posted 02-21-2004 08:17 AM               

Your ear will do the rest as you learn to play it.

posted 02-21-2004 11:04 AM               

Neck is "square" Douglas fir with my standard "magpi" pickup system.

posted 02-23-2004 01:36 PM               

Then the saddle position is irrelevant. You only need to get the open strings in tune and then learn to play the thing in tune. All the intonation you need is in your ear and the bar in your left hand, nowhere else.

posted 02-23-2004 04:21 PM               

I just picked up this beauty in GUITAR CENTER just over the mountain from you... yes, it is in fact a very rare Hawaiian built by Chris J. Knutsen in his "late period" (somewhere between 1927-1930). And yes, it had been sitting in Guitar Center for 2 1/2 years or more, waiting for someone to notice it (at least, that's how long it took me to recognize it for what it is).

Take a look at that saddle - wavy all over the place. The intonation is TERRIBLE because the saddle is actually sitting out of and in front of the saddle slot. I cannot play a straight bar, say, at the 12th fret, and have any combination of more than two strings play in tune.

posted 02-24-2004 06:33 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Paul Hostetter:
Guitar Jim: [b]The notes on this guitar will never be fretted....only open notes and notes played with the slide will be used.

Then the saddle position is irrelevant. You only need to get the open strings in tune and then learn to play the thing in tune. All the intonation you need is in your ear and the bar in your left hand, nowhere else.

[/B]

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posted 02-24-2004 09:00 PM               

In the simplest sense, intonation is the degree to which a player can play a note at a given ideal pitch. It’s a common term in the violin and vocal music world where there are no chords really, and no frets. You play/sing flat, you play/sing sharp, all this is part of a performer’s intonation.

In a fretted instrument, intonation involves a complex of mechanical issues, because the frets run interference with a player’s skill. Press a string down and it plays sharper than the intended pitch because the fret is in the "wrong" place, that’s an intonation problem one can ascribe to the instrument. Actually, it’s usually the saddle or the nut that’s wrong, but the point is: the fretted note is wrong. The intonation is wrong.

When you subtract frets from the equation, all that’s left is the open strings between a (hopefully) straight saddle and a straight nut, nothing more. Adjusting intonation is done with the bar on strings that are presumably in tune and have that modicum of definition to their ends - that much is certainly a no-brainer - but more importantly, like a singer or a violinist, the player needs to have an ear and some coordination in manipulating the bar until the intended notes are in tune. That’s intonation.

To invoke the term intonation, based on a distorted and screwed up saddle such as we see on this poor old Knutsen, or even a straight one where it belongs, does not constitute "intonation" at all, it is merely one factor that affects it negatively.

Cool guitar though!

And Guitar Jim: if the saddle is reasonably straight, whether it’s slanted or not, it’s entirely possible to play a full chord in tune (as in tune as steel guitar can be anyway!) with simple bar technique. The little offset for the B in normal guitar setups is so small that it won’t affect bar intonation audibly. If you find I am wrong, and somehow the second string always sounds sharp to you when you know the open strings are perfect, then go for a straight line saddle. But I bet it won’t matter.

posted 02-25-2004 09:59 PM               

Lucky for me, I'm not a perfectionist. You can always do like the violinists & spackle a little vibrato over things.