Thanks for the input! I wish it were that easy. I usually leave my mandolin in the recording room overnight to acclimate it before I show up. Then, between the warmup and the many takes, I usually spend about 90 minutes trying to record. The A strings still go significantly (2-4 Hz) sharp within 30 seconds of starting to play again, even at the end of the recording session. A humidity change would likely be asymptotic, eventually slowly leveling out, and would take a bit to take effect between tunings. I'm pretty sure it has more to do with the fact that the nut is 18 years since its last refresh, and my "flat-to-sharp" tuning method (the standard method, especially for violinists) leaves some tension "stuck" behind the nut that ends up releasing once I start playing. I was super careful last string change a month or so ago to clean and re-graphite the grooves, but the problem remains. These last couple months have been the only time in the last ~20 years of playing this mandolin that I've had the issue.
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