Forum Activity for @strumelia

@tull66 , Ken H has answered your original question below.

I'd like to point out a place that will answer many of your questions as to how to post in a forum, how to add photos, etc:
https://fotmd.com/forums/forum/site-questions-how-do-i

Note- that forum i linked to is not a place to ask your dulcimer questions, but if you browse the threads there you'll see answers to many of your questions on how to navigate this site.

Welcome!

Thank YOU Robin!  I didn't have to do much of anything- i just applied a new update. Looks like the both you and the developers spotted the bug independently, and they put out a fix for it yesterday. Solved!  

That was easy.

Hi Robin. Just as I was about to ask for some help on this, I saw that a bug fix was released for our Comment module concerning notifications. It seems quite possible that this will fix our problem, so I applied the update.

I just now made new comments on one each of your photos, audio clip, and videos.
Please let me know now (again) if you receive notifications today for these 3 new comments I made.
Again, thanks for your help in testing!

I received no notification for your comment on my photo, Robin.

Now that we have the issue narrowed down a little, we know it's a coding issue related to comments on media items, not a 'video' or 'audio' function issue specifically.
I'm going to see if I can get help locating the exact problem tomorrow. Usually this kind of thing is a matter of one of my custom modules needing updating in order to function correctly again with another module, like it used to.

Thank you so much Robin for noticing this, and for helping me test out where exactly this is happening (and not happening).
It's often hard to notice something that's missing, as opposed to some obvious problem that's immediately visible..

I'll respond back here when I find out more, hopefully tomorrow sometime.

Ok, can you please leave a comment on one of my photos now?

Before I try to get this fixed, I would like to test this on other types of 'item' that you created Robin...

I just left 'comments' on three more items you created: a photo, a Group discussion, and a Forum discussion.

Can you tell me which (if any) of my new comments generated a new notification for you?  Thanks!

Thanks Robin!

Robin- aside from not getting notified about 'comments'...

I just now 'liked' an audio and video of yours. Can you tell me if you get the usual private message notification for my two likes?  (i suspect you will get them for 'likes')

Anyone else having this issue, who used to get notifications and are no longer?

Robin, perhaps you can leave a comment on one of my audio clips and one of my videos, so i can see if I get the notifications? (my personal settings are set to send me an email upon such comments, as opposed to getting the notifications in a private message, so not sure how good this test will be.)

Have you double checked all your 'notification' settings to make sure they have not changed and are as you like them?

Greg- that terrific information to read on this beautiful dulcimer's makers!

The eagle peghead and two makers' labels puts me in mind of something else, having to do with dulcimer maker Keith Young-

Some of you may have seen some really gorgeous Young dulcimers that had an expertly carved clinging tree frog carved into the wooden peghead . When I was ordering my beautiful curly maple from Keith, I asked him about the possibility of getting it with the tree frog peghead. He told me that he himself had carved the first few frog pegheads, but that it became too much and that he had a woodcarver carve the frogs for him for a while. Eventually the carver no longer did the frogs and that's when Keith stopped offering the option altogether. So, my dulcimer has simply the elegant scroll peghead that Keith himself would carve.

This makes me wonder if the dulcimer in this thread was basically made by Hicks but perhaps David Love (as you said known for his woodworking and also making of wooden toys) carved the eagle peghead... thus resulting in the two makers' labels inside, giving them both credit for their hand in the instrument's creation?

If she can count to five, then this tune might be very helpful to start with:

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

It's absolutely the easiest tune to play for a beginner, and can be played noter style (or fretted with one finger) on the melody string only, with the other strings brushed unfretted, as pretty harmony notes that go with the tune naturally.

The key to playing in both directions is to practice very slowly and often. You'll get it! Sit yourself down and practice slowly and stick with it. In the end you'll be glad to have the skill. Your hand has to go in both directions anyway, so why not make good use of it?

Once you get comfortable with it you'll find your playing gets more fluid and pleasant sounding. When I hear an audio clip of someone playing and if right off the bat sounds unpleasantly choppy to me and with awkward timing, it usually turns out they are strumming or picking only in one direction.
Think of it like walking with both legs as opposed to hopping along on one leg. One leg will get you from point A to point B, but it'll won't feel very smooth and pleasant.

If you play in chording style (fretting across all strings) then yes a 6+ fret is going to make things waaaaay easier for you. (And you won't have to learn all the different chord fingerings for each tuning.)
If you are only going to be fretting melodies on the melody string then learning to retune to different modes will be all you need to do. (and in most cases you'll be only retuning one string.)
If it were me I would get a pro to install that fret since you don't want to mess up the fretboard and you'll want it to not come out later and to look matched. I once went to a music store/guitar store and they did a nice job for a small fee.

@Jost, you may be right about Pretty Saro. I have seen folks play it on dulcimer by tuning mixolydian and then basing the home note on the middle string.
Saro is probably not a good example for me to use. There are many versions of that ballad, and some sound major and some sound more minor... so I guess you could play it in various ways.

