Reply To: Silver Strings
It seems that silver is valid choice for string intruments, most commonly as the winding around a core material. The article I read wasn’t too clear about the difference it makes to sound, except for “silver winding … is thinner for the weight, and this is why solid-silver winding gives a slightly brighter sound.” Wikipedia adds the vague statement “Some violin E strings are gold-plated in order to improve the tone quality.”
I infer that different materials have different tonal qualities, affecting “brightness” vs. “warmth”. Certainly I don’t know enough about either strings or metals to make any predictions about what would sound better.
For reference, the article about historical string instruments and the Wikipedia article on strings.
ETA: Apparently someone did a double-blind study to test the acoustical worth of a platinum flute. Result: not much.