Forum Activity for @strumelia

Yeah, there is some serious stay-at-home action going on everywhere now.

My husband and i are now planning every meal with much forethought and care.  It's really making us appreciate and savor every egg, apple, quart of milk, or fresh banana that we still have. After all the fresh perishable stuff is gone, we'll be digging into dried, frozen, and canned stuff, but that can taste good too.  Made rice and beans on tortillas tonight, with some pan-seared raddichio tucked in.

We take a brisk 1.5 mile walk around the mostly empty county fairgrounds several times a week- it's pleasant and is only a half mile from our house and is open to the public. It's got lots of paved asphalt paths and loops. Only a few scattered people are there at any given time, walking their dogs or with baby strollers or jogging. 

It's such a strange thing to look at a practically empty calendar devoid of 'running out' for various errands, shopping, appointments, or meetings. 

Stay well dulcimer friends! 

Greetings Don, and welcome to the site.   :)

Over the years, there have been a few groups dedicated to players in states that don't have a whole lot of dulcimer players who are active on the internet. After a couple years of no activity whatsoever in some groups, I sometimes delete them. That's in order to make the main Group list a little easier for people to visually sort through.
I'm thinking that a group specific to NH is not going to have much activity (I say this from prior  experience). I'd suggest that you join our NorthEastern US regional Group:
https://fotmd.com/strumelia/group/2/northeastern-us-dulcimer-players
and start some posts or discussions there if you like.
Or perhaps better yet, simply join groups that have subjects you are interested in about playing styles or types of dulcimers (fingerpicking, stick dulcimers, dulcimer traditions, modern playing styles, dulcimer building, etc). There are groups that focus on all kinds of great dulcimer interests!

Thanks Don, and I hope you'll enjoy it here. 

@silverstrings, that is inspiring about your hand stretching more over time!  I imagine others will have renewed hope after reading your story.  :)

There's yet another factor helping people with small hands who practice or play often-  I don't think most folks think about how our hands get more nimble with more playing.  New music makers move the hands stiffly or somewhat awkwardly of course, and they also simply think too much before each note. With time our hands learn how to more swiftly and gracefully move, jump, or slide from fret to fret or string to string. We learn how to hammer on, slide a bit, or lift off the string.. all of which facilitate smooth moving along the melody of a tune without needing to purposefully stretch quite as much.  So even if your hands don't stretch very much, it will get easier with time and patience.

@pmundy , what a lovely and uplifting post and so well expressed about your journey in the joy of music.  Thank you! 

Yeah Ken, it stinks when someone implies in an opinionated way that other ways of playing, methods, or instruments other players use are less valid.   I agree!
That includes dissing: chord playing, noter playing, diatonic frets, chromatic frets, using tab, DAA tuning, DAd tuning, calling people 'sheep', disparaging teaching or group practices, playing jazz or playing hymns, whether someone's instrument is what we consider a 'dulcimer', and in fact includes the entire concept of either traditional or non-traditional being somehow more valid. 

Instead of putting down other people's enjoyment of their preferred way of playing their music, we should all lift up and share our joy in how we can play something, sheesh anything , to begin with!  It's such a privilege that we humans can produce sweet notes that are something we call music. We should be trying to help people achieve their goals in simply playing personal music in a way that makes them happy, helping them solve their problems. We should strive to be encouraging rather than boastful or patronizing, while always, always being respectful that there is more than just our own preference or opinion. We can share the joy of our own ways of playing music without putting others' methods down.

I have to say I think this whole concept of "dulcimer police" is very tired and negative. It may have had its use in the past, but it's time to retire it already. IMHO, perpetuating the idea that other people are being 'police' is in reality just another way to continue dissing others and keep alive an "us vs. them" mindset while boosting our own legitimacy.  To set a good example and actually make a real difference, let's look closer to home and examine our own selves before we push the same old ideas about other people being villains. 

My positive things today:

My husband was finally able to get his pneumonia vaccine...yay!

We had a yummy tortilla dinner by candlelight in the kitchen.

