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Wound Strings: Underlayer vs. No Underlayer
An option is available for the Academie line of wound strings involving the silk underlayer. By default this is a thin wrapping of silk that is wound around the gut core of the string before the wire (Silver, Silverplate, Copper, Copper/Silver) is wound on. For many years we have been putting this underlayer on Academie strings in response to customer requests, but awareness and knowledge of historical performance practice has progressed enough now that we now offer this feature as an option.
According to our research, it is unlikely that such an underlayer would have been used on wound music strings before about 1900 — and for those players who want to explore the true nature of historical strings, we offer to make strings without this buffer layer.
The effect of the underlayer is to increase the internal damping in the string which gives the string a warmer tone. Without the underlayer, the tone of the string is brighter and has more of the lush, ravishing tone attributed to historical times. The addition of the underlayer also assists in stabilizing the string and increases its longevity.
What Are Those Little Black Squares That Came With My String??
Those little black squares are anti-tarnish strips put in the envelopes of strings wound in sterling silver to avoid tarnish. Sterling tarnishes, turning black-ish in color, and cosmetically looks bad. The anti-tarnish strips react to hydrogen sulfide and other tarnish-causing gases to neutralize them. If the silver string tarnishes it is still perfectly fine, but these little squares help prevent tarnish.
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Hand-made in the USA by Gamut Music, Inc., a leader in the revival of early music strings and instruments. Gut strings are not intended to be used with fine tuners or string adjusters, and those devices should be removed before installing the gut string on the instrument.
All Gamut Academie strings (pure gut and gut/metal-wound) are made with beef serosa unless they specifically say “sheep gut.” All pure gut Tricolore violin and viola strings are made with sheep gut; gut/metal-wound Tricolore and all Red Diamond strings are made with beef serosa.
Gamut gut string gauges are approximate (≈) diameter. Meaning, that while a ≈0.60mm string is polished in the workshop to a diameter of 0.60mm, changes in ambient humidity, temperature, shipping, and storage conditions can cause to string to expand or contract slightly.
Gimped gut strings and custom gauged equal tension strings are gauged with the equivalent-gauge (=) system. This means that the gauge listed, such as =1.50mm, indicates that the string is approximately equal in weight to a plain gut string of that diameter. Of course, because the wire is much heavier than gut, the string will be much thinner than a plain gut string.
More information about Gamut gut strings, string types, gauges, and string tensions can be found on our FAQ/Articles page. Not finding an answer to your question? Please contact us directly: support@gamutmusic.com.