Forum Activity for @strumelia

I'd like to add a couple of points to this thread:

1) Any time cookies are cleared or removed in your Browser, you will be logged out of most sites, even if you have the 'remember me' box checked.  Once you log in again, a new cookie will be created for making logging in easier.  If you have your browser set to not accept any cookies, then you will be needing to log in every time you visit FOTMD.  Likewise, if you share your computer, the same thing will happen if other users clear browser cookies. Also, the cookie settings on your tablet or phone will be different than the ones on your desktop, so you can't expect the exact same behavior across your devices.

2) This site is set so that if you don't delete your cookies and have the login 'remember me' box checked, then that particular device will keep you logged in for a certain number of days, or perhaps as long as a couple of weeks.  But it's not set to keep you logged in 'forever' (which is a good thing) ...so there will naturally be times every week or two where you WILL need to log in again when you visit.  This is normal. I find that I myself must log in at least once a week, even though i visit several times a day.

The 'remember me' checkbox is convenient, but if cookies are cleared on your browser you will be logged out despite that.  And the 'remember me' setting is only for a certain number of days, not 'forever'.  If you have the remember me checkbox checked and you still have to log in every day, then the suspect cause is likely that your browser cookies are somehow being cleared or not being allowed.

Hope this helps!

As Bridge just hinted at with his 'gut feeling' comment, the problem here could be that you are expecting equal temperament sounds on an older dulcimer that may have been fretted in just temperament.  This would result in an instrument that not only sounds badly intonated when in DAd tuning, but even in DAA tuning when chording it across all strings.

Our member Robin Clark has written extensively over on the ED forums about equal vs. just tempered scales on older dulcimers.  I don't know how much you guys already know or don't know about this subject, but here are a few of Robin's posts on it over on ED (which will sadly shut down at the end of this month):

http://everythingdulcimer.com/discuss/search.php?st=0&sk=t&sd=d&sr=posts&author_id=6698

There are also a lot of great discussions here on FOTMD concerning the equal vs. just temperament factor with older dulcimers:

https://fotmd.com/search/results/all/1/25?search_string=just+temperament

One thing I would say is that many folks wind up thinking their old dulcimer was improperly fretted and they proceed to pull out all the original frets and refret it in equal temperament. This is a disservice to irreplaceable older dulcimers and will immediately and severely devalue them forever (that's assuming they were not actually badly fretted by an inexperienced maker).  If one needs an equal tempered scale due to how one wants to play (intended repertoire, playing style, tunings), one would do far better to simply use a more modern equal-intonated dulcimer.  The old just-intonated dulcimer fret spacings sound sweeeeet when you play noter style in ionian tuning, as they were designed to be played.  

Again, I do NOT know if a just temperament is the cause for the frets being 'out of tune' in this instance, and I don't know anyone's expertise or knowledge level here.  But any time an old dulcimer is involved and thought to be badly fretted, the intended fret scale should be high up on the list of factors.  

I'm hoping Robin Clark will jump in here, since he has done a lot of research and experimentation on the subject.

I've moved this thread to our "Instruments- specific features, luthiers, etc" forum since it will be helpful to others seeking shorter scale/vsl McSpaddens in the future.  I also removed a few posts that were veering into different directions in a non-constructive way.  Thanks, and carry on!  

This is cool.

I did however, move this thread to the "Instruments- luthiers/instruments Forum because it's about a specific maker and the issues effecting the instrument's playability.  

I like Randy's suggestion- so the main rhythm leaders can better keep all together!

If it's this tune:

http://abcnotation.com/tunePage?a=nlfiddlers.org/ABCtunes/Reels/0011

then it's a very old fiddle tune (Scottish maybe?).  A tune , not a song .  Not sure if anyone's written words to it in more modern times, but I've only ever heard it played as a fiddle tune in oldtime festivals.

Hi JP,  Dusty Turtle has answered your questions.  (thanks Dusty!)

A couple additional details I'll add-  

I just created a new discussion outlining the simple steps to add an Audio file (your own Mp3 file, or soundcloud) to this site, see here:

https://fotmd.com/forums/forum/site-questions-how-do-i/32804/how-to-add-an-audio-mp3-or-soundcloud-clip-to-fotmd

A good way to learn your way around here is to click on the links along the top of the navigation bar on every page.  It shows the main areas.  They pertain to what 'everyone' posts.  Another good way is to click on the links you find on your own profile page... they pertain more to content that YOU post.

Do look through the Site Questions forum Dusty linked to.  It contains other threads that have been asked and answered, like: How do I post a Video?

