Forum Activity for @strumelia

Rich- I moved this discussion to the correct forum.

It's really sooo easy to switch back and forth from DAd to DAC and back, and such a nice lonesome sound! I also like the 'open string' resonant sound much better this way rather than putting a CAPO on fret 1 and playing in E minor.

Congrats on trying DAC and having fun with it, Dennis!

I had a middle string on one of my banjos that has had an annoying 'wolf tone' lately. i tried a few tricks like paper in the bridge slot, and a pad under the tailpiece, but those didn't do a thing. Though the strings aren't that old (6 months?) I changed that one string today and the annoying tone was gone .

mAYBE IF THE SWEAT PANTS ARE ROOMY ENOUGH you can stash a dulcimer in each leg while you're wearing them....just don't sit down! lol

I once saw a cool cloth 'gigbag' that someone made for their dulcimer out of an old blue jeans leg. They lined it with flannel and made a drawstring top. Awesome!

Mandy you sound like a total natural on that mando. Very impressive!

...are you going to change your name to Mandy Lynn now?

Robin T , that's a great tune to add to the dulcimer fiddler repertoire- nicely played!

I find it interesting to note that there is only one note that dips below the tonic in the Lester clip- and that note is really just a rhythm ornament that the banjo player put in, it's not actually part of the tune melody. This tells me that this tune really is in mixolydian mode (it actually doesn't seem to work in other modes), and could be played from the open string tonic position too, if one chose not to use the one banjo ornament note. That one note does add some interesting difference to the tune, though. Just mental meanderings on tunings, versions, and such!

Don't you just LOVE Lester's raw tone on that fiddle? Talk about yummy !

Does sound like a 'Reuben's Train family' tune.

She probably already saw the skinny dipping picture, so John Henry's tuxedo shouldn't be too much of a shock.

Welcome Gayle!

Hi Katie,

Lots of dulcimer players change tunings back and forth to play in different keys, or in different modes, etc.

Some change tunings often, some not so often, and some folks don't like to ever change tunings! There are many people who always stay in DAd, and many who always stay in DAA, for example. Some of the folks who dislike re-tuning do have more than one dulcimer, kept in a different tuning. This doesn't necessarily made them a 'pro' however! ;)

Re-tuning often can shorten the life of a string to one degree or another, but then strings are cheap and easily changed, and no string lasts forever anyway. Guitar players and banjo players break strings regularly, it doesn't faze them too much. Trying to tune up to a note in the wrong octave though will break a string for sure!

Clubs and workshops often have everyone stay in one tuning for convenience sake, by the way.

I suggest you at least try out both DAd and DAA at least. ...and who can resist playing Shady Grove in the haunting aeolian DAC tuning....?

I'd love to hear some sound clips of you guys playing your whistles, if you ever care to post them here...

Thought I'd highlight this old thread from 2 1/2 yrs ago when we hit 500 members.... good times...

http://mountaindulcimer.ning.com/forum/topics/wow20-members-to-go-and-its

Happy 3rd birthday FOTMD!

Shucks you guys! ....

Folks, please no copying sections of Netflix or movie dvds and posting them here... copyright violations galore for FOTMD. Please think about copyright issues before posting any copyrighted or performance material on a public site.

Thanks!

Dana R. McCall said:

Judith if you can wait till Weds I found it on Netflix but they have to send me the disc. I'll post a clip of the song on here then.

How can you be so sure? lol!

Man the harpoons! lol

I've been, about 12 yrs ago. I love Augusta, and old-time week is particularly nice. No lack of fascinating classes to take, and lots of mixed jamming everywhere. Lots of variety and something for everyone.

One member to go before we reach 3000 members ....!

Here's a tip o' his favorite, Mountain Dew...a toast to ' Depity Mo ' who I'm sure is smiling down from someplace as we reach 3000....

25 miles- that's wonderful Bill !!! I plan to do an easy 6 miles on my bike tomorrow morning, and a 2 mile walk.

That guy in front of the computer is actually a stranger- i just picked it up on the 'world wide web' after searching for 'geek'....lol!! I like to imagine he was part of the Design and Development Team for FOTMD's formation three years ago. Gotta love his tech setup...and got his ash tray, cigs, and mug of Cream of Mushroom soup all lined up on top there....

