Greg, so true! One would hope that a maker would allow sufficient width of a staple fret to accommodate either string, if it were built intended to service a pair of strings. But you're right- in our non-perfect world it's a point to watch for when choosing which melody string to remove.
I agree! For noter playing , keep the melody string on that is closest to you and the edge of the fret board. 
You've got to make a "dancing kangaroo" limberjack!
Omg Ken- great idea! 
Play an Hour or two a day, 4-6 days a week.
That's quite a bit of playing. If you push the strings sideways while fretting, it does dig in more too.
Pro players i suspect get their frets worked on somewhat regularly every few years.
I'm no pro, but I have banjos with frets I probably ought to replace...dug my way down. ;)
Oh Robert that's exciting that you nailed the fingering on your recorder after many months of not playing! You deserve to be proud. Would love to hear/see you play it sometime! The sound of recorders is so rich and beautiful. I agree, a Bb instrument is a wonderful range. And yeah I hear you on the C minor tunes...yummy!
Wow, I'm relieved that my first pennywhistle class (of a series of 6) isn't until tomorrow night which means the snowy roads will be pretty well all cleared by then. If it was tonight they might have had to re-schedule. Looking forward to it although the first class will likely be a little too easy for me since I've been playing for 7 months already. It'll be fun anyway though! 
Yesterday evening during the snowstorm Brian and I played music in the living room. His played his fiddle tuned to Bb flat, and I played my low Bb whistle in harmony to the melodies which he played. It worked out really nicely and was so enjoyable! Still finding my way around the notes and lots of mistakes, but mostly sounds pretty...wheee! It's great to be able to choose what kind of instrument I want to play on a given day. Most go along just fine with Brian on the fiddle. He's a 'one instrument' kind of fellow..I'm way more fickle. 
Great posts, Dusty and Brian!! This helps to explain a whole lot.
I find it fascinating that for dulcimers, any discussion about playing in a different key really sort of has to go into tunings/capos and available fret intervals/notes.
Paula can you tell us about a particular workshop moment of inspiration that opened a door in your personal musical life? That's really what I was after in this thread. 
" Tell us about the single LIVE workshop or music lesson that was the most musically inspiring to you in your music life. Could be on any instrument- but tell us about how that teacher's in-person lesson or workshop made a big impression, opened a door to your progress, or inspired your music playing in some profound way."
The advantage of a capo is that you can use all the chords you've already learned.
But with the capo on fret 4, you won't have the same pattern of whole/half steps to use as you have in DAd...so how can you use the same chord fingerings as you do in DAd? Won't you have to learn new chord fingerings anyway?
Great photo, Sam!
I think our bees are still about a week away from bringing in pollen of any kind yet...we have temps in the 30s this week and inches of snow predicted still!
Here's a cool website that shows pollen color charts by season:
http://eversweetapiaries.com/pollencharts.htm
I've lost 3 of my 5 hives this winter. Sadly, that's not terribly unusual for folks these days. It's hard for the bees (and other beneficial pollinators) to survive and stay strong. I'm just hoping my remaining 2 hives make it through til Spring because it's a whole lot easier to recover my hive numbers starting from 2 than from 1.
I tend to agree with Rob- tuning to EAA would make it much easier to play in A. Cross-tuned fiddlers do the same kind of thing.
Good info Dusty, thanks!
So, I guess a capo at 4th enables one to play some tunes in A but not others, while needing to get the G# on the middle string. I think chords would be a bit of a bear to work around, and the lack of G# on the melody string would really bum me out. 
Dusty, if you capo on the 4th, you also won't have the G# available on the melody and bass strings- you'll only have a G natural on those outer strings- it'd be like not having the 6.5 fret.
(Kitchen Girl and Road to L. both sound more like minor, not major tunes to me?- with no sharps?)
You can capo on 3 to get the key of G successfully IF you have the 6.5 fret because that gives you your needed C#. But unless I've missed something obvious, capoing to 4 won't give you the right whole/half steps to play in A major.
Dulcimers have certain whole/half fret placements that mean you can't just move a capo up and down to get any key you want- unless it's a chromatically fretted instrument like a guitar, banjo, or a chromatic dulcimer.
I'm not understanding how that's going to work on DAd tuning. Are you planning to make chords on all your strings, or just pick out the melody on one string?
How do you plan to make the needed I,IV,V chords in A major on a DAd tuned dulcimer?
And if you capo on 4 to get to the key of A, you won't have the needed G# on the melody and bass strings.
Have you addressed how you all will tune and/or capo your dulcimers in order to play in the key of A major?
Tell us about the single LIVE workshop or music lesson that was the most musically inspiring to you in your music life. Could be on any instrument- but tell us about how that teacher's in-person lesson or workshop made a big impression, opened a door to your progress, or inspired your music playing in some profound way.
I signed up for a series of 6 classes that will start on March 16... Taught by NY folk musician George Ward. I'm looking forward to that!
It's now about seven months since I started playing the penny whistle, and I'm still really enjoying it!
Lately I've been playing in the key of Bb on my lower plastic whistle- trying to play harmony parts to Brian's fiddling tune melodies on his 'Bb fiddle'. That sounds kind of pretty when I can get harmony passages right. Still working hard at it, as it's not easy for me! Maybe in a few weeks I'll be able to record a little video of that without tons of mistakes...(one or two mistakes is always acceptable in my view.) 
I threw together a new social fun site for anyone who plays tin whistle and is interested in joining:
Dusty that dancing guy always reminds me of the Young Frankenstein movie with Frankie dancing in a tuxedo... 
