Subject: Edlinger Lutes

From: BENJAMIN NARVEY <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Oct 2013 21:04:34 +0200

Dear All,

   I am getting a small theorbo made after Edlinger, but my lute maker
   feels the model is excessively thin; she is worried about
   sound/projection. I should think the sound may be less complex than
   deeper lutes, but perhaps I will have more projection since less sound
   will get trapped in the belly.

   Does anyone have experience with Edlinger-type models? I would like to
   stay as close to the original body as possible and see what happens,
   but the maker has never made anything so shallow before and is getting
   slightly cold feet about it.

   Any and all thoughts would be much appreciated!

   In any event, it should be a dream to hold!

   Bonne musique,

   Benjamin

   --
   [1]www.luthiste.com
   t +33 (0) 1 44 27 03 44
   p/m +33 (0) 6 71 79 98 98
   --

References

   1. http://www.luthiste.com/

---

From: Jon Murphy <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2013 03:26:02 -0400

Dear Benjamin, and all,

My lute building career ceased before I finished my first real one 
(still have the form and the body staves I'd made), so what I say may be 
irrelevant. My interest moved to the Celtic harp, but I did make - and 
still play - the "flat back" lute from Musikits (13 string, 7 course). I 
would guess that the average depth of the "flat back" is similar to the 
Edlinger's that I saw on web sites. As the principle of Musikits (Jerry 
Brown) was a player of 12 string guitar he designed this so one could 
make a lute shaped 12 string guitar or a 13 string lute by filing the 
string slots in the bridge and nut -  he expected most would make the 
guitar.

Some years back I attended a master class run by Ronn McFarlane (as a 
listener) and brought my "flat back". After the class I asked Ronn if he 
would play it and give me his opinion. For some reason, probably as he 
was a bit wrapped up in the master class, he didn't notice that it was a 
"flat back" (guitar profile with a lute shape). He played a bit and 
commented that it had a "sweet" sound - which I interpreted to be that 
it was different, but nice.

My own ear, listening from the same chair where I'd been for the master 
class students and Ronn's demonstrations for them on several different 
"real lutes", would agree with your speculation. The sound was less 
complex, and therefore what Ronn called "sweet". It was not a small 
sound, nor a "thin" sound - one might call it a "clean" sound. As to 
projection, it was similar to the other lutes, although that was hard to 
tell as all the students had 9 or more courses giving a fuller bass.

Let me digress into my totally amateur observations on sound production. 
You mentioned sound being "trapped in the belly", an interesting 
thought. I am in continual gentle argument with fellow harpists on the 
effect of the body of the harp on the sound - the woods and the shapes. 
The harp is unique to our stringed instruments - the strings pull 
directly from the soundboard, and most of the strings are harmonics 
(even if distant harmonics) from all the other strings. The object of 
the body of the harp is to support the sound board and not damp the 
vibrations of the sound board. The object of the soundboard is to pass 
the vibrations to the sympathetic strings. The sound production and 
complexity is almost all from the strings to the air.

On the other hand, the lute, the violin, the guitar, and all the others 
of that family use the body of the instrument to "mix" the sound. Note: 
harps don't have sound holes, the others do. The lute family transmits 
the vibration of the plucked or bowed string to the body through a 
bridge (the complex bridge of the violin family must have something to 
do with the way it is transmitted, can't see why it would be that way 
otherwise). That means the resonance of the body, and the contained air 
"column", must have something to do with the sound. I would guess that, 
unlike the harp, the shape and wood of the body and the air "column" 
would have a great deal to do with the complexity and projection of the 
sound.

The modern solid electric guitar uses electronics rather than an air 
column to transmit the vibrations, we can drop it as a design for a lute 
(although I'm sure one could make one that would sound almost 
authentic). Any instrument that uses air "column" needs an exit, else 
the air won't vibrate and resonate - it will just "bounce back and 
forth" and the instrument will sound "dead".

Wow, a lot of verbiage from one who is not an expert. I'd be interested 
to hear from real luthiers whether I'm off base, on base, or a couple of 
steps away. There must have been a reason for Edlinger to make the lute 
this way, perhaps it was for the "sweetness".

Best, Jon

On 10/18/2013 3:04 PM, BENJAMIN NARVEY wrote:
> To get on or off this list see list information at
> http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
>