. I love this aspect
to oud music more than anything else.
Leon
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jdowning
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As far as gut and silk bass strings on early ouds and lutes are concerned, it is probably the use of the plectrum (risha) that makes the
difference.
Until the late 15th C lutes were played - like the oud - with a plectrum. Then the change from plectrum to 'finger style', polyphonic, playing began
to take place with the lute (as well as the addition of a sixth course).
Use of a plectrum produces a range of upper harmonics in a thick gut or silk bass string that the soft fingertips cannot so lute players likely found
it necessary to compensate by adding the thin octave string to provide the missing upper partials.
One lute virtuoso - Francesco da Milano - active during this transitional period, is reported to have often used two metal finger picks (presumably on
thumb and fore finger). He may have needed to use the finger picks on his instruments (lute or viola da mano) - strung in the 'old way', oud like with
unison basses - in order to make the bass strings sound satisfactory.
The practice of using octave strung basses for the 'stopped' courses (1 to 6) - although frowned upon by some at the time - continued into the early
17th C for the lute. Some researchers claim that the courses lower than the sixth - the unstopped basses - were always octave strung a practice that
continued into the Baroque era until the lute eventually became obsolete by the late 18th C.
So, because the oud has always been played with a risha, the problem of inadequate sonority of the bass courses (evident in the lute of the 16th C and
later) has never been a significant problem - even less so with the eventual introduction of modern metal wound bass strings.
Just speculating.
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Ararat66
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Wow John .. that's so interesting.
Thanks
Leon
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jdowning
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Arthur H. Benade in his "Fundamentals of Musical Acoustics" (Dover Publications, New York) confirms - mathematically - that the width of the pick
(plectrum or risha) significantly affects the production of upper partials produced when a string is plucked. The narrower the pick, the greater the
number of high frequency components in the sound produced. A fingertip - disregarding the softness - is considered to be a wide pick.
The relative significance of this - as it applies to plain gut or silk bass strings - needs to be tested.
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