And do look through the Site Rules Dusty linked to as well.  There it explains more answers to your questions, like: What kind of videos are allowed?  Reading the site rules will help you avoid posting something that moderators will remove. 

Lastly, because this thread is all about how to use this site, I'm now going to move it into the Site Questions Forum, so that others will benefit from it as well.   Thanks!  

Lois, I'm not privy to any inside info, but I really believe that Bruce will make sure that *IF* the ED forums shut down, that at least the static content such as articles and Tab will be relocated and available online somewhere "in perpetuity" as he put it.  Bruce has indicated that this is his intention, and we have no reason to doubt it.

Additionally, there seems to be a bunch of people making offers to take over running the ED forums.  We don't know if/how that might work out, but it's another possible outcome.  And it seems yet others are downloading the entire site onto home drives.
I feel we need to patiently wait and see what develops.

Susie, I'm sure the location of the tabs from ED will be well posted by many, no matter how the scenario plays out.  

Again...  Bruce Ford says he will keep ED's Tab files available online for everyone to use, and no need for everyone to download all the Tabs.

You da man Dusty, with yer superpower little jump drive!    

Ken, wasn't that when they were making floppies out of stone tablets?   

Hi Indy!

To post an ad to sell an instrument, first click on link to "Forums" along the top row of site links on any page here.  Then find the For Sale Forum at bottom of the list of forums .  Once there, click the big "+" button to create your new thread.  Be sure to read our guidelines for posting sale ads there.  We do ask that you make a site donation of $5-   if your ad results in a sale for you.   :) 

Hey I remember when 4 GB was considered HUGE... :D
ED is mostly a PHP forum, and text does not typically take up that much in terms of server size. Because of our multimedia content, FOTMD currently uses 23 GB of our 48 GB dedicated server.  If I wanted to put fomtd on a smaller/cheaper 24 GB server, we wouldn't have room for any new members or content, and I'd have to remove a bunch of content and members to allow for normal growth.

I find my idea of my favorite pick changes from year to year.  I have a whole box of favorite picks I've collected over time, and they are not all that similar... It's funny how our own playing preferences can change and evolve!

Don't forget, Bruce did write the following:

"We have some great resources like our tablature, articles and other items not directly associated with a user account that needs a place to live. I’m going to look for options of how best to make these resources available in perpetuity."

Bruce may well be making plans to house the Tabs and articles someplace online himself.

The FOTMD moderators and I are going to be keeping the discussion about ED closing focused in one thread, so people won't get confused by multiple ongoing threads about the same subject.

Please follow Dusty's link below to the active discussion where anyone can post about it.  I'll lock this thread now. 

Thanks for understanding!

Kusani, I was just as surprised as everyone else to find out about this today.  Right now, everybody (myself included) likely needs some time to wrap their heads around it all.  In any case, it's not really my place to insert myself into.

In the meantime, as others have suggested, people should take the time to download whatever Articles they are interested in on ED, and probably also a good idea to just take an hour or three to go through the TAB collection there and download your favorites.  Saving your favorite articles and TABs will go a long way towards feeling a little more grounded.  Lois' reminder is also good, in that most pages on ED will be still somewhat accessible through the internet archive.

Here is where you can get more info:

http://everythingdulcimer.com/discuss/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=34074

and here:

http://everythingdulcimer.com/ed_end_of_life.pdf

I moved this thread to our forum on specific luthiers' instruments, questions, and instrument issues.  

Robin... it's tempting, but no way!

For exotic bowed instruments, I have my jouhikko(tagelharpa), have a little cheap rebec, have my Cretan Lyra, and have a Langspil being currently made.  Spreading myself too thin just results in my being a crappy player on all of them!  I'm having fun ...but I really don't need to add yet another learning curve instrument to the mix.  

Erhu.... another wonderful and exotic instrument that I idly dream of being able to play...  

Thanks for your post, Rick!  

Lorraine, what I mean is, a single $5 donation for any single sale of something for $100 or higher. 

Of course, if someone sells an $800 dulcimer through their FOTMD sale ad, it'd be awfully nice of them to make a donation of perhaps a little more than $5... but that would be up to them, as I only really request a $5 donation per sale.

If you are selling something like a CD or book, which are much less than $100, then I'd ask that you please make a $5 donation once (and if) you had sold $100 worth of them through an ad here.