Yes i guess I'll go look for that jar of pickled dulcimers, gonna wait til mid next week though. Last two times the contest took way too long and the suspense was killing us all!

Seems like only yesterday it was 290 members.

Can you imagine if someone told you you could choose and keep ONE of these instruments hanging on the wall there.... how on earth could one possibly choose? Just as well i suppose that we'll never be presented with such a 'terrible' dilemma. lol...

They are all so gorgeous!

Randy, thanks so much for sharing all this with us so we can enjoy the thrill along with you. Sounds wonderful!

Wow, the time has flown- seems like just last month you were thinking of starting up a jam, Mandy!

Great that it's turning out to be such fun for you guys.

I'll add a bit to Dusty's good advice- I usually just say that 'we all seem to be out of tune with each other', and I suggest we all tune to the same tuner to get us all 'in synch together'. That way nobody gets offended at all. Oy! the things we do! lol

Can someone tell me how regular old-time (not necessarily just dulcimer groups) jams are done? It's my understanding that an old-time jam would basically be everyone playing the notes together with no breaks or leads. Is this correct? The ones I've been to (only a handful) weren't really OT per se, more bluegrass I guess. Everyone would play together to begin with and then each person would take a lead or break until it went around the room.

Mandy, I've played almost exclusively in old-time sessions for over 14 years, my husband is a wonderful old-time fiddler. But I've also dabbled in bluegrass, folk, and Irish sessions now and then (not that I'm good at playing in those styles though, I'm not...lol). There are many kinds of jam sessions: general folk music, bluegrass, old-time, Irish trad, Cajun, etc etc. I'd have to label most dulcimer groups as 'folk genre' since they play such a wide variety of both trad and modern material.

Many musicians who just play for fun (and particularly those who would most likely be interested in open jams) play tunes and songs that overlap more than one of these genres. For instance, bluegrass players play a lot of old-time songs but they play them in modern bluegrass styles...and many folk singer types will sing bluegrass songs, or vice versa. What I'm trying to say is that maybe you are limiting the response you get if you label your jam specifically as an 'old-time' session. An old-time session would not normally be playing modern folk songs or playing/singing songs in bluegrass style.

In a typical old-time session , it's most often the fiddler who leads and decides the tunes based on their repertoire, and the other instruments find and fill in their complimentary roles around that...not necessarily all playing melody. The fiddler usually leads the tunes. Nobody takes breaks or solos, and it's considered impolite to drown out the fiddler. Sometimes people sing out verses to familiar tunes, but it does tend to be mostly instrumental and fiddle-tune based. Sometimes there is singing of old-time songs, as in Carter family repertoire, but not done in bluegrass style.

In a folk 'song circle' , people take turns playing/singing their own song of choice and they can either welcome others to play along as a jam, or in some instances it's a true 'song circle' in that the person does their song alone while others listen, and then it's the next person's turn. In a regular folk 'jam' you can go around with folks picking their own songs and starting them but everyone customarily playing along. Singer-songwriters who play guitar tend to gravitate towards folk jams, since 'folk music' includes both traditional and modern material of all kinds.

In a bluegrass jam , there is a huge repertoire of bluegrass (post 1935) material along with its customary etiquette such as breaks and leads. Some bluegrass songs are relatively modern (just be aware that those songs are likely copyrighted). There is a lot of singing, and not so many all-instrumental tunes like one sees in old-time sessions. Other bluegrass songs have been adapted from old-time repertoire, tunes and ballads, but are played in bluegrass style. But bluegrass and old-time are most definitely not the same even though they share many of the same tunes and ballads...they don't play or sound the same, and it's considered clueless or even inconsiderate to play in bluegrass style when joining in on an old-time session. The rhythm, timing, harmonies, chords, even sometimes the keys are distinct between the two.