Vacuumed the whole house! ...and now (for a little while at least) it'll feel so nice to walk around the house barefoot. 

Ah, the little things in life can be so nice.

Soups are like the most nutritious and comforting meal we can have during these stressful times.

I didn't make soup today, but we're just about to make some smoked salmon w/egg in soft tortillas, with our own home-canned tomatillo green sauce!    Followed by maybe watching a movie in bed.  A little slice of humble Heaven.

Yeah, any instrument that makes you feel happy when playing it is just plain GOOD.  :)

(Cynthia I would love to hear more of you on your kantele- I loved what you posted a while back... so full of feeling and so ...from a Different time and place.)

There are many more gourd banjo makers now than there were ten years ago.  You can actually get a decent playable one for $300 or less.  Gourd banjers are less expensive than regular banjos in general. 

Bess, for that tune (from an old WV Hammons family recording) I was playing in clawhammer style. Other times I play in minstrel style and tuning.  Even though the two styles have a lot in common and can look like the same thing to an observer, I do find the actual physical playing styles of clawhammer and minstrel banjo to be different in significant ways other than simply because they use different tunings.  It took me a few years to actually notice that there were these differences.  To this day it takes me a minute or so to mentally/physically adjust when I switch back and forth between those two styles of playing.  There are always some moments of "Uh, what the heck are my fingers supposed to be doing, again?"... lolol.

I do suggest that a beginner decide which of the two styles to concentrate on for a while, rather than jumping back and forth between clawhammer style/tunings, and minstrel style/tunings.  Mixing the two up could be problematic unless you've had at least a year or two of playing one style before exploring the other style.  It's possible to learn both styles at the same time as a beginner of course, but the result would very likely be a hybrid style, so you have to decide on what your personal goal is.

If you mostly just play alone at home or with family you can play however you like without worrying about styles at all.  But if you plan to play with other folks that seriously play one of those styles and not the other, it might not be the best idea to jump into their established jamming group and start playing their customary repertoire in a hybrid style.   ;)   Playing in groups means we try to blend harmoniously and enhance what the group likes to do, rather than sticking out and possibly disrupting what they like to do. 

Some banjos are loud and beautiful, others can sound mellow and beautiful.  I have quite a few banjos.  My most mellow sounding banjo is my lovely gourd banjo with nylon strings:

Don you wrote me about this a week ago or so, and I responded, but never heard back from you. Can you tell us an example of a particular group you belong to that you have this issue with?  At least then I can check that you already belong to the group, and start from there in helping you.

Also, as I asked you prior:  when you have this issue of not being able to access a group you are a member of... are you sure you are LOGGED IN on the site when you try to access the group?  I ask this because any person who is online looking at fotmd.com would be able to see the site and many of the site pages... but they would not be able to see the content of groups unless they were logged into the site.  If you see your NAME in the top right hand link bar, then you are logged IN.  You should check that because what you describe sounds like that may be what's going on.  To see the contents of any Group you are a member of, you need to be LOGGED IN to the site.

Hobbyhorse... great job!  I like that you were inspired by my epinette built for me by Michael King. 

Another way to think about it is-  in the days before there were smart phones or tablets, everyone used to read newsgroups and forums on their desktop computer monitors. Once tablets and smart phones came along, every post or two took up an entire phone screen, and people really began to hate having to scroll through endless screens of their tiny phone screen to get to today's posts in a discussion they were following. People don't like having to scroll through a whole long discussion from start to finish every time there was a new post in it. That's really the reason why so many sites today make sure the most recent posts are first/top and older posts are below them in that order.

Some online forums are still set up the 'traditional' way. When everyone was doing their online reading on large monitors, it made sense to have threads read from start to finish in original order, like a book. Many of us got used to that and it's not always easy to switch back and forth when you follow various sites. But nowadays people mostly prefer to view the latest posts when they check in to see what's new in their favorite discussions. 
I'm sorry that it can't be changed as an individual viewer preference... that's sometimes possible with simple PHP forum sites, but I'm afraid it's not possible on this network platform.

