Oud later), tuned in successive fourths. Curt Sachs said they were called (from lowest to highest pitch) "bamm", "maṭlaṭ", "maṭnā" and "zīr". "As early as the ninth century" a fifth string "ḥād" ("sharp") was sometimes added "to make the range of two octaves complete". It was highest in pitch, placed lowest in its positioning in relation to other strings. Modern tuning preserves the ancient succession of fourths, with adjunctions (lowest or highest courses) which may be tuned differently following regional or personal preferences. Sachs gives one tuning for this arrangement of five pairs of strings, d, e, a, d', g'. Historical
Violin Concerto No. 1 (Paganini) orchestra compared to the solo violin, because the orchestral string section plays less frequently on open strings, with the result that the solo violin part emerges more clearly and brightly from the orchestral accompaniment. Contemporary audiences did not realise that Paganini had retuned his instrument, and were thus all the more amazed at what he appeared able to play. (The more musically adept members of the audience would have recognised the distinctive sound of a violin's open string, and would have observed that this fell on the keynote of work (E-flat), and would have therefore realised that Paganini had re-tuned