source file: m1345.txt Date: Fri, 6 Mar 98 12:19:47 +0800 Subject: Re: Fretless versus Fretted From: Leigh Smith > Oops -- that was a typo: The Oud is indeed unfretted in the Middle East. Which I can confirm. I picked up an Egyptian Oud recently that uses mother-of-pearl and laquer (sp?) on the fingerboard, and different from the lute, is performed with a plectrum (traditionally an Eagles feather) to double-pick in a very impulsive fashion. With the right tension strings, you get a very clear tone without buzz because of the amount of energy imparted into the string. You do need to be "fretting" on the very tip of the finger, I must try the sarangi fingernail stopping. Interestingly, there is not a saddle like in a guitar. I bought it because I liked the sound and felt it would aid playing alternative tunings, without having to build or commission a special guitar, resetting sliding frets etc, and could draw on lutherie experience of a traditionally fretless, plucked instrument. I hope over time it will aid training my intonational sense. I was interested to read the Oud in the past has used frets, does someone have a reference or examples? Other Levant instruments like the Saz and Tar use tied on frets, which of course the Lute has used, the Bouzouki and I believe it's arabic cousin, the Buzuk, use hammered in frets. --- Leigh Computer Science, University of Western Australia Smith +61-8-9380-3778 leigh@cs.uwa.edu.au (NeXTMail/MIME) Microsoft - never has so much been made by so few, by pushing so much of so little, on so many with so little resistance.