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Dr. Oud
Oud Junkie
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Location: Sacramento, CA, USA
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Oud or lute?
My latest acquision is an unusual oud, which was played as a lute with tied on frets. The body is unusally long - 22 3/8 in (568mm); narrow - 12 3/4
in (323mm); and deep - 8 in (203mm). The neck is only 7 11/16 long (297mm) which would make a string length of 23in (586mm) but this is not in
proportion to the body length. The top ribs are missing on both sides, so there's no clue to where the braces or bridge was placed?!?
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Dr. Oud
Oud Junkie
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the back
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Dr. Oud
Oud Junkie
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side view
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Dr. Oud
Oud Junkie
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the label - 1889! who's got the oldest oud now, huh?
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amtaha
Oud Junkie
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Mood: beginner's frustration ...
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Number 123
The work of Baseel Al-Toweigy, The Carpenter, in Halab
1889 ...
Wow .. !
How did you come about this find, Doc?
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Dr. Oud
Oud Junkie
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I bartered it for some restoration work for Ronny Andersson.
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Faladel
Oud Junkie
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Basel Altounjy is a very ancient luthier of my city, the family altounjy exists in aleppo and it is near to my family, there is a very well preserved
oud of Basel that I have played .
Oud Player
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oudplayer
Oud Junkie
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Hey doc
if i am not mistakin gmy uncle has a oud liek this in london, which is funny bc it hink he has a face of a oud liek this i dught this only but i knwo
its frm the 20 or 30s and the body broke in many areas so he said when i come down to visit him in london when i get a chance he might give it to me
then
but it looks alieka awesome oud to me
thx sammy
we are lost camels in the desert and wanna find our way to water and the water is in aden
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Ronny Andersson
Oud Junkie
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well this is the closest an oud player can come Laux Malers baslutes
Best wishes
Ronny
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Jameel
Oud Junkie
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Nice one Doc.
Reminds me of the oud in this photo from Joe Tawadros' website. The one on the far left.
Incidentally, I was talking once with kanun player Dr. George Sawa about old ouds. He said that all the old ouds before the turn of the 20th century
had this shape. The wider, bigger ouds are relatively new.
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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Interesting. It is, of course an oud but Ronny Andersson's observation about the similarity to lutes by Laux Maler prompted me to check data that I
have on file relating to Maler lutes.
Laux Maler was a famed German luthier operating during the first half of the 16th C. None of his lutes survive in their original state as they have
all been subject to modification over the centuries - fitted with wider necks and bridges to carry a larger number of strings. The surviving
instruments all have a characteristic long narrow almond shaped body profile built up with from 9 or 11 ribs.
Some years ago - using dimensional data from the surviving Maler instruments - I made a reconstruction of what I thought these lutes may have looked
like originally. The design and barring of the belly was based on an original belly fragment in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremburg - Cat. No.
M154. This belly has traces of the original bridge set low down below the current bridge location. The reconstructed lute with this low bridge
position and neck carrying eight frets to the body joint gave a string length of 730mm. The lute has been quite successful and I still use it
today.
Taking a tracing of the oud body profile from the image posted by the Doc and superimposing this over the reconstructed Maler lute profile - to the
same scale - it can be seen that the profiles are very similar as are the ratios of body length to body width which come to 1.75 for the Maler and
1.76 for the oud. I have assumed that the centre of the label is the location of the oud soundhole.
The big difference is in the body depth. Maler lutes had a more or less semicircular body profile whereas as the oud is proportionally deeper in
section. This deeper body profile, however, can be found on lutes of the late 17th/early 18th C by makers such as Hoffman and Tielke (who also used a
narrow body profile similar to the Maler lutes).
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Ronny Andersson
Oud Junkie
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Indeed interesting about the Maler lutes John. I believe this oud had a soundboard made of Lebanon cedar and I know Richard will use cedar for an
eventually reconstruction of the soundboard.
Here are some photos of Richard's monster, compare its size next to a Turkish oud!
Best wishes
Ronny
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Ronny Andersson
Oud Junkie
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Here some interesting pictures of a recent reconstruction of an early lute based on iconographic sources circa 1426. It is built and reconstructed by
David Van Edwards; string length 67cm!
Best wishes
Ronny
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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I may get a more accurate profile of the oud from the image Ronny posted as there could be some foreshortening in Richard's photo. So will recheck the
comparison with the Maler reconstruction and see how it turns out a second time around.
The thin end plate of the oud is similar to that on the old oud that I am restoring. This type of end plate was used on lutes also except that they
were usually not so deep and extended further around the bottom section of the body. There seems to be a hole in the neck block but no sign of a dowel
or dovetail? Could this be an old nail hole originally used to secure the neck to the body (in addition to a glued butt joint) - a practice followed
by early lute makers - or is it just that the neck joint does not pass through the neck block on this instrument and is, therefore, not clearly
visible in the photo?
Nice fingerboard inlay - could you post a more detailed image of that as well for information? Thanks.
John
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Ronny Andersson
Oud Junkie
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Yes John, I noticed the same when I had the oud here that the neck is attached to the neck block with what seems to be a nail- let's wait for
Richard...
 
Best wishes
Ronny
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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Richard - is it possible that the neck of this instrument has been cut down - ie reduced in length - some time in the past? I am curious having just
carried out a preliminary comparison of three 'early' oud profiles in "Question - Big Ouds, Little Ouds" in the "Advice, Tips and questions" Forum and
noticing that the neck seems to be proportionally shorter those of the other two ouds.