For clarity's sake, a few things should be noted:
At the time everythingdulcimer closed, Bruce Ford its creator announced he was shutting the site down and deleting the forums rather than choosing to hand it all over to new owners. He had his valid reasons. It was indeed a sad day for so many of us when Bruce's site closed.
The person starting this new site has posted the "About" information that they purchased the everythingdulcimer .com domain in an online auction once it was no longer owned by the original everythingdulcimer owner/creator (i.e. Bruce no longer wanted to keep paying for the domain, and let go of his ownership of the domain name). Unpaid domains typically are made available to anyone interested in buying them. Often they just become advertisement click sites that can have nothing (or something) to do with the original domain's subject matter.  That's just how the internet works.

This new person decided to use the everythingdulcimer domain name and to call their new dulcimer site everythingdulcimer, the same name Bruce Ford created for his site.  They seem to indicate they will also be adding the tabs from Bruce's old everythingdulcimer site, which Bruce kindly made available for download to anyone needing tabs.  As the new ED site owner makes clear in their About section, this new site is not affiliated with Bruce Ford or his old everythingdulcimer site .  Originally, they began a site they called DulcimerJam, but they've now switched to using the name EverythingDulcimer instead.

We wish them well! ... after all who doesn't like as many dulcimer related websites as possible? 
The Everythingdulcimer Facebook page is another existing venue enjoyed by many, which is not connected to this new everythingdulcimer site.
It can get confusing, but there are now four sites to keep distinct in our minds when it comes to "everythingdulcimer" (for those like me who like to keep track of such things, lol):  The original website created and owned by Bruce Ford, now gone.... the Everythingdulcimer Facebook page which was created as an offshoot of the original site for people who like FB, still active.... the DulcimerTab .com site which offers all the old ED site's TAB in addition to adding new tabs over time plus the Teachers and Events section like ED used to have.... and now this new 'everythingdulcimer' site as well. I'm sure the new site will grow quickly, particularly because of the familiar and long respected name and domain.

I do think it'd be good if the new site's owner would actually identify themselves a little more... I like it when sites do that. 

I'm Strumelia, I'm located in New York state. I started playing the dulcimer about 22 years ago and was an active member of Bruce Ford's everythingdulcimer site for about fifteen years, also the "SweetMusic Digest" before that. I started Friends of the Mountain Dulcimer ( FOTMD.com ) ten years ago and I run it with the help of several dedicated volunteer moderators who are very generous with their time and assistance on the site.  You can contact me directly anytime by email at the link at the bottom of every page here.  I'll respond right away with site help if you need it.  I wish I could give my real full name here, but alas I must discourage stalking incidents ...because Internet.  So I generally just go by 'Strumelia' here on FOTMD. 

Best wishes to the new mountain/hammered dulcimer site!

McSpaddens are known to be well made and are very reputable.  Also, you can contact the company if you ever need assistance or have questions.

Dusty and Robin are both correct on how to add videos.  :D  I'll also add this:  videos added to the main Video section that we host here (by adding them from your profile page using the + button) must be non-copyright material and must feature yourself playing or singing etc.  Videos added to your discussion post as part of a discussion can be of any video, it's just linked/embedded as part of a discussion and is not part of FOTMD's video or audio collection. 

Hi there Marc, and welcome!

To answer your question- yes any videos or audios of the playing of non-public domain tunes/songs must be added to posts in the Rockin Free World group.  That is to keep our site's Video and Audio collections free of copyrighted materials that are part of our hosted collections.  Doesn't matter if you arranged the version or not in this case. 
(And of course if you composed your own material you can post it even if you copyrighted it..you own the copyright.)

Hope you enjoy it here.. 