Update:  In addition to being able to see all your Followers from the "My Followers" TAB on your own profile page, I've also added a LINK in the dropdown menu when you hover over your name at top right of the site (when you are logged in).  There you'll now see a link to Pending Followers followed by the number of any followers that are currently pending your Approval.  It's a quick way to see if someone's waiting.   :)

Hi Cheryl!
To send a message, please read through this thread- it has step by step instructions.  Hope it's clear!

NOTE: the private message system on FOTMD is now independent of the "Follower" system.  Members can now send PMs to any other member, regardless of whether they are 'following' each other.  Yay!

Hi Linda, thanks for your inquiry!

It's surprising how most of the Groups associated with particular states tend to languish.  Some I have actually deleted because of no interest for years, after an initial enthusiasm by a handful of members. Your suggestion was considered by several of the site moderators.

Rather than having a new group created, I suggest that you make a new discussion in the General mtn dulcimer forum, here:

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

(click the plus+ button to start a new thread)

Put 'Maryland' in the title, and ask for others to chime in if they live near you.  You might get a good response, and you can always continue the discussion there as long as you like, if others join in.

Thanks!

You fellas planning on taking sponge baths and sleeping in your cars?  

Yes, that is indeed a Youtube setting in your YT preferences... I have no idea where to find it now but I remember setting my prefs for that in my Youtube settings.

I was just curious- does the Sweet Music Index (dulcimer listserve on majordomo Clearspring) still exist?  Is it still running?
I know Dwain still has some pages about it on his Bearmeadow site, but is the list still alive and running?

Is the Hindman gathering really cancelled?  Have they given a reason?

Sounds like lots of fun Robin.  I hope you inspire some folks to make local music!  

There were many wonderful home musicians, and musical families, in the Appalachias before the time of radio.  Regular people sang while they worked, they sang at the end of the day to unwind, they sang during worship, and in play. Jean was considered unique for sure when she 'burst upon the folk scene' in NYC in the 1940s!  However, there were many others in her time and place who were formidable musicians, particularly traditional singers.  Her own sister Edna came a few years before Jean and was a great singer/dulcimer-accompanist in her own right. These ballad singers were much respected in their communities. As Jean said, it was the songs that led the way among the music she grew up with- she considered herself first and foremost a singer, not a dulcimer player. Jean also played guitar, banjo, and recorder and I don't know what else.. likely some piano because she did some school teaching as well.

Jean described how she was disappointed to later discover that she did not 'invent' her method of singing the melody while playing the harmony... she came to realize it was something other creative music makers did as well.  As a young person she thought she had invented the method for the first time... because she invented it for herself to solve the problem of not hearing the dulcimer when she played and sang the same notes in unison.  Don't we all 'invent' things and marvel at our own genius, only to discover others invented the same thing long ago? 

I strongly believe that some of the more creative music makers within any broader population, no matter what their education or background, will experiment with playing, instrument construction, tunings, songs, strumming patterns, etc.  After all, that's how the 6.5 fret came into favor. Yes for sure musicians can settle into a favored way of doing things, but just because people described them as doing things one way, I always allow that they tried out a few variations at some point...even if it's as minor as trying a different material for a pick.  I know I do such experimenting all the time!  When i stumble into a tune on the banjo where the notes are not easily accessible.. the first thing I do is fool around with the tuning to make it more playable. 
Despite the scarcity of documented writings and recordings of very early dulcimer, I maintain my conviction that inquiring-minded musicians of any time and place will twist pegs and have their own 'eureka! moments'.   Thus, you'll never see me saying that people didn't do this or didn't do that.  I may say a tuning was 'the most common' (and ionian certainly was the most common, likely followed by unison such as used in Galax...one can play 90% of American folk repertoire in them), but I never will say something was 'not done' or never done'.   :) 

I have two epinettes des Vosges.  Their fretting patterns and stringing are almost identical. Yet I keep one in major ionian and one in aeolian or dorian mode to play the simple minor folk tunes I love.  I keep a Hummel in major tuning to play cheerful dance tunes, and I am having a bowed langspil made now that I'll be playing probably only in minor tuning.  Interestingly, the oldest surviving Icelandic langspils in museums had variations in fretting patterns, indicating variations in tunings.  And some are pure diatonic as we know it, and others are chromatically fretted.  They were strummed, plucked, and bowed.  According to what I've read, there is no documented 'original' traditional tuning that survived in descriptions, so people during a later langspil revival simply adopted the tunings that worked for them.  Those revival tunings are now generally accepted as 'standard', but we don't really know how players may have tuned the earliest langpils.  
I know there are many, many folks who only play major tunes, or who play only in one tuning.  But i can't imagine not playing the soulful minor tunes of Jean's time!  Ah, but I digress...(and blab...)

