More about the tuning

I did a little research on the 10 strings per octave in the melody section:
 

C - C# - D - E - F - F# - G - G# - A - B

It looks like this is quite common on the "5/21" fretless zithers: 5 chords, 2 times 10 plus 1 melody. It is called "partially chromatic", which is diatonic (C - D - E - F - G - A - B) with one or more accidentals (in this case C#, F#, G#).

So why these three accidentals?
I can explain the C# and the F#: they are in the A and D chord in the chord section of the zither. For the G# string Jan Castelein, assistant engineer at Galaxy Studios, gave me the hint that it may have someting to do with the raised 5th (augmented triad, two major thirds).

Looking at the chords:

• A-chord: A-C#-E, with raised 5th is A-C#-E#
• D-chord: D-F#-A, with raised 5h is D-F#-A#, no, there is no A# string on the zither
• F-chord: F-A-C, with raised 5th is F-A-C#
• G-chord: G-B-D, with raised 5th is G-B-D#
• C-chord: C-E-G, with raised 5th is C-E-G#

How about minor chords?

• A-minor: A-C-E
• D-minor: D-F-A
• F-minor: F-Ab-C
• G-minor: G-Bb-D, no, there is no Bb (A#) string on the zither
• C-minor: C-Eb-G, no, there is no Eb (D#) string on the zither

Hmmm....

Gluing it back together

With all bugs removed, it was time to glue the zither back together. The original glue was probably hide glue, which I do not have. I decided to look for a modern alternative.

An obvious choice would have been common white wood glue ("houtlijm"), but I found out that this is based on polyvinyl acetate (PVA), which tends to creep when under constant load. And 41 strings will put a lot of constant force on the wood! So I decided to use a polyurethane glue, which is very strong and does not creap, as long as you clamp it properly for at least 4 hours.

This website has some good information about using glues for musical instruments:
http://www.apsimplepsaltery.com/glues.htm

First I glued the side of the frame:

And next the braces:

Woodworm killer

Ok, this is some nasty stuff:

I treated all wooden parts from the zither with it ... outside ... with gloves ...
There were probably no woodworms left in the wood, but if there were, they did not survive this shower. >;-)

Strings and back removed

I removed the strings and the back panel of the zither to work on the wood.

As you can see, there are some nasty cracks in the front panel. The back panel had two large cracks and did not survive the removal in one piece.

The small white dots all over the front panel are holes from woodworm (!). Probably old, and dead or moved on by now, but I will treat the wood with woodworm killer just to be sure.

Zither history

Some zither history on the Ancient Music website from John McCrady in Texas, USA:

http://www.johnmccrady.com/level3-zitherhist.html

"Arpista" zither at Germanisches Nationalmuseum

I found the zither on the website of the Germanisches Nationalmuseum:

http://www.mimo-db.eu/MIMO/infodoc/ged/view.aspx?eid=OAI_GNM_DE_859042

It was made around 1930. If my zither is from the same year, that would make it 82 years old!

Strings and tuning

There are two groups of strings on the zither:

Chords

20 strings: 5 chords of 3 strings, with an additional bass string at each chord

• chord '5' (A chord): E - A - C# - A
• chord '4' (D chord): D - A - F# - D
• chord '3' (F chord): F - C - A - F
• chord '2' (G chord): D - B - G - G
• chord '1' (C chord): E - C - G - C

The strings made me think of the (open) strings on a cello: A-D-G-C (fiths intervals). But there is an additional F string/chord, a minor third from the D.

Melody

21 strings:
C - C# - D - E - F - F# - G - G# - A - B - C - C# - D - E - F - F# - G - G# - A - B - C

Each octave has 10 strings: the D# and A# are not there. This made me wonder if this instrument has some kind of strange tuning:

• Chromatic would have been 12 strings (the same as on a piano)
• Diatonic would have been 7 strings (only the "white notes" on a piano).

I am still searching for this 10-string scale. For now I assume that the D# and A# are left out because they are not part of the chords on the left. But then it is strange that the G# is there on the melody section (and not in the chord section)...

Zither pages

Some websites about zithers:

• 'Zither' on English Wikipedia 
• 'Guitar zither' on English Wikipedia
• 'Citer' on Dutch Wikipedia
• 'Zither' on German Wikipedia
• FretlessZithers.com
• Zither US
• The Guitar-Zither Clearinghouse
• ATLAS of Plucked Instruments

How it all started

This zither has been in my familie for quite some time. My aunt bought it at a flea market and later gave it to my sister. The last 24 years, it was stored in the garden shed at my parents house. Last month I decided to take it with me to clean and tune it. What started as a fun project, quickly became an addiction. :-)

Here is some information about the zither:

• Arpista Concert Guitarr-Zither, made in Germany
• fretless, 5 chords
• 41 strings (20 on the chord section, 21 on the melody section)