Having all strings in tune when open but all sounding sharp when fretted... in this case with the photos I think it's fairly obvious that two factors are causing this-  the action is too high (causing the strings to overbend and pull sharp when fretted), and the nut (and maybe bridge too) is leaning in towards the center (causing the scale to be artificially shorter while the frets remain in the same place, causing sharp fretting).  The pix show poorly fitted nut and bridge that were put in later, perhaps the originals had their slots altered too much and messed up. The dulcimer is a Berg and thus highly unlikely to have its frets in the wrong position. 
This dulcimer deserves to have a nice well fitted new nut and bridge.  And of course lovely new strings once that's done.  :)

@geezer , I agree with what Brian G advised.  With your experience, there really is little need for you to be looking for tab books.  Though dulcimers are not tuned to the same intervals as guitars, thus you'd have to learn different fingerings and chords than you use on your guitar.  But you should be able to figure out lots of contemporary tunes you already are familiar with, on your own.

If you read sheet music, you can skip looking for dulcimer tabs books and instead do google image searches for tunes you want to play.  Keep in mind that if a tune is contemporary, it will more likely be under copyright and this limits your ability to get copies of it for free and/or online... whether it's dulcimer tab, standard sheet music, guitar tab, etc.

@Gennaro - there are skilled dulcimer players around who play complex modern music, blues, baroque music, etc on their dulcimers, and they do it beautifully.  But do keep in mind that mountain dulcimers were created in the 1800s in imitation of yet older European folk instruments that were used by 'common folk' to play relatively simple folk tunes and hymns... hence the diatonic fretboard and traditional basic tunings using the tonic note and a fifth for the most part (DAd, DAA).  It's a little more challenging to play modern or complex music on a diatonic dulcimer than it is to play such music on a chromatic six string guitar.  Some people who play various types of instruments will have different repertoires that they choose for a particular instrument, based on what that instrument is best at doing. There are no actual limits, but know that some things can be easier or more challenging!
If you play other instruments as well, you have a general musical jump start and advantage.  But, you won't be able to play the same fingerings/chords you are used to between dulcimer and guitar or banjo.

You can try a thicker pick to soften that pick clicking noise.  Or you can try angling the pick differently.
Some people (myself included) actually like that pick clicking/percussion effect and use it as part of our personal playing sound.  One person's "bad habit" may be another person's 'bonus effect'! 

Your brief "deer moment" just made it all the more appealing, because we can all so easily relate to moments like that in our daily lives.     

I watched your performance Sandi (and some parts of the service as well) at
https://livestream.com/accounts/6164779/events/8950700/videos/200482706

- Sandi's group starts playing at the 18 min 30 second mark BTW... if you want to get right to the dulcimer music  ;)

I have to say that was a BEAUTIFUL song, and just beautifully played by everyone in turn in your group.  Truly delightful and full of joy!  The melody of that song is especially lovely, the way it dips down sometimes.  What is that song/hymn called?  It's wonderful and you guys ALL did a fantastic job.  It's also great how your sweet little Feather dulcimer sings out bright and clear like a little bird.

Another good consequence from recording yourself is not only to do it in order to LISTEN to how you are sounding, but in a video (made for your own use only) it's helpful to SEE how you are playing.  It's surprising how one can see certain bad playing habits we didn't know we had.  Stuff like maybe too much arm motion, poor posture, bad finger fretting position, facial grimacing, stiff shoulders... all things we might not be aware of until we SEE ourselves doing it in a video. 

@susie , I do that as well!  (try to end whenever I play or practice on a good note... or maybe even a few good notes if I can!) 

(I've removed a member using a fake account with ill intentions.
Sorry for the interruption in this perfectly nice and useful thread. Carry on everyone, thanks!) 

Awesome!  Yeah that Dusty Turtle is a real pip. 

That's cool, Ken.  But some folks find their playing improves when they 'practice' in some manner. And if they're struggling with their playing and don't practice to improve it, then that's no fun either... it's more just frustrating.  Maybe their playing is not 'fun' to them in that case. Some types of practice just are fun for people, or at least interesting and challenging.

