still listening to this one.

Following up on my previous post, I actually did take the Bar Violin and tuned it from GDAE down to DDAD. Nothing magical happened, viz.

1. It sounds crappy. No surprise there: a string's size and composition vary depending on what pitch you want it to sound good at (and what your instrument will tolerate without breaking).
2. "Midnight On the Water" doesn't sound that much better (the low D in particular is just a drone), and I still can't play "Bonaparte's Retreat."

They can, though:

I can play backup on the slow one. It's a process.