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During theBaroque period, it was common practice to tune the viola damore in the key of the individual piece. Joseph Maier listed 16 different tunings for viola damore in his 1732 treatiseMuseum musicum.Vivaldi used the tunings of D major, d minor, A major, a minor and F major in his eight concerti for viola damore. By the end of the 18th century, the tuning settled into one tonality, which is the one that is used today and most often for classical, romantic and contemporary pieces. That tuning, from the lowest seventh string up to the top first string, is:

A - d - a - d - f# - a - d"

The bulk of viola damore music during the 18th century was written in scordatura notation, a system by which a violinist could more easily play on a viola damore with different tunings other thanthe standard tuning of a stringed instrument tuned in fifths. The top four strings of the viola damore could be tuned to different possible pitches but the written notation would use the open g, d, a, and e strings of the violin for those pitches, so that if the top string were tuned to d", the written note was an e"and it would sound d". For the lower 3 strings, it was common to have those written in the bass clef, but sounding an octave higher.This system made it feasible for one not used to scordatura tuning to play more easily on the viola damore. On the other hand, some composers, such as J.S. Bach and Christoph Graupner did not use scordatura notation at all and so the written notes were those actuallythat weresounded.