In any case, here's to our each having enough Eureka moments in our playing journey to keep us inspired!

It feels similar for some notes, and of course notes go up as you uncover more holes from the bottom.  But there are numerous fingering differences- enough to mean you have to learn a new fingering scale.  BUT I think the PW is a little simpler than the recorder in terms of fingering.  Googling fingering picture charts for both, and you'll see what I mean.  

Richard, your FOTMD pinback buttons are in the mail!   

heheh... Robin I think we'll just have to remain in disagreement concerning this groaning board of specifics and conclusions.      

Richard, the one thing I think we can all reliably agree on is that there is no 'one only' for mountain dulcimers-  no one only tuning, no one only playing style, no 'one only' size, or shape, or kind of music...  And that doesn't even take in to account the whole decades-long debate about what 'traditional' means in the first place!   

Blondie I get them directly from Susato.  They offer a couple of cheaper models in their whistle lineup, but I get their best model which is the Kildare, which comes in various keys:

http://www.susato.com/konakart/Pennywhistles/Kildare/1_144_-1_73.do

If you like the low tone but not too terribly long that it becomes difficult to play and reach, then I'd suggest their Kildare Bb (with no keys), and the Kildare in A (with one key).  Those are the two middle whistles in my photo there.  The low G is the longest in my photo, and for a beginner it begins to get a little hard to play even with the helpful key.  I find it way easier to play the other three in my picture.  

If you order, be sure to clarify that you want complete whistles... not one whistle head and the various bodies that will fit it.  Why?- because tho it's cheaper to keep swapping the one head onto two different bodies, I find it annoying to have to keep doing.  On their "M" series Kildares, it's one size head that can be swapped among all four sized Kildare bodies.  But maybe that wouldn't bother you, in which case you could save a few dollars.
Whatever you decide, be sure you order clearly- they automatically sent me one head and three bodies on my last order, when I had ordered three separate complete whistles.  They had to send me two more heads afterwards. 

That's great John!  

Robin, Jean Ritchie is an example of a player experimenting with various tunings before 1940.  I highly recommend anyone interested in dul;cimer history to read her very entertaining account of growing up in her book "Singing Family of the Cumberlands".  In it, she describes being a little girl who snuck her father's dulcimer off the wall when no one was around, and sitting on the floor behind the couch, picking out her favorite tunes from her family's huge traditional repertoire.  She describes figuring out that she had to retune the melody string in order to play some of the tunes on the melody string... to have all the notes she needed.  She then tells of her father Balis coming home and taking the dulcimer off the wall and commenting that "The wind must have gotten to these strings again."  (he knew)  

Anyway, Jean was born in 1922, so if she were 8 or 10 at that time, that would have been 1930-32.  But aside from Jean, I find it impossible to believe that other traditional mountain musicians had not also done such obvious experimenting.  They did so abundantly with banjos, after all.  And it seems highly unlikely to me that they would have given up on playing all the wonderful spooky ballads and hymns popular at the time simply because they didn't realize they could turn a peg and get all the notes needed.  They turned their pegs all the time, just to get in tune after all.  I experiment with tunings on various instruments myself, and I'm no music scholar or professional.  I just think there is precious little written documentation from those times and remote areas.  These were pretty isolated mountain areas, with not so much formal education available pre-1930.

Keep in mind too, that Galax dulcimers have the opposite of shallow narrow bodies... yet because of their repertoire and playing style, most folks seem to regard them as very 'traditional sounding' as well.  

and.. One can play many old tunes in DAd tuning in noter drone style and sound 'traditional'.  But it's not 'because' they are in DAd tuning. Likewise, one can play Shady Grove on a traditional-replica dulcimer in DAG tuning, in modern chord style, ...and NOT sound very traditional.  The many variables come into play, but I would consider the least influential of those to be the tuning.

Lots of great replies already!  

Personally I find that the concept of 'traditional sounding' (meaning I suppose 'old' sounding when it comes to dulcimers) has less to do with a specific tuning than with other factors.  Such other factors can include style of playing, physical characteristics of the instrument, and the repertoire of music being played.  

It is perhaps splitting hairs, but the practice of retuning to the various modes can facilitate playing in a drone style (thus DAA or DAG are quite useful, for example).  But I wouldn't go so far as to say it's the tuning that sounds traditional there...  I'd simply say the tuning might make it easier to play in the drone style... and most people feel the drone style definitely has an 'old' sound to it... you can describe the dronal sound as old, archaic, traditional, ...or whatever word you'd use there.