Forum Activity for @strumelia

Yeah many of them are missing Jan...but they're not even in the source code so there's nothing I can do to dig them up.  (Update:  I've deleted a few posts and responses that made no sense since the photos were no longer there)   Onward and upward!  (or should I say under and backward?)  

Here's me in 1997....about 19 years ago....possum on a stump?  with my Keith Young curly maple dulcimer that's seen in the fotmd logo.  Ah, would that I were still that spry and willowy!    

I think of Rod often and fondly, and I truly miss him.  Such a kind and thoughtful man... he was deeply dedicated to his family, his music, and to all his many dulcimer friends both old and new.  Thanks for the reminder CD, ....and good to see YOU back here again.  

Rod's music is still very much worth a listen:  http://fotmd.com/rod-westerfield

David, the mostest simple of the simplest tunes for noter playing beginners:

http://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2009/02/new-player.html

After that, move on to Go Tell Aunt Rhody, and then Amazing Grace...ionian DAA tabs are there in my blog as well for those tunes.

Yes, definitely!         lol

Hi all,

This is a great subject! - but I feel strongly that it will be more accessible and will  benefit everyone in the future as well if it's located in our Dulcimer Therapy Group here: http://fotmd.com/strumelia/group/57/dulcimer-therapy

Unfortunately, I cannot move a discussion from a Forum to a Group, so I'm going to close this discussion to new replies and I'd like to ask SaltSprings to please create the discussion anew in the Dulcimer Therapy Group.  That way it won't just sink down into oblivion on the General Forum..instead it will be very easily found in the Therapy Group discussions, and will be very helpful to members in the future who are looking for this specific information!   

John Henry has posted a beautiful tune tribute, played for John P ....

Lament for John P

Update, seven years later (!):

We no longer play at that farmer's market.  Right now I gotta say that my favorite place to play is with my husband in our living room in front of the fireplace, whether there's a fire or not.  Though we do still enjoy going down to town and occasionally playing under a tree on Main street somewhere...for no particular occasion.  We don't put out a hat or case for money -simply to avoid anyone possibly complaining about 'busking'...ha ha!  

I just listened to this again Kevin- it's awesome powerful.

As I recall you made this zither for yourself...do you still have it?  What was the scale length?

Thought I'd revive this old thread in case some of our newer members wanted to add their own stories of how they first discovered the mountain dulcimer!  

You're right Joe- there seems to be a little glitch in moving discussions.  I'll look into it!

UPDATE: this has been fixed.  This discussion is now in the General forum.  

- I moved this discussion from the For Sale forum to the General music forum.

Thanks Dusty, these instructions are very helpful!

First, click the main links to FORUMS, and then choose the Forum that seems most appropriate to your intended subject. 

Here's another image showing to click the "+" PLUS button to ADD a NEW discussion when you are in the Forum category of your choice:

Excellent point Ken.  Even professional players never seem to be completely satisfied with their skill level- and that tells us something.  To me, it's the ongoing learning and little steps in playing music that both keep my interest and give me a sense of accomplishment.  The journey.  The rest is simply the joy of making lovely sounds, no matter how simple they are.  

It's a little confusing that we have both a Profile page picture and an avatar picture...and they can either be the same or different.  On the other hand, it adds variety.   :)

 Dan, could be you changed the image on your Profile page, but not your actual user avatar.

Go to your profile page Settings and check the avatar image that shows when you go to your "Account" TAB in your settings.  Then once that's changed too, SAVE your settings and also clear your browser cache to see the new results.

Every member has both an Account picture and a Profile picture.  Oe shows up only on your profile page, and the other shows up next to every post you make. When in your Settings, be sure to go to both TABS and upload your chosen avatar picture: your Account TAB, and your Profile TAB.  Also remember to SAVE your changes at the bottom of each page before leaving the page, after uploading your new picture.

Ah!  Thank you Randy!  I was a bit confused since Robin posted it.

How beautiful!    We will all miss John...and as Robin said-  Fare Thee Well.

Robin, did you perchance compose that pretty tune in memory of John Phillips?

It's so pretty to hear you play it!

Patty's right about that, Erin-  you can set your video to private, semi-private, or public on Youtube, but you won't be able to have it selectively view-able to only certain people here on FOTMD-  it has to be set to public if you add it here on FOTMD.  I'm talking about if you want it to be in our site's general Video section.

