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Looper's Delight
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Sitars don't actually have any drone strings. The drone is provided in Indian music by another instrument - the tamboura or maybe a sruti box. The sitar has 3 or 4 main playing strings, 2 or 3 chikari or rhythm strings, and then 15 or so sympathetic strings underneath the main playing strings. The main purpose of the sympathetic strings is to resonate (sympathetically :-) with the notes being played on the main strings, thereby providing that 'shimmering' sound, and a very quiet slight echo. Occassionally a sitarist will use the grown-out fingernail of the pinky on the right hand to reach underneath the main playing strings and strum the sympathetic strings once or twice for effect, but this is done quite sparingly. John Mclaughlin used a custom acoustic guitar with a scalloped fingerboard and accompaniment strings something like a cross between the sympathetic and chikari strings. He talks more about it here: http://www.cs.cf.ac.uk/Dave/mclaughlin/art/return.html#gib Stephen --- WKlein8318@aol.com wrote: > In the spirit of the Tueffel and Glisstar thread, is > anyone out > there aware of a manufacturer of electric sitars or > guitars with > additional drone strings? > > I've never seen an actual sitar, but from photos it > appears > the drones run under very large D shaped frets, with > the melody > strings passing over the top of the metal arc of the > D. > Is that accurate? Any DIYers ever try this? > > Bill > ===== Stephen __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get email at your own domain with Yahoo! Mail. http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/?.refer=text