Complicating matters is that you can sometimes be in a tuning that is associated with a certain mode, but be playing a tune that is in a different mode... especially if you play melody notes across strings- on more than just the melody string.

Btw since you play banjo-
Adding DAC aeolian mode tuning as an option to more easily play lonesome sounding tunes in the key of D is just like how oldtime clawhammer banjo players add 'sawmill tuning' ( gDGCD) to their repertoire in addition to their basic gDGBD tuning, when they want to play spooky or plaintive g modal tunes on the banjo. Once someone learns Sawmill tuning (sometimes called Mountain Minor tuning) on their banjo, they usually want to come back to it often. It's pretty addictive, exactly the way DAC tuning is on the dulcimer. 

Melvoid, so much about tunings depends on two things: 1) what key you want to be playing in, and 2) the limits of your string gauges in tuning to various notes without being so tight as to break, or too loose as to be floppy.

If you are at the stage where you want to experiment just a bit but don't quite understand all the details yet, then you can stay with your first familiar tuning, OR play with DAd and DAA both, OR you can dip your toe in the water by adding a third tuning- I'd suggest DAC, for playing the beautiful lonesome sounding Aeolian mode tunes like Shady Grove or Cluck Old Hen or Pretty Saro.

I've explained a lot about tunings and modes in many posts on my noter/drone blog, but here's one post from it that includes a simple video of retuning between the four most common modes and tunings for dulcimers:
https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2010/02/video-re-tuning-between-four-common.html

Using the key of D for my example, and starting in DAd tuning, I demonstrate how to tune from mixolydian DAd to aeolian DAC, then to ionian DAA, and finally to dorian DAG. Then I re-tune back through each made again until I'm back in DAd. This method is a simple way to get into the concept of retuning for dulcimers. Hopefully it helps in some way.

If you download the youtube video as an audio file, then get Amazing Slowdowner program, you can open the audio file in AS and change the pitch of the tune without changing the speed. Change it to the key/pitch you want, then save that new audio file. Then you can play along in the exact key you want. (AS can also be used for changing speed btw)
I have always found Amazing SlowDowner to be extremely useful.

Teddy and Rufus... bros just chillin' in the sun...

Which is why some older dulcimer ancestors had their frets right along the edge of the instrument- because either they had no raised fretboard, or one that was less than 1/2" tall off the top of the instrument. Having the frets run along the edge of the body enabled using a noter when the frets were on or immediately above the soundboard itself. Imagine trying to use a noter on frets that are installed down the middle of the soundboard, directly into the instrument top rather than on a raised fretboard.
One of the very definitions of the mountain dulcimer specifies it having a "raised fretboard running down the center of the instrument". Many instruments that are earlier dulcimer ancestors have frets along one edge of the instrument- epinettes, hummels, langspils...

As to strum hollows and 'sweet spots', it's true that the mellowest sound of all will come from plucking/strumming a string near the halfway suspension point. Yet violinists, guitarists, banjoists, etc don't generally bow/strum/pick in the middle between nut and bridge. Some oldtime banjo players play "up the neck" to get a particular soft mellow effect, but bluegrass, tenor, classic, and Irish banjo players play near the bridge purposely because they like the crisp snappier sound. The strings are more rigid to play on right next to the bridge, with almost no flex. So most folks feel more comfortable plucking/strumming several inches away from the bridge, where the strings begin to have more give. On the other hand, bowing at the halfway point creates just too much string bouncing and flexing, thus a bow is usually kept pretty close to the bridge where the string tension is stiffer. Another physical issue is that the halfway point is where the seventh fret octave is, and people do a LOT of fretting in that area- you can't be both fretting and strumming or picking in the same area at once. (I'm assuming folks define the 'sweet spot' not as exactly the halfway point, but rather as somewhere between halfway and the bridge.)

How I find strum hollows essential in real life playing:

I used to play the mtn dulcimer in fingerpicking style long ago, with plastic fingerpicks because I have crappy fingernails. Playing on a dulcimer with a strum hollow was delightful and comfortable. Playing in that style with no strum hollow was an AWFUL experience for me because the tips of my fingerpicks were constantly bumping into the fingerboard accidentally, and made a racket with clicking sounds. Personally, I couldn't play in fingerpicking style without the strum hollow. Especially if doing 'pinches', which some traditional players did when playing with their thumb.
Strum hollows also facilitate playing with a bow- as you rock the bow a little to play either outermost string, as you have to do when there is not an arched bridge, you don't want to scrape the bow hair on the fretboard edge.. but that's less common than fingerpicking. Been there done that, and a strum hollow totally solves that issue.

I have similar issues with picks bumping into the fretboard on banjos with no strum hollow. That's why they are so common on banjos.

Yes- the v is 'down'. The v^ is down,up.  By 'down' I mean the dominant direction that you tend to strum in- some folks strum inwards towards their body on major notes, others have an outwards dominant direction, away from their bodies. Thus, my v means your dominant direction strum. Easy to think of it as 'down', while the ^ is strummed as you go in the return direction of the strum. For more on this, use the blog's right lower keyword search feature and choose 'strumming' for various posts on strumming tips.

