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So as I've said a few times here, I took up the lute a couple years ago. I wanted something I could practice after my daughter went to bed, and I got really into early music. Etc... Etc... I rented an instrument for a couple years, am taking lessons, and it has all snowballed...

I just took delivery yesterday of an instrument I commissioned:

https://www.niskanenlutes.com/index.php?p=recent (Mine is the Railich 12 course)

The luthier here who I worked with is an absolute artist. I was able to work with him to design an instrument that is very versatile and takes my short fingers into account. And having spent most of my musical life looking for instruments solely for function, it was really fun to plan an instrument that had some purely aesthetic features (the rosette, the choices of wood for the bowl and fingerboard, double headed vs extended neck).

I would, again, recommend to anyone to pursue an instrument like this (piano, guitar, lute, harp, etc...), that is so far removed from what we do as tubists. It has caused me to think about music on tuba completely differently (in a good way...).

Nice!!

I have never played classical guitar, so I can't speak to that.

I have also never done the Bach suites on lute because mine is a Renaissance lute, and there is a completely different tuning for Baroque lute.

HOWEVER. Having played a lot of not-at-all classical guitar and bass, I can confidently say that 12 courses of strings does not make it easier or harder than doing it on 6 strings. It's like comparing apples to oranges for a lot of reasons. Virtuoso performers are virtuoso performers. Playing Milano on a 6-course is just as hard as Dowland on a 7-course is just as hard as Kapsberger or Vallet on 11 courses. People will always find the technical limits of any given instrument.

My preference is the fanned fret Opharion, which gives better tonality to the bass strings, and is the instrument on which I derived my personal fanned fret guitar, which I had the neck commissioned to my specs.
Opharion: My electric guitar derived from the Opharion:

I love both of those. I have never tried a fanned fret instrument - What is the transition like from not-fanned frets? And can you go back and forth pretty fluidly?

Need more strings?

Try a theorbo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVabz8LneI4" target="_blank"

Hup

timayer wrote:I love both of those. I have never tried a fanned fret instrument - What is the transition like from not-fanned frets? And can you go back and forth pretty fluidly?

I don't want to hijack the thread, because your instrument is magnificent. But to answer the question, no, no transition issues at all. There are other similarities between ancient and modern stringed instruments. For example, compare the theorbo with the harp guitar: combination of bass and treble instruments in one.

Hey Timayer - what tuning do you use?

Hijack all you want!

Tuning is Renaissance with an inordinate number of bass strings. Top to bottom it goes G D A F C G F E D C B A (though I have the A tuned down to a G right now).

These instruments were used well into the baroque period. In the movie Tout les Matins du Monde, set in the mid to late 1600's, there is a scene where the Depardeau character conducts a royal court mixed ensemble with all kinds of variations of lutes, theorbos, viol da gambas, etc., and wind instruments.