I wonder about how practical an instrument the lautenwerk was in
Bach's times. The copies of lautenwerks I have seen have always been
strung in nylon. In Bach's time a lautenwerk would have been strung
in gut, I presume. Now, stringing a lautenwerk in gut today would be
expensive. (The only instrument I can think of with close to that
many gut strings is a large triple harp.) It would also be hard to
keep in tune. In my limited experience dealing with gut strings they
behaved like a weather station. Breathing on them was enough to get
them out of tune. Does anybody in the list have experience with
maintaining a gut-strung lautenwerk? Would such a beast would have
been more expensive than a metal-strung harpsichord in Bach's time?
Thanks,
Isidro
(so far a lurker)