O.K. kimo,
Here’s a totally,
totally unbiased view on the best way to go.
First, get a Southcoast Baritone Ukulele. This is not the Baritone made to be Little Johnny’s Junior Guitar, but the one built like an ukulele – light construction, light bracing, etc. Actually, it’s built pretty much like a Cuatro, so you could get one of those as well. Just the same, you’d be safer with the Southcoast. There are Ukuleles masking as Cuatros and too many Cuatros are badly made (not all, of course, by any means). But on top of that, as Cuatro playing is mostly about serious heavy strumming, the action is often pretty high compared to an ukulele.
The reason I make this suggestion is that the Renaissance Guitar was not much bigger than a Baritone Ukulele. When it had 4 strings, the tuning was actually linear G, like a Baritone. Back then, strings were gut – maybe loaded gut for the low notes, and I think both construction technique and string technology have changed the game a bit since then.
The Cuatro is acknowledged to be the most direct descendant of the Renaissance Guitar. It predates the Ukulele by around 400 years. To me the present day low re-entrant Cuatro tuning gives a sound very appropriate to Renaissance works. Chording is the same as with an ukulele (the old “standard ukulele” key of D tuning), although picking will be different since with a Cuatro set-up, you have both a low 4th & a low 1st string.
If you just want to try it out, you can always give it a whirl on a regular Baritone. Those are overbuilt for that sort of stringing, but just the same, they’ll likely sound better with Cuatro strings than Baritone strings, as the range of notes in a Cuatro set-up is a better fit for a Baritone sized body.
For strings, get the Southcoast Cuatro String set. It’s a better performing string set than you could get in Venezuela (I told you there was no bias here). If you get both the Southcoast Baritone and put the Southcoast Cuatro strings on it, as soon as you string it up, you’ll sound exactly like the Venezuelan maestro Leonardo Lozano (or maybe even better). I set up a download from his “Cuatro en Musica Renesantista” here:
http://www.southcoastukes.com/sound/02BranledeBourgogne.mp3
The album was issued in Japan and is now out of print. Drop me an e-mail if you’d like to hear more. Good luck on the wonderful music you’re learning, and Happy New Year!