All this is not to say you can't have a super fun jam by mixing up folk, bluegrass, old-time, gospel, blues, whatever- all together! You certainly can!- throw it all in a pot and see what cooks up. But my point is that calling it 'an old-time jam' or a 'bluegrass jam' or a 'folk jam' implies a certain and well defined genre and repertoire, and that will definitely limit the people who respond to your ads. My suggestion, if you don't want to focus that specifically on one music genre at first, is to simply call it an acoustic music jam. That will bring all kinds of players and you'll get a varied pool of people and styles. You can always draw people from that pool into a more focused session later on. Hope this helps!

I have a bit of advice if you want it- start just by having a weekly or monthly jam. Get to know the people who come and see what they do. I'm imagining you'd be welcoming most folks with acoustic instruments, right? Well, unless you are actually wanting to form a band that contains everyone who comes to the jam (and maybe you DO want that), I suggest you hold off talking about forming a band to the general jam group... You may find that you don't blend well musically (or personally) with everyone who comes to the jam, and it's far easier, with less bruised egos, to invite a few people later on privately in terms of forming a band rather than to tell the whole jam group from the start that you are wanting to form a band. I guess a lot also depends on how big or small you want your band to be.

Good luck and have fun!

Bill, here's a picture from Steven Smith's site showing the notes on a typical dulcimer fretboard when tuned to DAd:

The top string would apply to any string tuned to D, the middle string shown would apply to any string tuned to A.

Not all dulcimers have a "6+" fret.

Are you not getting these same notes on the various frets on your dulcimer?

Yeah, except for the little 'nag screen' that pops up each time you open the program, the free version of TablEdit is pretty useful. Easy to just close the nag screen each time before you start to work in the program.

Phil, it's a great organization! Thanks to you for drawing our attention to it. And Melody, who works with the organization doing these programs, has now joined FOTMD as a member too! Melody says she loves dulcimer music and has some on her playlists.

Phil, that is something very, very special that you are playing for your mother now.

Phil, what a WONDERFUL video to watch....brought tears to my eyes this morning. Everyone should watch this to the end of the video- gets better and better.

My mother spent her last 2.5 years in a nursing home near me, and I made sure she had her classical music radio station playing all day in her room, every single day. I would make sure and check that the nurses turned it on every day. It played while I sat with her as she died, too. Classical music was my mother's biggest joy in life. (Aside from spending time together the two of us, that is.)

Wow is right! What a fabulous find, Geoff! I'm drooling over that one...

And the accompanying letter makes it so very special.

I look forward to hearing/seeing you playing it!

There are a few gems in this older discussion on jam etiquette as well...

Ken, that's a great list of tunes that can be played in Dorian mode, especially since they include some modern tunes too.

Just to round things out, here are a couple of my noter Blog posts that walk beginner's through the Dorian mode, with simple tuning diagram and an easy-level tab for Little Sadie:

http://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2009/11/golly-modes-arent-so-scary-after-all.html

http://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2009/04/little-sadie-in-dorian-mode.html

I think that we are beginners as long as the amount of what there is yet to learn is larger than what we already know...and that's certainly true for me! And maybe we are all simply 'learners'. May we never stop learning until we die...

My very first dulcimer was a walnut hourglass McSpadden. My daughter has it now. It has the most beautiful resonant voice one can imagine, and is so smoooooth to play. An excellent choice!

Barbara, my response to your original question is that practically speaking, I myself only really 'need' two dulcimers- one for playing in A and G, and the other for playing in C and D. That's assuming I don't 'need' any other dulcimers due to aesthetic reasons like them sounding different or enjoying playing with different fret patterns or sizes.

Robin Clark said:

Hi John,

You don't need to tune down for A modal tunes - leave your strings at d,d,d,d (or d,d,d if it is a 3 string) and just place a reverse capo under the two drones near the first fret lifting them to e,e . This gives you a tuning of e,e,d,d, (or e,e,d for 3 strings). You now have key of A dorian starting atthe 4th fret

I think you will find there are many differing opinions on what makes something a 'mountain dulcimer'....or not.

And speaking of using up small pieces of wood- Years ago when I ordered my limberjack "Clyde" from Keith, he told me he used up the leftover bits of dulcimer wood to make his limberjacks, mostly walnut pieces. He said that was why they danced so well- they were imbued with dulcimer wood spirit.

I have at least 10 different limberjacks- both new and old, but the two Keith ones are always the best dancers!