There are 4 ways of laying the string instruments
1) Strumming accompanying chords
2) Harmonic improvisation by more than 50% of the time triads or 4 ,5 notes chords alternated some times by solos
3) Melodic improvisation by more than 50% of the time by soloing and some times alternating some intervals or chords
4) Finger picking which tries to incorporate equally isocratic bass, isocratic chords and solo with he same instrument.
ALL OF THEM REQUIRE ESSENTIALLY DIFFERENT INSTRUMENTS AND TUNINGS!
E.g.
1) Strumming accompanying chords
2) Harmonic improvisation by more than 50% of the time triads or 4 ,5 notes chords alternated some times by solos
3) Melodic improvisation by more than 50% of the time by soloing and some times alternating some intervals or chords
4) Finger picking which tries to incorporate equally isocratic bass, isocratic chords and solo with he same instrument.
ALL OF THEM REQUIRE ESSENTIALLY DIFFERENT INSTRUMENTS AND TUNINGS!
E.g.
1) Strumming is done very well with Ukulele, Charango, standard tuning 6-string and 12-string guitars and even 4-courses instruments that are the minimum requirement for 4-notes chords. There are even better tunings from the well known for this (e.g. the harmonic tuning of post 90 applied for 4-courses instruments or 3m-3M-3m versus the well known 4-3M-4)
2) Harmonic improvisation requires large sounding body for the chords are best tuning is the 3m-3M-3m-3M-3m versus the well known 4-4-4-3M-4 for 6-string guitar Or another example is the 3-string panduri tuned at an open major chord 3m-3M. Other appropriate tunings for 6 or 7 string guitars are the 3m-3m-3m-3m-3m-(3m) or 3M-3M-3M-3M-3M(-3M)
3) Melodic improvisation is done with instruments usually with deep although small area sounding body so that the single note sound more like "doggy" or "knock" and tunings that involve strings in intervals of 4 or 5. (See posts 160-175) Examples of instruments are violin, lyra, Russian pandouri, saz, Bouzouki, mandola, bass , puerto rican cuatro etc.
When the instrument is tuned uniformly in the strings by intervals of 4 then a span of the 4-fingers over consecutive frets will give when shifting from the last small finger to the next string and first index finger and interval of 2 .While when the instrument is tuned in all strings by intervals of 5 the same continuation motion in the fingers will give an interval of 3. This may explain partially why folk music (e.g. like Irish ) on instruments tuned by intervals of 5 (e.g. mandocello) have more intervals of 3 compared to folk music (e.g. like puerto-rican ) on instruments tuned by intervals of 4 (e.g. like cuatro).
When the instrument is tuned uniformly in the strings by intervals of 4 then a span of the 4-fingers over consecutive frets will give when shifting from the last small finger to the next string and first index finger and interval of 2 .While when the instrument is tuned in all strings by intervals of 5 the same continuation motion in the fingers will give an interval of 3. This may explain partially why folk music (e.g. like Irish ) on instruments tuned by intervals of 5 (e.g. mandocello) have more intervals of 3 compared to folk music (e.g. like puerto-rican ) on instruments tuned by intervals of 4 (e.g. like cuatro).
