Thanks for the info Jack. Strange the Kung Folklora should be so poor as many of their other instruments are very good. I have Kung Baroque descant and Treble recorders and am very pleased with them. They are on the soft side, but speak well throughout the range, have good tone and make excellent consort instruments, their soft tone allowing them to blend into the group. I know a number of people who have Kung basses and are very pleased with them.

Your Ab recorder would also suit a lot of James Hill's tunes played in the original key. The Northumbrians often transpose them to G to suit the pipes.

Daylia,

I think you have missed the point I was trying to make. The adjustments I was talking about were not semitones but very small adjustments of a few cents - a matter of adjusting breath pressure to bring the third into tune with the tonic and fifth in such a way as to eliminate the beats. This involves playing a major third fractionally flatter than the "natural" tuning of the instrument and a minor third fractionally sharper. I was surmising that players in string quartets do the equivalent making small adjustments with the fingers of the left hand to bring the chord fully into tune.

BTW, In the case of the recorder group, We are also working from parts with the key signature written in.