pernambuco=rosewood?
Station 01
Do I understand correctly that pernambuco is a type (sub-species? regional
variant?) of rosewood from the Pernambuco (sp?) region of Brazil? If so,
what are the differences betwee pernambuco and regular rosewood? How
would African blackwood, which is a kind of rosewood, fair as a bow making
wood?
--
Stephen Hill
us...@ns.net
In article <zzzz-03079...@camil23.music.uiuc.edu>, zz...@uiuc.edu
(Station 01) wrote:
> Do I understand correctly that pernambuco is a type (sub-species? regional
> variant?) of rosewood from the Pernambuco (sp?) region of Brazil?
Nope. Pernambuco is not a Dalbergia. It is Caesalpinia echinata. The
general view is that there is _no_ satisfactory alternative wood for
making modern violin bows.
> How
> would African blackwood, which is a kind of rosewood, fair as a bow making
> wood?
Since African blackwood can have a specific gravity of 1.2+, I suspect it
might be worth trying for baroque bows, perhaps even modern bows if it
hasn't already been tried. One quick way to make a preliminary assesment
is to get someone to do some Luschi readings of the speed of sound in some
samples, and compare those readings as well as bending strength, etc. to
acceptable woods.
JDT
us...@ns.net wrote:
>(ase...@ns.net)
Since I play 'em, but don't build 'em my knowledge of violins woods is
very elementary, but I highly recommend an article in the current
issue of Strad (a british magazine - you sometimes can get it at a
Tower Record store) has an excellent discussion of violin woods. The
problems of rainforest ecology etc. - The amount of Perumanbuco wood
or any other wood for that matter in use for violins is miniscule in
the global scheme of things. The biggest problem in Brazil is not so
much the harvesting for the wood, but simply clearing land and burning
the wood so the land can be used for general agriculture.
I wouldn;t have a bow made of anything but perumanbuco. I had one of
"brazilwood" a generic name for anything but perunambuco as a young
student and it was inferior. The few glass fibre bows I have tried
were not up to professional standards. Even selecting a good
pernambuco bow suitable to my taste, style of playing, strength of my
arm and hand and matched to my violin can be a real pain.
"Fiddlesticks" is not a term taken lightly by advanced violinists.
Jon Teske
us...@ns.net
> I had one of
> "brazilwood" a generic name for anything but perunambuco as a young
> student and it was inferior.
FWIW--'brazilwood' is typically the term applied to inferior examples of
wood from the _same species_ as 'pernambuco'. Many different names are
applied to the wood in different countries and for different purposes.
Ronald M. Schmidt
Station 01 wrote:
>
> Do I understand correctly that pernambuco is a type (sub-species? regional
> would African blackwood, which is a kind of rosewood, fair as a bow making
> wood?
Pernambuco is not a sub-species or whatever of rosewood. Pernambuco is
from Caesalpina echinata, whereas Rosewoods belong to the papilionaceous
plants. So far as I know, rosewood has not been used as bow wood, but I
must admit, I may mix it because of different names in Englisch or
German. So called Schlangenholz is used for baroque bows and seems to be
heavier than pernambuco.
Hope this helps,
Ronald
Michael Low
In article <31DC19...@hbz-nrw.de>, "Ronald M. Schmidt"
<sch...@hbz-nrw.de> wrote:
I believe that a favourite wood for baroque bows is snakewood - it often
has a characteristic striated pattern to it (like stripes on a small
snake).
Michael