Re: playing outdoors

"Turloch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Pauline Lerner
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> > The survival of this violin and its good sound after repair and warm up
> > almost constitute a miracle.  How would you explain it?  Was the
collapsed
> > bridge a factor?
>
> It was somewhat amazing to me as well, considering the likely
> variations of temperature and humidity. I'm not sure what the effect of
> relieving string tension had upon its survival, nor do we know how long
> ago the bridge had been collapsed before we recovered it.
>
> It's survival may have been due to the environmental changes in storage
> taking place gradually over many hours or days. A building that is
> heated may see more rapid changes in conditions (as often economic
> factors may forestall heating/cooling until the temperature becomes
> uncomfortable) as opposed to a storage environment that is not
> artificially heated/air conditioned.
>
> Certainly the geographic location of the storage site has much to do
> with temp/humidity extremes and factors. Another thing that may have
> contributed to it's survival was it being buried in a pile of lumber.
>
> > It had been stored in closets and not played for many years.
> > Being uninformed, I did not loosen the strings when I stored it.  One
day, I
> > opend the mandolin case and found my beloved instrument in smithereens.
It
> > had broken into lots of small pieces and was completely beyond repair.
I
> > still grieve for it, even though I have bought better quality mandolins
> > since then.  Do you suppose that the splintering of my mandolin was due
to
> > the pressure of the strings on the bridge?
>
> Pauline, this is most unfortunate, as I'm sure it was a dearly
> cherished heirloom. I'm sure it was a painful loss. I'm certainly no
> expert on long-term storage and preservation, but folks I know who have
> experience in museum storage have told me that their first concern is
> always to maintain as constant humidity and temperature environment as
> possible, as the drying/shrinkage and humidity absorbsion/expansion
> cycles on wooden instruments can be detrimental over time if the
> extremes become significant. Sometimes the storage conditions are
> matched to the wood, and based on the enviroment of the wood's origin.
>
> I'm sure there may be others on this forum who are professional
> conservators who can comment further on this subject, but it seems to
> me that the stresses of environmental changes may have had been a
> contributing factor with the demise of your stored mandolin.
>
> I have seen violins that had remained fully tensioned in long term
> storage that needed the necks reset, and ones that were loose tensioned
> in storage that had fallen sound posts. Many instruments in neglected
> long-term storage have their pegs shrink and become untensioned. I have
> never found one myself that had phyically disintegrated due to being
> fully tensioned in storage.
>
> -Turloch

Turloch,

First, thank you so much for resonating in sympathy with me and my loss of
my mandolin.

Now that you've explained the effects of fully tensioned and loose tensioned
strings in storage, I agree with you that this could not have been the
reason why my mandolin broke into smithereens.

The issue of temperature changes indoors and outdoors depends a lot on
geography.  My grandmother lived in NYC and I lived first in Baltimore and
then in the Washington DC metro area.  Sudden and large changes in
temperature and humidity are very common here.  (They make it so hard to
keep your violin in tune!)  In contrast, most people keep the indoor
temperature of their home relatively constant.  In this area, I think long
term storage of a stringed instrument would be safer indoors than outdoors.

You said that your miraculous violin was buried in a pile of lumber and that
this might have helped save it.  How would that have worked?  One possible
consequence of storage under a lumber pile is termites.  Old violins have
been found with dead insects or worms inside, but the violins were still
intact.

For me, there are still mysteries here.

Pauline