I don't do formal practice either- I tend to think of my playing as practice. But for many people, their normal playing can repeat poor techniques or playing habits, whereas a structured practice or exercise can help them correct poor playing habits and improve techniques. If your playing does not improve on its own over time and doesn't make you happy just as it is, then practice or exercises can help!

Here's a fairly comprehensive (though by no means complete) list of banjo tunings:

http://zeppmusic.com/banjo/aktuning.htm

It includes such tunings as dADAD, aADAD, aDAAD, aDADF#, and others. (in written banjo tunings, the first lower case letter is the short drone string)

The real question however is what you want to do by tuning a banjo to D and A notes.  What we think of as "dulcimer tunings" are really just notes. Usually a tuning is used to achieve a specific purpose.  It enables us to play a tune more easily, or to play it in a certain way or with certain fingering positions.

You haven't told us what your situation or your goals are, so I'm making assumptions here-  As a longtime player of both mtn dulcimers and banjos (and I'm really more a banjo player than dulcimer player), my personal advice would be this-  play your dulcimer like a dulcimer. If you want your dulcimer to have a tone like a banjo, get a dulcimer with a banjo head on it.  Learn to play and (initially) tune your banjo as a banjo, rather than trying to make it imitate a dulcimer.  Banjos are designed to be played most easily like banjos, and learning to play a 5string oldtime banjo is not all that hard, after getting past the first little learning hump of unfamiliar right hand motions. IMHO if you're tuning a banjo like a dulcimer in order to try to make it easier to learn to play (if you're a dulcimer player), you are doing yourself no favors.  It might make the first week or two seem easier, but it will make playing the banjo harder and way more limited later on, plus most banjo learning material will then be useless to you as well. 
If I've made incorrect assumptions, then forget all this.  lolol! 

Banjos have five strings, including a short drone string.  Oldtime banjos can be tuned to over a hundred different tunings, in many many combinations.  Some of those combinations can include strings tuned to D and A and yes also DAd and include other notes on other strings, like gDAda. Keep in mind that our familiar DAd or DAA dulcimer tunings are nothing more than a tonic note with a fifth... and "tonic + 5th" notes appear in the tunings of all kinds of other instruments as well, since it's a common musical interval to use.

Banjos have lots and lots of tunings.  The reason people tune banjos in different tunings is usually in order to play certain tunes or certain 'families of tunes' more easily.  Since it can be hard to remember so many tunings by naming all the tuning's notes, some banjo tunings are conveniently referred to by a song name associated with it... such as "Sandy River Belle tuning", "Little Birdie tuning", or "Reuben's Train tuning".

Hobbyhorse, that rebec looks wonderful!  What is the scale length you settled on?  Did you make a 'tenor' sized one?

You are very talented.  I like the looks of your crwth as well.  Do you bow the crwth?

I think when we make a big move from one operating system to another (or just apply a major update), it's inevitable that some programs will not function as we're used to, or not at all. Most programs have substitutes that will work nicely for what we need to do, and of course they run the gamut from totally free to shareware to subscription to one-time outright purchase. It's good to do some online searching and read reviews of programs one is thinking about trying out.

I have not yet retired and all my daily work is done on my home office computer. I recently moved most of my daily computing from my older 'workhorse' win7 desktop tower to a new win10 laptop.  In the process I decided to leave behind certain 'old reliable' programs I depended on for years, and start fresh with different ones.  Yes it meant days (weeks?) of methodical online reading and research, but by putting in that initial effort I've saved many hundreds of dollars.  It forced me to update my knowledge about managing my computer setups better and how things actually function. A refresher course of sorts. I was also very happy to avoid today's overpriced software subscriptions, even if it meant a learning curve on new programs.
I hate spending so much time scouring the web for software and hardware info in advance, but now it's starting to pay off - I feel like I have a handle on things... at least for a few years until it needs doing all over again.  I guess once i retire I can get a bit lazier about updating my system. 