Adding audio/music files to FOTMD Music section:  

1) upload either an MP3 (and if it's too large a message will say so)

OR  2) Add it as a Soundcloud clip. (you have a Soundcloud account where you've already uploaded your audio clips) -Soundcloud is like Youtube but for audio clips.

Adding a video to FOTMD video section:

1) Follow the instructions to add a YOUTUBE video that you've already uploaded onto your Youtube account.

2) OR... Follow the instructions to add a VIMEO video that you've already uploaded onto your Vimeo account.

Note- you can upload an MP3 directly from your computer to the Music section.  You cannot upload a video directly from your computer to the video section.

This kid is as cute as a button!

(and she grew up into a popular and talented country musician)

Gotta love it...

I have been contacted by a good friend of his and by his son, and I've been asked to share the very, very sad news that John Phillips (FOTMD member John P ) has passed away unexpectedly at home from a heart episode.

John has been an active and respected member both here on Friends of the Mountain Dulcimer and on Everythingdulcimer for many years.  His amazing musical knowledge, his humor and diplomacy, and his generosity in sharing and helping others has truly enriched the entire dulcimer community.  John loved being part of our FOTMD 'family' and his absence will be profoundly felt.  My heart is heavy today.

Please share here as we pause to reflect on John and on his family in their time of loss.

This is so cool!

Years ago, I had the typical daydreams about recording CDs or teaching at festivals, etc....  but as time goes by I find more and more enjoyment from just playing at home with my husband, and playing occasionally with a few friends.

Like Robin Thompson, my biggest love is playing home made music at home.  I also enjoy the learning process and consider that to be a lifelong pleasure.  My husband and I are able to learn a whole lot while playing music together.

I also do enjoy playing occasionally for events in my community- our village's Sidewalk Summerfest, a humane society fundraiser, and next to the Blacksmith/spinning wheel/candlemaking demonstrations in the "Old Timey" pavillion of our County Fair.
I still travel to one far away gathering (before I get too old)...an early banjo one in Virginia or Maryland.  I kinda like that one and don't want to give it up just yet.  

So, my goal is to continue doing most of the above.  

EDIT:  I want to add that another goal of mine musically is to be able to stop, or almost stop, working my day job (patent illustration) so I can have more precious time to explore and play and learn more on several different instruments that I would dearly love to get better at playing.  I simply don't have enough time while still working every day.  

I was just pondering about how we all have many things in common in our love for playing music, and yet we also have a wide variety of goals in our personal musical journeys.

Of course it goes without saying that we all have our own particular fondness of different types of music and different playing styles...but I'm not  referring to that.  

What I mean is the variety in our music goals- things such as:
I want to become a dulcimer teacher, ...or I want to be able to record some professional CDs one day and sell them, ....or I want to play for hospice situations, ...or I want to play during my church services, ...or I want to just play at home on my porch for an audience of birds, ....or I want to mostly play and socialize in my dulcimer club with dulcimer friends, ...or I want to be able to play with other musicians in a local bluegrass jam, ...or I want to be able to play my mother's dulcimer that she left to me...

Please share with us what your  fondest goal is in your personal music journey!   

Mid-winter cold and grey...craving some fresh grown greenery but certainly no early gardening possible yet.

A few years ago I had been doing a lot of growing edible sprouts in my kitchen, and last month I started back up doing it again.  It's both fun and  uplifting in the middle of winter to see the jars and containers of little sprouts growing.  Compared to buying lettuce and greens (or even sprouts) at the supermarket, home grown sprouts are not only way more nutritious, but incredibly cheap- I find that a one pound, $12 package of alfalfa seed will produce around 100-150 cups of sprouts.  

It's actually enjoyable to 'tend' them twice a day with a fresh water rinse/drain right in their jars, like having miniature greenhouses growing on your kitchen counters.     

After about 4 or 5 days they are ready to rinse in a large bowl to skim off the empty hulls, and put into the refrigerator for eating!  Sometimes they don't even make it to the fridge... Brian has to be scolded about eating an entire batch at one time as a big salad...hey, leave some for me!  For the past several weeks I have about 5 jars going at a time with different seeds at various stages. A mere 2 tablespoons of alfalfa seed will produce 4 cups of yummy fresh sprouts... !

I moved this thread out of the Site Questions forum to a better forum category location.  

Can't wait to see "Favor"!   Sounds really lovely.

Even after many years, I still cling to Shady Grove.  It just gets me.....plus it's easy enough that it's hard to become rusty.  

I just realized I missed a great pun opportunity:  ...way up there where the aire is thin.   

