Strip Muting

[Les Smith]

With the recent discussion about the pros and cons of strip muting,
I can't resist adding that this becomes a moot question if one happens
to be tuning a Bosendorfer, Bluthner, or a number of high-quality 19th
century grands that looped and tied each individual treble string to
it's own hitch pin. Making all those loops can be a real pain in the
you-know-what when restringing one of these instruments, but my over-
all impression is that the one string/one hitch pin system did contri-
bute to the overall tuning stability of the instrument as well as making
them somewhat easier to tune initially. My feeling has always been that
the switch to one hitch pin for every two strings was adopted primarily
as an expediant to speed stringing.

Les Smith
lessmith@buffnet.net