One other point Melanie-  there's no law separating chord style completely from drone style playing.  Lots of tunes that are played in DAd tuning utilize playing the melody almost all on the melody string, with an occasional chord thrown in. So while doing that you are also developing some of the skills and understanding needed for noter drone playing anyhow.
And when you strum in drone style you may not realize it but you are sometimes producing 'chords' without fretting them, on the open drones strings.
Like I said, there are many ways to build on your skillset... so no need to get too apprehensive about learning lots of different things.  Much learning and understand just comes naturally as you play more, no matter what style you are currently playing in.   :)

Melanie, everyone has to start somewhere. It's almost impossible to learn all methods and styles and tunings at the same time. But i also kinda hear that you are fearful of making the 'wrong' decision on what stuff to learn. I just want to say that it's perfectly ok to pick one kind of way of playing to try out for a while, and then to explore other ways of playing later on.

What you learn at first will not be set in stone.  In fact anything you learn in one method will actually help you understand things when you later try out a different playing style or approach. That's because in music, our knowledge base builds on what we have learned so far, it accumulates... so rather than thinking you'll have to UNlearn your prior stuff if you decide to explore a different playing style later, I think you'll find that learning new stuff comes more easily with time.  Hopefully, knowing that can help you relax a little about making decisions about playing styles, tunings, and techniques you are thinking about trying out.  It also makes sense to focus on one style or method at a time, rather than thinking you have to learn everything simultaneously... such as leanring the chords for Dad and DAA and DAC tunings all at the same time... No need to learn them all at the same time- pick your favorite tuning and stick with it until you get a hankering to try another!  :)

Where are you located?

Robin, i love it!  So fun and resourceful. 

Dusty that soup sounds wonderful.  I make something a little like it, sort of with root veggies in the winter- golden beets is my fave to add in, and I make the base chicken brith.  But i do have miso in a jar in the fridge- and you've inspired me to pull it out and make some up soon!  I also made some udon noodles in chicken bouillion a few days ago- but I forgot I had the miso paste and will use that next time!  I read that miso paste is fermented and keeps well for years or indefinitely in the fridge if you don't introduce other stuff in the jar.  My refrigerated miso paste still looks, smells, and tastes great after 3 years now.     They actually found honey in 2,000 year old Egyptian tomb jars.. that was perfectly edible!  Also much older edible wooley mammoth meat in the frozen tundra.   !!

Such sweet looking fur friends, all! 

RobinT... you got another doggie?   Do post a pic here soon if you can!

Our three kitties are doing fine lately- they all happen to be in their prime and healthy (knock on wood).  The only downside of that is that they'll all get old at the same time... might wind up being difficult for us!

If your dulcimer is a standard size with a scale length of 25-29", it's unlikely you could tune a thin string way up to the "a" above the usual high d.  Once you use a .007 or thinner string, and tune it up to such a high note on the standard size scale, that very thin string will almost certainly break under the tension. There's only so far you can go with the method of using a thinner string to tune higher and a thicker string to tune lower... going too far will mean a string so fat it will be unplayable and thuddy, or a string so thin it will simply break before it reaches the extreme high note.  When you've reached those string gauge extreme limits either way (too low or too high), the next step is to switch to an instrument with a longer scale or a shorter scale, so that you CAN tune to those notes without having to use impossibly heavy or thin strings.

Dusty brings up some good thoughts in his post.  And I too am curious about your goal in tuning this way.   :)

Be sure to look at these two other fun discussions on the use of strikers (also called "fiddlesticks" technique)... they include a video showing use on an epinette, which is like a small mtn dulcimer:

https://fotmd.com/forums/forum/general-mountain-dulcimer-or-music-discussions/4572/fiddlesticks#r4575

https://fotmd.com/forums/forum/general-mountain-dulcimer-or-music-discussions/22623/oh-fiddlesticks

Nice to once again look over this thread of giving thanks.  I feel blessed to be here and privileged to have so many online friends through our shared love of music. I feel a positive connection to you good folk who participate here on FOTMD currently, and to our friends who have been here in the past. 

May you all have a wonderful day tomorrow, hopefully experiencing (or even creating) something meaningful to you.