So happy you are enjoying it!

There are many beautiful and plaintive tunes in DAC tuning (Aeolian mode). They are so easy to play in drone style when in the proper tuning.

Here are a couple other DAC/Aeolian tab posts from my blog if you like to explore more:

https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2009/03/here-is-another-old-ballad-in-aeolian.html

https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2009/03/black-is-color.html

https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2009/07/wedding-dress-my-little-doney-gal.html

Yes- thank you Dusty! My coffee had not kicked in yet when i wrote that.  lolol   Will correct my post.

Wow I bet you are super thrilled to have this new beauty, Richard. Happy playing! 

Suzette, tune to DAC and try my free noter/drone style tab for Shady Grove:

https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2009/03/beautiful-aeolian-mode.html

(I posted over 30 free tabs on my noter dulcimer blog)

Ah, so now we know: 1) why Leo could not attach a word file, and 2) why there was suddenly a .pdf there that Leo did not put there. Mysteries solved!

Leo, I have our site code set to not allow people to attach word docs to posts, because that type of file can contain malware code. It's just a site safety setting that has nothing to do with you.

What a lovely dulcimer Megan! 

That's a terrific subject to cover, Patricia.

Early music is one of my passions. Much of it utilizes compelling drone intervals that are familiar to drone style traditional dulcimer players.

Having a 6.5 fret won't stop a dedicated noter player from playing traditional tunes on a dulcimer in noter style...and sounding great!

There is nothing particularly special about 'banjo strings' vs 'dulcimer strings'... except in relation to their being offered in convenient pre-packaged sets. Banjo 'sets' are geared towards banjo scale length (generally 25"-30") and standard banjo tuning: gDGBD (the last D being an octave higher than the first D, equal to a dulcimer high d).

The reason old timers and older books mention using banjo strings is not because they thought banjo strings were better suited than dulcimer strings. Rather, it's simply because there didn't used to BE many places to buy pre-packaged sets of 'dulcimer strings' in those pre-1970s days, whereas banjo string sets have been around for a lot longer and were way easier to find in music stores. Old timers were resourceful and used whatever they could get their hands on. This was pre-internet- there were no websites to order strings from- you had to either go to a music store or order from a paper catalogue using stamps envelopes and sending checks. (and then "allow 6 to 8 weeks for delivery", LOL)

The truly best approach is to use a string calculator (Strothers is the current best one online) and based on the VSL of YOUR dulcimer and the notes that YOU want to tune the strings to, select the gauges you'll need for that tuning. Then buy some separate steel strings (usually loop-end) from a site like juststrings .com. Have some extras on hand for breakage. If you have a typical sized dulcimer and simply want to use typical DAd or DAA type tunings, you can buy packets of dulcimer string 'sets' and it'll work just fine in most cases. It's convenient if you don't need anything out of the norm.

Commercial strings heavier than a certain gauge will more likely be wound, which you'll notice when ordering strings online. If you have your heart set on unwound heavy bass strings then you 'may' have to buy a spool of that heavy gauge music wire and cut/twist your own unwound bass strings. It depends on just how heavy the gauge is that you want. Personally, I found heavy unwound bass strings to really hurt my fingers when fretting, so I do use wound heavy bass strings on my banjos and dulcimers. If you always play with a noter this wouldn't matter.

I agree with the approach of keeping it simple- go with our original name and designated day in March. Don't worry about what others may/may not be doing.
I agree with Robin's thoughts about it being a simple celebration that anyone can be part of from their own home in whatever way they can or would like to. Complicating things or broadening the scope only makes people not want to do anything themselves.

Steve- I'm sorry but i had to delete a couple of your posts that were copied from another site. The formatting of the text, ads, headlines, and pictures was so gigantic that it screwed up the page here on fotmd. Plus run-on lines. It made everything here impossible to read and would also generate Google errors concerning posts with huge items or text that doesn't fit on a page. Try to not copy/paste chunks of content directly from other sites, thanks! 

We should be careful about using photographs taken by other people. For example, many of the nicer photos of Jean Ritchie were taken by her photographer husband George Pickow, and of course the family owns the rights to them.

Here, maybe try this version, I upped the contrast a bit with the white text. Here's a jpg and a pdf of same thing.

Should look fine printed out either in color or in greyscale...

 INTERNATION APP. DULCIMER DAY-page-002.jpg - 246KB

Wonderful to see the same player over such a long time span, with a glimpse into the past again.

If you click the link to "Forums" you will see various forums for different subjects, and you can pick the forum that applies for your new thread.
(and Thanks Dusty!)

I wonder how many years Bruce C. has played a dulcimer and not used it til now in his concerts? Cool.

Dusty, you are a mover and a shaker! 

Steve, I'll send you a private message through fotmd.