Forum Activity for @ken-hulme

If you have PBS Passport, the entire Ramblin series is available there.  Jean's episode is Season 1 episode 104.   I'll be watching it later tonight....

Not sure about staple 6+ and 1+ frets but there certainly were some unusual fret patterns used by some builders, certainly!  For example fret patterns to play the Major DAA Scale from the Open fret not the 3rd fret.

1-5-8 is the numeric designation for Mixolydian Mode tunings, so yes, it was used ages  before the 6+ fret came along.  Those of us without plus frets  change tunings from Ionian to Mixolydian to Dorian or Aeolian and the other Modal tunings simply, by changing the open note of the melody string(s).   'Way back, many of the old timers tuned to either 1-8-8 (bagpipe tuning) or 8-8-8 (unison tuning with all strings the same gauge, all tuned to the same note -- a.k.a. Galax tuning.

G -- GDG  Good on a short VSL dulcimer

That slot at the tail end of the fretboard was, IIRC, a Howie Mitchell "thing".  Not sure it ever worked as advertised.  

I think if you had half of the string tension pulling up and half the string tension pushing down, the result is not increased tension but rather a neutralized/balance of tension not helping at all...

Hi Beth!  Where are you in Yorks?  I have e-friends in Hawes and that part of the Dales as well as elsewhere in the UK.  My partner is from Brighton originally but has been here longer than there.   I play mostly the Child Ballads and Border ballads/folk music, using Noter & Drone style.  Three is a good number of dulcimers (although I have more) as you can  tuned in each of the main folk keys...

Matt/Nate -- that 15 degree break angle is very close to the commonly-used-in-dulcimer-builds 12 degree break angle of strings from the nut to the tuners, and from the bridge to where the strings break hard over the back of the fretboard.  Dulcimers with sharper break angles, especially at the tail seem, qualitatively anyway, to have more volume.  I'm thinking of those which have the bridge set all the way to the rear so the strings drop almost 90 degrees to the string pins in the tailblock.

John's given you a good start.  You can also plug the VSL into the Strothers String Gauge Calculator along with the desired open note to determine reasonable gauges.   Tom & Missy Strothers | String Choice

One reason that that instrument might not be so great sounding is that the square area the soundholes seems a bit less than would be common, and there are no holes in the upper bout

"Duckslammer, IIRC comes from a Tom & Missy Strothers ancedote about someone mis-hearing "dulcimer".

Mountain Mahogany does not grow east of Colorado.  It has a Janka hardness of about 3200 -- roughly the same as the Ebonies.  Makes great noters, nuts & bridges for Mountain dulcimers, tippers for bodhran, musical bones, and similar projects.

Thanx John,  Fixed it.  y new eye isn't quite up to par yet... another few days before the swelling goes down.  

Hi @jazzc...  Had cataract surgery yesterday so i couldn't take any pix until today... Here are my two favorite Traditional dulcemores:   
Uncle Ed Thomas replica Kentucky Hourglass by John Knopf on the bottom. Traditionally painted flat black. 
Above is my Virginia style Hogfiddle by Bobby Ratliff
.
Both have the high-silvery sound of traditional dulcemores rather than the more mellow sound of modern dulcimers

 Favs2.jpg - 62KB

Either my Uncle Ed Thomas traditional dulcemore replica by John Knopf; or my  traditional Virginia style Hogfiddle by Bobby Ratliff,  Both with staple frets under the melody string and plain (no 6+) diatonic fret layout.  

Dusty's right.  In English there were no standardized way to spell anything until some years after the Oxford English Dictionary was completely published (1884-1928) and accepted as the standard (taught in school).   Basically between WWI and WWII. And the farther from mainstream society folks were, the more those spellings seem to have varied.  

For example, my Scottish Clan name -- Home -- dates back to 1225 -- has at least 28 ways to spell Home, and people with all those different surnames are genetically related!

Three years ago this was asked by @shannonmilan  "Do you mean to say they also differ on their tuning?"    
"They"  being dulcemores and dulcimers.

Yes and no..   What I said was  " The most common tunings <for traditional dulcemores> seem to have been Unison (all strings the same gauge and same high note -- d-d-d) or Bagpipe (middle and melody strings an octave higher than the bass string D-d-d), with 1-5-5 tunings a close third."

So Yes, they do differ
-- traditional dulcemores  are/were most commonly tuned to ddd or Ddd and other key equivalents
--modern dulcimers are most commonly tuned to DAA, DAd and other Modal tunings (DAG, DAC, etc) and their key equivalents 

and No
-- in that dulcemores and dulcimers can be tuned to exactly the same tunings

.  