Our thanks to Teri West for her creative dulcimer smiley!
Lexi- give a big pat to Smiley for us... he's a special feller for sure!
I admit I'm particularly fond of these smileys:
... lolol!
Yeah I can see how DropC tuning would be good for singing and backup !
More ways to see it:
If you are tuning to DAd, it'd be from low to high : D3, A3, d4.
https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2010/12/what-notes-do-i-tune-my-strings-to.html
I think it was member @hugssandi
I'm reading a knitting pattern for knitting a pink hat. Haven't picked up my needles in about 10 years(!) and I got inspired. I'm really enjoying taking it up again for a few minutes of relaxation here and there. Love the act of carefully making something with my hands again. I'm finding it's like riding a bike- I need to review the instructions for certain things, but it's coming back to me very quickly.
I'm realizing they now have a million online youtube videos for knitters. The internet didn't even exist when i first learned to knit almost 30 yrs ago. (!) Yay! 
Hi D- if you don't use the 1.5 fret, then you'd not likely use its 'mate' that's one octave higher (the 8.5 fret).
The reason we don't often see such extra frets mentioned in tab is this- the reason for adding them is to enable you to play in a different mode and key without re-tuning. 90% of tabs seem to be written for DAd or DAA tuning... both of which can be played without using the 1.5 or 8.5 frets. Bluesy tunes might use them more often though.
I find the 1.5 and 8.5 frets are handy for me when playing in fiddle tune sessions. One example of where I find it useful is if fiddlers switch to a modal-y sounding tune in the same key and then switch back to a major-y sounding tune in the same key, without much of a pause. Since I don't use capos either, those two extra frets give me more options in weird fiddle session situations. But for folks who play typical pop and/or traditional folk tunes mostly from tab, they might rarely run into instances that call for a 1.5/8.5 fret.
I thought it would be interesting to hear about the songs we were taught when we were very little, in kindergarten through the first few years of grade school, like up to the age of around 10.
Did certain songs 'stick' with you through your life in meaningful ways?
What were YOUR early impressions and experience in learning songs as a small child in school?
Ok Glenda, the new group has been created- go ahead and join it. Have fun!
I used to be the moderator for the Indiana group but. I can no longer find it has it been deleted ? Will I have to create a new one or is it in the files somewhere and I just cant find it? I've not been on for a while and check in occasionally but would like to activate the Indians group. Not sure I'm in the right category Glenda
Ok, Glenda, I'm back- 
We have about +/- 60 different Groups here on FOTMD. We do have Groups for 'some' US states, but not for others. For some subjects or areas there may not be enough interest to maintain a separate space for their activity. Every couple of years, I go through the site's Group section and delete any Groups that have been completely inactive for over a year and that have none (or almost none) discussions, few members, and few comments. Doing this keeps the Groups area of the site fresh. I'm afraid the Indiana Group had been very long completely inactive and was thus deleted.
However, if you are interested in being active in, or overseeing the activity of a new Indiana Group, then I will be happy to create a new group and although i can't make you an actual site moderator, I can adjust it so that only you can create special sticky 'pages' in that group for any Indiana subject you might feel is helpful to the group members. You could keep an eye on that group, start topics of interest perhaps, and let me or another FOTMD moderators know if there's ever a problem in the group that needs attention.
Shall I go ahead and create a new Indiana Group for you to help 'shepherd', Glenda?
Hi Glenda!- @glenda-hubbard - I have to go out the door right now for some doctor visits for several hours, but I'll be sure to come back and respond to your Indiana group question when I return home!
Bill- most oldtime fiddle tune banjo players I know, when playing for key of D, will either tune up to aDADE
which is referred to as 'double D tuning'. (the first lower case letter is the short fifth string)
OR, if they don't want to tune up that high they will tune to 'double C tuning' which is: g, C, G, C, D
and then you can hook your fifth string up to 'a' and put a capo on the second fret for the other 4 strings. That would bring you back up to double d tuning but with less cranking of the strings if starting from standard G tuning of gDGBD.
I usually just tune up to aDADE to play in D.
Alan was not only a wonderful fiddler, but he helped to preserve and bring deserved attention to the rich tune repertoire of Henry Reed. From watching him at a music camp, my impression was that Alan was not only a fine musician, but a real gentleman as well.
This is so cool...
and more info in this article:
Hi Hoosier,
This is something I am in the process of changing around for Forums. The site has just had a large software update and things are being changed a little and tweaked.
Please read my post of an hour ago where I talk about this forum post sequence, and follow that thread:
http://fotmd.com/forums/forum/site-questions-how-do-i/25868/software-updates-of-jan-2-report-bugs-here
How long is the scale from nut to bridge, and what have you been tuning it to?
Hi Stephen! Yeah that's like fiddle cross tuning for key of A.
Don may have learned this from fiddler Bruce Green, they play together a lot as you know (aren't they both terrific?). Here, Bruce is likely in that A cross tuning on his fiddle: https://youtu.be/aJL2DeQZutw
Hey are you still playing your great TMB box dulcimer much? I just watched your lesson video on it the other day, again .
Yes, in an ideal world all instruments would be priced to be accessible to all people. However there are always those pesky variables like cost and choice of materials, hours and experience level of labor, construction or finishing methods, shipping costs, rent and location, etc. Not all building options that increase the price of an instrument are mere cosmetic matters such as elaborate pearl inlays or gold plating.
