...and what is your experience?

I just read Emmet's write-up on Raised Matched Reciprocal tuning and how it seems to bring out a bright resonance in the Railboard. Right now I'm rehearsing for a festival gig and playing every day through both a PA system and Genelec studio monitors. Both fullrange, but of course differently sounding. A month back I changed from medium Matched Reciprocal to medium Deep Matched Reciprocal and I like the sound of the MR better than the sound of the DMR. The concert I'm rehearsing includes structured improvisation along a playback track so I'm having a really good option to estimate these two tunings, especially since I did the same concert back in January on the MR tuning. Also, besides these rehearsals I'm playing a lot "plain practicing" with my SG-12 at medium MR and I'm finding that these strings seem to be perfect for the SG-12; the STick Guitar resonates with the chords in a way that the Grand doesn't. ;My Grand had a little more "musically resonating behavior" at MR but I'm now starting to suspect that the best resonance will happen for the Grand at using heavy MR. ---> or maybe heavy guage Raised MR. The point in writing all this is that I base my judgement also on how the strings sound in a mix, since I'm rehearsing with a pretty complete backing track and really can hear what works (not only what feels good when plugging in to play solo). I have never tried Raised MR or heavy guage before so I'm wondering what people think about these? I've also recently learned that too thick strings doesn't sound good either, as that would bring the instrument into clunk-land. I love the sound of my SG-12 and think that the SG's string thickness related to the scale length imply that a Grand should be stringed heavy for a similar behavior. Correct? And in an ensemble mix I'm noticing that the same notes tend to sound better if played lower, with longer vibrating strings, on a higher tuned instrument. All evidence pointing at the direction of Heavy Guage Deep Matched Reciprocal. I guess...

I've never tried it (I'm just getting acquainted with MR) but I would think Raised MR would favor the melody side; you can play A on the 4th string 10th fret instead of 12th fret for example; so if notes are played 2 frets lower than on MR, the increased length of the string from the tapped fret will give you more ring/sustain, right?

On the bass side however, wouldn't you lose a little depth? I mean even if you never play anything below the lowest D, wouldn't you miss being able to play D and A on fret 2 of the lower 2 bass strings? I'm just guessing here of course... I'm trying to play King Crimson's Red, even though I'm only learning (I've been at it for about 2 months now, with little time for daily practice) and Raised MR would be great for the intro/outro on the melody side, but wouldn't be very practical on the bass side for the rest of the song.

If you're not in the habit of using the X fret, then I think your concerns would make sense. But this tuning actually shifts the bass tuning down to a really nice spot, with the low E on fret 2.

But what you really need to do, perhaps, is get into the habit of playing at the X fret more. The Railboard actually has a lot more space between the damper and the X fret, so it's an even more playable spot.

I'm thinking of putting this tuning on a 34" scale 10-string to see how it feels...

Gentlemen, please leave out the traditional discussion about "what notes can be played" and let us stick with the subject; how the most pleasing musically resonating sound concerning Stick and strings is affected by changes as tuning, string thickness and STick model. Anyone with hands-on experience want to educate us newbies?

Hi Per,

I've used MR and Classic both, with lights, heavies and mediums on both sides of the instrument.

Which notes are available to you is a bit more relevant than your post makes out, as it will define the outermost boundaries of the tuning. If you don't need the low C, then Emmett's new tuning is worth a try, as the sensation he describes of how it feels is more "ringing" and resonant, mainly because the strings are generally thinner, not thicker (if I'm reading him correctly).

Now, he's not using a 12-string, so how the highest of 6 strings starting with low D will sound is an open question. The highest-pitched string I've ever had in that position was a B, and that was on a 34"-scale instrument with an ACTV-2. The ACTV-2 and the slightly shorter scale length both tend to make that string less "wiry" than it would sound on a 36"-scale instrument with a Stickup, for example, or a PASV-4 in the 2nd 3rd and 4th pickup settings.

In the 12-string version of the tuning the highest string is a C# (just a halfstep below the highest melody string in the Classic tuning, which is pretty high). A string that thin played at those lower frets is pretty wiry, but if you like the idea of being able to play very high parts on both sets of string, the amount of overlap and corresponding timbral variety at higher pitches this tuning would allow is pretty intriguing. Higher notes and chords would have a more "acoustic" tone compared the the same notes played at higher frets, on a lower tuning.

The higher the tuning overall, the greater variety of timbral choices you have for higher notes (and vice versa).

Generally, I like the tone of heavy strings, but not their "resistance", as natural vibrato is a huge part of the sensation of playing the instrument for me. I find the PASV-4 darkens things up sufficiently that I don't hear that much of the "wiriness" on my SG12, even with its .0065" high A string.

If you want to go for a "darker" sound, then I think the heavier gauges will please you more, but there is a point up above the 10th fret or so where the lowest bass string just starts to suffer from an overabundance of non-musical harmonics. A way around that is to spend more time on the 2nd thickest bass string down near the nut.

So I trust this response is more in line with what you were asking for, though how helpful it was will have to be up to you

Very helpful input, thanks a lot! One difference I noticed when going down to Deep MR, from MR, was that the two lowest bass strings on the bass side became less trustable for tone. I mean, at DMR some frets sound louder while other fets give less tone to the string sound. I suspect this comes from the slightly lower tension (actually the DMR strings should need to be even thicker than SE's current DMR set specification in order to keep tone consistency related other tunings).

It's an expensive survey to try out all possible tunings but I think my next goal will be the heavy RMR. I'm looking for the sweet-spot where the Grand sounds good all over the playable range. My SG-12 is already there; no need to try other strings on that one.

If you're using mediums now, you probably won't have much of an adjustment for the flap and nut height, but you will need to adjust the intonation.

The exception will be on the melody side, if the transition from plain to wound changes string positions.

Aha! So heavy string sets use a wound 3'd! I didn't know about that, but generally wound strings sound better than plain (to my taste). Great! With the fret rails I'm not experiencing the usual (low fret) difficulty in pulling wound strings for glissando. I have kind of been stuck at DMR for the repertoire, since I did a gig in May and now the North Sea Jazz festival this weekend, but I'm looking forward to investigate other tunings soon.

You guys confuse me...

Hi Per,
'
Sorry to disappoint but the heavy Classic 3rd melody string is a plain .014 I think.