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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On the other hand the neck length is very close to 1/4 of the total length of the oud - which is the proportion that manuscripts from the 10th to 14th
C (for example Ikwan al-Safa and Kanz al-tuhaf) say it should be. Is it possible that ouds - even into the late
19th C - were still being built in accordance with these ancient traditions but which, in the short space of time of the last 150 years or so, are now
lost?
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Dr. Oud
Oud Junkie
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The neck joint indicates no forshortening of the neck, so I'm inclined to agree with the 1/4 length proportion. I would welcome any information about
bridge placement, bracing, etc of these old manuscripts, since the face and top ribs are missing.
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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Recreation of early lutes is bad enough but the situation seems to be far worse for ouds as there is apparently little data surviving either in
manuscripts or extant instruments.
I can only work with secondary source material as I cannot read Arabic and so data that may be available in original manuscripts is inaccessible to
me. The two early sources already mentioned in this forum - the Persian Kanz al-Tuhaf and Arabic Ibn al-Tahhan ouds - give dimensions that are suspect
due possibly to scribal error. However, making a guess at what may have been originally intended, the former oud would have measured 81 cm overall
length, string length 67.5 cm, body length 60.75 cm and bridge (front?) at 13.5 cm from the bottom of the body. The latter oud measures
correspondingly 90 cm overall, string length 81 cm, body length 60.75 cm, and bridge (front?) 9 cm from the bottom of the body. Note that the the Ibn
al-Tahhan neck is proportionally longer than 1/4 of the overall length so that the proportional bridge placement of the Kanz al-Tuhaf oud at 22% of
the body length might be a more representative choice giving a string length of about 740 mm for your oud - but, of course - without further data
points this is just speculation based on 14th C oud design. A late 19th C oud may have had a higher bridge position than this with consequent
reduction in string length?
Barring is a problem with no historical data available at this point in time. As there are similarities between modern oud and early lute barring
(where there is some data), the latter might be used as a guide.
For information, my recreation of the Maler lute based on the early 16th C soundboard fragment by that maker - Cat. M1.54, in the Germanisches
Nationalmuseum, Nurnberg - has bar centreline placements measured from the bottom of the bowl as follows:
No below bridge bar due to the low bridge position at 65 mm, bar1 at 125 mm, bar 2 at 160 mm, bar 3 at 225 mm, bar 4 at 252 mm, a bar through the
rose centre at 285 mm, bar 5 at 345 mm and bar 6, midway between bar 5 and the neck block at 410 mm.
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ALAMI
Oud Junkie
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Now that the full text of "Rasael Ikhwan Al Safa" (Epistles of the Brethren of Purity.) is available as pdf (arabic) I was able to do a search on the
word oud. I found the part they are talking about oud. The text says beautiful things about oud and its mystic value and symbolism, the technical part
is very short.
It is partly translated in David Parfitt site:
http://www.oud.eclipse.co.uk/history.html
From what I understood the oud they're talking about is 4 course (associated with the 4 elements) and it seems to be a fretted instrument, they
explain how to tie frets (they are using a word I am not familiar with : Dostaan or Doostaan (is it fret ?). however it may be the original name of
"Doozan" which means nowadays "tuning"
I saved the few (arabic) pages about oud as a separate pdf that I am attaching.
On the other hand, I have a late 19th century oud (1892), it is more like modern ouds except for string length
Total length: 72 cm
String length : 63 cm
Depth : 20
Neck :21.50
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Peyman
Oud Junkie
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Dastan is persian for finger positions and sometimes frets (it literally means "Hands"); and duzen is Turkish for tuning.
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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Farmer in his paper "Was the Arabian and Persian Lute Fretted" confirms that many early writers such as Al-Kindi and Al-Farabi referred to 'dasatin'
or 'dastan' which were tied frets, certain evidence that the oud in the Middle Ages was fretted.
Ibn al-Tahhan did not need frets - according to Farmer - because he knew the place of every note on the fingerboard without 'dasatin'. Ibn al-Tahhan
also recommended using graduated frets ie fret diameter reducing from the nut towards the bridge - common practice among lute players - and that four
rolls of gut were required to fret an oud.
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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ALAMI - could you post the body length and width of your oud for information
Thanks
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ALAMI
Oud Junkie
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Made in Tripoli Lebanon 1892 by Al Arja Brothers (Couldn't find any info on the makers)
5 course
Total Length: 72
String Length: 63
Body Length: 51
Body Width: 36
Depth: 20
Hole: 12 (centered at 30 cm from bottom)
nut: 3.5
Bridge: 10 cm (7.5 cm fm bottom)
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jdowning
Oud Junkie
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A beautiful oud ALAMI.
Could you please confirm the measured distance from the bridge to the bottom of the bowl? I have scaled dimensions from the image but the bridge
location doesn't seem to fit - 7.5 cm seems to be the distance from the back of the bridge not from the front (the side closest to the rose)? Scaling
the front edge to the bottom of the bowl seems to be about
8.7 cm.
I always assume that bridge location given by early writers is from the front edge of the bridge but it might also be the centre of area of the bridge
(which could approximate to the bottom face of the bridge on an oud).
Interesting that the bottom of the bowl is almost semicircular as this may be an early oud feature.
The design of the outer area of the rose does not seem to be symmetrical. Does it contain any calligraphic information about the instrument or maker
etc, interwoven in the design?
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