Santoor
Kurt Herrmann
Anyone out there had any experience with santoors? I have one, and I have a
good time with it, but there is not much material available for it, so it's
kind of up to the player to figure out what to do with it. I have a couple
tuning schemes, but since the bridges are floating, you can get different
harmonics and scale patterns (insanity) by moving the bridges toward the
edges or the middle. Does anybody know, for certain, where the bridges are
ideally placed? I can't say for sure, but since Indian musical instruments
focus on overtones (sitar and tabla for example), I suppose they should be
at the octave point -- in other words, the bridge should be positioned so
that it splits the string at a point causing one half (well, one-third or
something) to be an octave above the other half.
Any ideas? Or if you can point me in a better direction, please do!
Thanks,
Kurt
Terry
"Kurt Herrmann" <swel...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:gICc9.355$gC12.2...@news2.randori.com...
manner as the European Hammered Dulcimer. The first url gives an HD style of
tuning, the second contains detailed Santoor tuning.
Good luck!
Terry
http://www.dulcimer.com/faq.html#dulcimer
http://www.santoor.com/
Kurt Herrmann
news:3d72ffe0$1...@news1.homechoice.co.uk...
Thanks for the links. I didn't realize there was a different tuning for the
european hammered dulcimer. Thing is, I couldn't see what you were talking
about on the first link...I could follow the fifths (fourths) tuning, but I
thought that was for american hammered dulcimers! Did I just not see it?
Kurt
Chith Eshwaran
> tuning schemes, but since the bridges are floating, you can get different
> harmonics and scale patterns (insanity) by moving the bridges toward the
> edges or the middle. Does anybody know, for certain, where the bridges
are
> ideally placed? I can't say for sure, but since Indian musical
instruments
> focus on overtones (sitar and tabla for example), I suppose they should be
> at the octave point -- in other words, the bridge should be positioned so
> that it splits the string at a point causing one half (well, one-third or
> something) to be an octave above the other half.
>
>
I am interpreting your question as not related to where the bridge should be
placed so the strings can be tuned well, but so that the right harmonics and
overtones are produced. Restating it, "any position (within limits) of the
bridge is workable for correct tuning [by tightening the pegs
appropriately], but only one [or some] of these positions will produce the
best tonality and timber, due to the proportions of the various harmonics in
the sound produced". Assuming this to be the question, here are my views.
As far as I know, only one side [the longer side] of any string is used for
playing in a santoor; therefore the other side's length should not ideally
matter from a tuning point of view. In theory, if the bridge is so
positioned that the natural frequencies of the two sides of a string are in
a simple ratio to each other (2:1, 3:1 , 4:1 etc.), they should boost each
other when any one side is struck and hence resonate strongly and produce a
louder, ringing tone. They may also produce a tone that sustains longer -
not necessarily a plus. I know that one reason Pt. Shivkumar Sharma (the
Indian santoor guru) places the instrument on his lap (and not on a stand)
while playing is to dampen the vibrations quickly, specially in playing
faster passages.
If the bridge is brought too close to the centre line, there is danger of
accidentally striking the neighbouring string [one coming from the opposite
side], as the height of the two strings will be nearly the same. To give
sufficient isolation between these two strings the bridge must be located
sufficiently away from the centreline. And if the bridge is too close to one
side, due to the sharp angle of the string on one side it will not be
sufficiently stable and may even topple when struck during playing. And it
will not transmit the maximum amount of vibrations from the strings down to
the santoor body, as the area of contact between the bridge and santoor body
is reduced due to the angled pressure. Ideally, the pressure on the bridge
should be vertically downwards or close to vertical, which requires the
bridge to be further away from the side. So the ideal placement of the
bridge balances these two extremes, perhaps leaving no room to accommodate
considerations related to harmonics and overtones.
Regards - Chith Eshwaran