Richard, At 10:03 06/03/2001 +0200, you wrote: >Yes.. and wheter Andre wants to admit it or not, his is also a declaration of >faith..escpecially in the direct reasoning he cites... "elasticity of new >wood". >There simply is nothing to firmly substantiate this claim. Certainly nothing >within the realms of science. It remains speculation not much better founded >then any other of the "theories" out there. FWIW: The following may only be anecdotal, but I think it does relate to what Andre said. Back in late 1969, when I was home on leave just before joining the Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club, my father asked me to go to New York and pick up some instruments from a luthier. The quartet was brand spanking new, and when I got them home he immediately tuned up the cello and proceeded to warm up on it with scales, etc. As he went through the entire range of the instrument, we noted that there were several notes which just didn't want to play easily. It was kinda like the "killer octave". Pinched or constricted might be a way to describe the sound. He practiced at least two/three hours a day for the three weeks I was home (he did have a day job, or would have played more), and before I left those notes were noticably easier to play. Two years later, when I was again home for an extended time, the cello was playing evenly throughout the range. My father's non-scientific explanation was that the wood had to "learn" how to resonate to those frequencies. Later, when I got into piano work, I heard from some "olde guard" technicians that similar things happen to pianos and it may take a few years for the "voice" of a piano to emerge. Andre said: >So...this knowledge, based on listening experience and combined with the >results of newly built copies of old violins and pianofortes gives me the >certainty that, at least, one of the reasons for decay in souplesse lies >in the changed conditions of the wood. It would seem that, in this case at least, over the life of an instrument there is an initial increase in "souplesse", followed by some period of prime tonal response and eventually a decline. Conrad Hoffsommer - Decorah, Ia. mailto:hoffsoco@luther.edu You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say will be misquoted, then used against you.
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