I often use the 1.5, and its octave higher 8.5....but truthfully I'd likely never use the third octave sister to the 1.5 which is the 15.5.    I do use the 6.5 and its higher sister the 13.5 though.  I find the tone and the hard feel above the 14th fret to be too problematic.  But that's just me....an incredible player like Guy could make it sound heavenly way up there where the air is thin.  

I'd get the 1.5, the 6.5, AND their octave higher pair 8.5 and 13.5.   And yes I use them.  

Note to other readers here: we have a Group devoted entirely to info on 'extra frets' here on fotmd:

http://fotmd.com/strumelia/group/29/i-have-extra-frets

- so if anyone gets inspired to start discussing the whys and hows of extra frets in depth, please continue any full blown discussions there in the group .  Thanks!

Steven, we all can't wait to hear about when you get it!      Post pictures!

What is your 'scale length'- the length in inches from the bridge to the nut?

And do you happen to know what gauge/thickness of strings are on it now?

Sometimes the tightness can seem extreme to a new player and yet not really be too much.  After all, the melody string(s) are not actually breaking when tuned up to high d, right?

Dwight plays a version of Abe's retreat in that tuning that he calls "Low G".

Robin, I wasn't thinking you were using a capo to up it to A...thus some of my confusion.

aAEAE... you are talking about on the banjo?   Tuning the first and third strings both to the same note in the same ocatave?  Tuning the 4th and 2nd strings to the same note in the same octave?   Are you talking about generally in the same octave as standard banjo tuning, or an octave lower?

On the dulcimer I think cross tuning variations of GDGD/AEAE etc is not so unusual?  I'm confused as to whether you are asking about tunings for the banjo or the dulcimer.

Hi Freddie, please start a new thread in our "For Sale/Wanted" forum here:

http://fotmd.com/forums/forum/for-saleinstruments-music-items-cds-learning-materials-or-wanted-to-buy

...and give it a subject/title something like: "WANTED- Melton style Galax dulcimer"

Thanks!   :)

Robert, that looks like a pretty good identical bunch for comparing tone.  A lovely sight, I might add. 

I think part of the problem is that with mtn dulcimers, there is a HUGE variety in the factors that influence sound: body shape, body volume, wood type, string gauges and types, inner bracing, wood thickness, instrument age, repairs, overall scale length or size, pick variations, noter or finger fretting, action,...the list can go on and on, and every one of these factors can influence the sound/tone/volume to one degree or another.  Side by side tests are rather meaningless unless every single factor but one is absolutely identical.

In comparison- violins, mandolins, guitars etc do have some of the same kinds of variations but overall they tend to be much more uniform and therefore it's a bit easier to make comparisons based on one factor, such as wood type or body volume for example.  Yet we expect to be able to make the same comparisons on wildly varying dulcimers?...we cannot.

There are just way too many variations to do accurate scientific comparisons on dulcimers that are different from each other in multiple ways.  In the end, our best means of selecting a dulcimer for ourselves remains: simply listening to an existing particular dulcimer to see if we LIKE the sound (what a concept), or by talking to your luthier of choice about your goals and preferences so he can try to incorporate some of the factors that would increase the odds of a custom dulcimer sounding to your liking.

All that said, it seems like we have this very same discussion every year.  

I personally feel the reality is somewhere in the middle here.   :)

I have the exact same dulcimer- given to me by a woman now in her 70s, whose father made it for her from a kit in 1983.  She said she'd never played it much and wasn't going to be playing it ever.  It has her father's name inside, but also has the kit sellers' green label inside, saying "The Dulcimer Shoppe, Folk Crafts Books", ...on highway 9 north in Mountainview, Arkansas.  It's identical in every way.

I used it in almost all of my dulcimer noter instructional videos, because my two main playing dulcimers both have 1.5 frets which would be confusing in a beginner video.  I don't normally play it, because it has a real hard time holding the strings to tension.  The original pegs were completely shot when I got it, and I replaced them with some similar looking ones which fit the holes and were in better shape- but unfortunately those tuners don't want to hold well either.  It's a real struggle to tune it to key of D.  Planet tuners would likely do the trick, but the dulcimer just isn't valuable enough for me to justify buying another set of high priced pegs (and I don't have bunches of tuners lying around), so I only use the dulcimer for testing out tunes on next to my desk, or for instruction purposes. It has a very narrow waist and the wood is quite thin.  I could post photos- it is truly identical in every detail to the dulcimer in your slideshow, Richard.