Well, I am glad that Leah and Jeri have their banjo tuning questions answered, I guess Don and I just have to shoot out the "gender-keys" thing together now. I suspect that we are really not disagreeing fundamentally, ie I know there are no intrinsically "feminine" keys or "masculine" keys.

But for any particular song the average male voice will be happy singing it in one key, and my experience (not from any academic research, just from a fairly wide-ranging experience as an accompanist) is that the average female voice is happier singing it a fifth higher. That's all I'm trying to say.

I accept that formal voice training may extend the range of both male and female so that such preferences disappear, and that there are naturally gifted vocalists with huge ranges to whom it doesn't apply, but for the average Joe (and Jessie) I believe my statement holds true.

btw, definition of average Joe is a man whose top comfortable note is D, and average Jessie's top comfortable note is A. Again, just personal conclusions from my experience over many years of hearing ordinary people singing folk songs.

Murray