Which wood?

[jetz320]

The question is the message. Also, can you use Zitan wood for an erhu? Will that work and what's the sound like?!

[YouLanFengChune]

Zitarn is BEST wood for erhu, but there are as many as 40 speicies in the family.

They are catergorized into Broad leaved ones and Small-leaved ones.

Small leaved ones, with the best choiciest from India (density 1.15, SiO2 content >13.9%) makes erhu sounding sweet, strong and clear. It is superb for playing modern technical pieces. Problem is, The wood is so hared to get, money doesn't move the sellers so much. I used entire rolls of snake skin to trade with Master-makers like Hu Han Rou, Lv Weikang and such master makers, whose intruments costs bombs internationally.

Some small leaved ones come from Zimbabwe and they sound good, though they have a lower SiO2 content. Not as highly sought after, and more stock in hand.

Broad Leaved ones have lower density. They are usually strong in sound, clear and its sweetness is definite. The only drawback is its lack oif Golden Grains unique to the Indian small leaved ones. It is also in slightly greater quantity.

[Si]

What is zitan in English?

[sanmenxia]

I've seen zitan translated as sandalwood or red/purple sandalwood. The problem is common names (both English and Chinese) for woods aren't consistant, the same name might be used for unrelated trees. Eg red sandalwood and white sandalwood are different unrelated trees, but red sandalwood and padauk belong to the same familiy. On the cadenza site there's "ebony zitan (dalbergia)" but when I looked up "dalbergia", it said it's the species that includes rosewood.

I've always wondered what is actually "hongmu" (lit. red wood).

Mu guess is that in non-technical usage, zitan could be any heavy purplish wood and similarly hongmu could be any heavy reddish wood. Has anyone got more info?

[YouLanFengChune]

Dalbergia is a blackish wood. In Chinese known as HEITAN (African Blackwood or Mpingo (Dalbergia melanoxylon))

Zitan belongs to Paduak Family. Andaman padauk is Pterocarpus dalbergioides

[YouLanFengChune]

Rosewood we commonly use for Aged Rosewood is Suanzhi
Dalbergin bariensis Pierre

[Charlie Huang]

Similar problems with wutong, shanmu and nanmu for guqin materials. Wutong is often translated as 'Chinese paulownia' yet there are so many spieces used under that heading that it confuses me as what is truly wutong that is the best for qin making. Shanmu is 'Chinese fir' but it really isn't fir; nanmu is god knows what (I think CCN translated it as red sandalwood)... At least we know that zimu is defo catalpa.

[carol]

I've always translated shanmu as spruce. I don't know if it's correct. A wood expert told me it's spruce by looking at its grains.

[Charlie Huang]

That maybe the 'proper' English name for it, who knows. Maybe something to find out when I do my PhD.

[sanmenxia]

Youlan, thanks for the info.
I've also come across "wumu" lit. black wood, which I don't know whether it means any black/blackisk wood or a specific wood (ebony?), maybe it's similar to "ebony", it could mean actual ebony or more loosely, any black wood.
I've got an erhu with "lao hong mu" (lit. old red wood) on a sticker on the base, is this another word for "aged rosewood "? What's the difference between hongmu and suanzhi?

[YouLanFengChune]

glad u're online. Send me your msn if possible..

wumu, usually ebony, from Burma. Density under 0.90 and is good for mellow erhus. Tends to shrink with time. Hence, not recommended for drier climates.

The term Lao Hong Mu is misleading. Most in China are not real laohongmu, except they look aged, and is deep black in colour. Usually the wood species is suanzhi. In Cadenza, we oversaw the cutting down of wood beams in southern china from mountain houses. In fact, we were part of a program to pay for the "re-furbishing" of houses for the mountain people. They needed to fix their hpouses, retatch roofs. Hence, we did both, and bought the wooded beams and columns, for erhu. hence i called them LAO HONG MU.

[YouLanFengChune]

Hi!

I have a story to share. This came from my distributor in Tainan, Taiwan. They tested the HEITAN (i called it ebony sandalwood, or Dalkbergia) erhus and discovered that by decibels and by comparison, heitan, when made the Cadenza Way, was so much louder and cleaner than erhus bought in SHanghai for 5 times our price. I was shocked, and so were they. I am working on my Heitan now to develop a child friendly version. Apparently, only thhose who are strong enough are able to play a heitan properly. A good player with my heitan was said to be able to ensure perfect sound penetration as a concerto soloist within an orchestra of blaring performers.

We have improved in leaps and bounds over this year. Thanks for the great support!!

[damien]

Hi...I found an Erhu made of Padauk wood with great looking snake skin. This is what wikipedia had to say about this kind of wood -

Padauk (or padouk) is a name for any of a group of timbers from the pantropical genus Pterocarpus. Not all wood from Pterocarpus-species qualifies as a padauk, some species don't yield timber at all, some yield a non-padauk wood. All padauks are of Asian or African origin. Padauks are valued for their toughness, stability in use, and decorativeness, most having a reddish wood.

The padauk found most often in the trade is African padauk from Pterocarpus soyauxii which, when freshly cut, is a very bright red but when exposed to sunlight fades over time to a warm brown. Its color makes it a favorite among woodworkers. Burmese padauk is Pterocarpus macrocarpus while Andaman padauk is Pterocarpus dalbergioides. Padauks can be confused with rosewoods with whom they are somewhat related but as a general rule padauks are coarser and are somewhat less decorative in figure.


What I want to know of course is, does Padauk wood go well in the construction of Erhu?
One guy that's not on this forum did say that it is one of, if not the best for Erhu.