So, does anybody play both Matched Reciprocal (or classic) and Mirrored 4ths?

While I find inverted 5ths in the bass to offer fascinating opportunities, and I like what I have done so far, I am also very intrigued by the possibilities of a 4ths tuning that would seem much more familiar to my experience.

For a second stick the SG12 seems like the likely candidate. For those of you with more experience...if you wanted to have an instrument with MR tuning and one with mirrored 4ths, which one would be which?

Thanks in advance for your comments.

I would make the SG12 in 4ths. I guess that in 4ths you will do more close voicing chords and those do not sound well in the very low register but they are nice in a higher pitch...
Just my 2 cents


Cheers, Daniel.

I have a bamboo grand and now an SG12. I think the SG is great in 4ths and can play almost the entire piano repertoire. I'm also learning an Andrew York piece and I think classical guitar music works great on it too. I have my grand tuned in Mirrored 4ths now and I think it will stay that way for a long time.

I think that a long-scale Stick with 5ths in the bass and an SG12 in all 4ths would make a killer pair of Sticks. I did that for a while with my old 10-string until I was captured by 4ths completely. I'm not sure I'll go back to 5ths.

-Eric

If you just want to give it a whirl and try it out, what strings would you suggest getting? I was gonna try just a pack of bass strings and use the 4th string (the A) for the high C in a EADGC tuning. If i liked it, i'd definitely order the proper sticks from SE, but just for a quick experiement (that and a pack of bass strings here, i can get for less than half the cost of a set of 10 stick strings).

I just want to experiment before making the committed change.

Thanks folks for sharing your thoughts. I find it helps the thinking process to hear others opinions.

Eric, what York piece are you learning? I'm still trying to get some York pieces up & running, but progress is slow. Currently trying to get "Chant" (from 8 Discernments) going, it sounds awesome on the Stick, but the 5th's in the bass make it pretty tricky (for me anyway).

I'm learning "By Candlelight". It's very straight forward in piano 4ths on my SG12. I was having a lot of trouble transcribing classical music in 5ths and finally tried 4ths. My conclusion is that if your primary focus is classical music, then 4ths is the way to go. I'm also working on pieces that are more like finger-picking folk guitar. They work better in 4ths, too. 5ths seem better if you want to bass a bass part with some chord tones in the left hand.

-Eric

Hi all,

Having spent some time with this recently, I have a few things to report.

It's pretty easy to play melodic lines in the 4ths in the left hand without messing with general play in 5ths on another instrument. I think this is because the exact patterns of the right hand can be easily mimicked in the left (with a bit more fret space to compensate for).

However, when you start throwing left-hand chords into the mix, it's very hard to keep one tuning straight from another, and I've ended up playing wrong chords on both tunings as a result. 3rds are where tri-tones were, 6ths instead of octaves. 4ths where Major 7ths were, etc.

It might not be a problem if everything you are playing is fully prepared and arranged, but if there's any spontaneity in your accompaniment approach, I think committing to one tuning or another is a better idea.

So If your goal is to play chord-based music in the left hand, I wouldn't recommend having two instruments in different bass tunings.

If most of what you're doing is counterpoint-based, then it's probably okay, or if you want to have a bass+ approach, with the left hand playing primarily bass lines in 4ths, then it seems to work alright as well.

Just my 2 1/2 cents.

Again, I really appreciate the feedback.

thanks folks