Those tuners should have a tiny screw in the end of each knob, which adjust how 'firmly' they stay in tune.  Start with a 1/4 turn tighter and see how that works.  Need more turn a little more...  Too tight and they won't adjust.

Whether tuned perfectly together or slightly apart in pitch, doubled strings should not be louder than one.  The sound waves mesh together perfectly (or nearly perfectly) like fingers interlacing.   The slight wave interferences are perceived as 'richness' of tone  not increased volume.  

I suggest "superglue" -- the thin, slow-set kind, not the 10 second stuff.   Leave the painter's tape on the underside to support the crack but remove the upper tape so you can see the crack.  With the top off of the superglue (for speed), c.a.r.e.f.u.l.l.y  flex the crack open just a hair and wick drops of glue into the crack.  Then close the crack gently uad hold until the glue sets.

You could glue (with Titebond not superglue) a piece of business card across the inside of the crack and trim to fit..  But the simplest reinforcement is to add another couple layers of tape inside there... carefully trimming the edges of the tape so it doesn't show, of course.  

@shannonmilan -- you do realize that this conversation is over four years old, don't you?

@shannonmilan -- you do realize this conversation is over two years old, don't you.

Nice Marsha!  Decades ago I played bass drum with Scottish Pipe Bands.  Then a couple years before Covid I occasionally played dulcimer along with friends in a group called Pine island Sound. The I built the  laptop Cajon below  --  a Brazilian hand beaten box drum -- that I played with them until  Covid sort of busted things up.  I more or less "tuned" the Cajon to sound good around the key of D.  It can be played soft or loud as well.  

12"x18" x 2.75"  The top is a fabulous piece of Oregon Myrtle, the sides maple and the back 'piano' Port Orford Cedar.

Can't find the pix I had of me with  the group...  

 Cajon front.jpg - 110KB

@ocean-daughter.  If you tune a Bagpipe tuning:  Ddd or Ccc for example, you can play both Ionian/Mixolydian and Aeolian/Dorian modal scales *without* having to have a 6+ fret!    

That's a Bowed Psaltery, not a plucked psaltery.  And a very nice BP it is too! 

The BP was supposed developed in post-WWII Germany by a violin teacher trying to get his students to bow correctly.  Whatever the truth, they are nice instruments, and you don't need a full sized bow to play them.  A simple 18" or so bow will work jut fine.  Several years ago I was gifted a BP and made some simple bows to play it with, using all sorts to waxed string other than horsehair/

The song dates back to the 1930s at least, and does not appear to be copyright protected. No dulcimer tab I could find.  Best to sing/hum/whistle the tune until you KNOW it, then sit down and pick it out on youe melody tring and write the tab as you go...

Since I seldom play with others and I'm not haunted by perfect pitch or ADHD, as long as nothing is too sharp or flat, "in the vicinity of..." work for me. 

Like John I've not heard of Stephens Lutherie.  And I also agree with John that there is no one Perfect Dulcimer, ... there is only what YOU find best for your playing style  Having just googled Stephens, I see a guitar luthier trying to improve the mountain dulcimer... 

The "floating fretboard" you see isn't that.  That's a "discontinuous" fretboard.  99% of dulcimer have a fretboard that runs all the way from the head to the tail.  The fretboard you see is 'guitar-like' -- it stops after the last fret, then there is nothing until a block for holding the bridge in its proper location and height.   

Some people will try to tell you that having the fretboard stop short will increase the tops' ability to flex and produce better sound. Truth is such an arrangement requires a lot of extra bracing under the top to prevent string pressure from warping the top downward.  That bracing does more to dampen sound than improve it and negates almost any advantage you might gain.

  Unlike the guitar, the dulcimer simply does not have enough top area available for such a scheme to work well.  I build a number of similar dulcimers 30 or more years ago, but discontinued the process because it was a lot more labor intensive for very little, if any measurable improvement in the sound quality.

@shanonmilan --the vast majority of us (traditionalists and moderns) play dulcimer horizontally -- "string side up" on our laps or on a table or stand.  There are a few who play it more vertically -- like a guitar...

The signature by L McSpadden really doesn't mean much.  It is known that the building team took turns signing batches of labels that got stock 'wherever', not that Larry made this instrument himself...

Redwood wasn't particularly rare back in the day. It is more so now tho.

The books are worth altogether about $20 tops.

Yes the instrument is in excellent condition.

Yes the case is typical of a John Maxwell quality case.  

Still, I just don't see $2000 here.  There are, as you said, equivalent McSpadden dulcimers, brand new for about $600.  Add a $200 or more for that case, and $20  for the books.  It may be 50 years old, but that of itself, really isn't worth $1000.

Just my opinion, of course.  Any dulcimer is worth only what someone will pay for it.

*  I'm not sure either of those bridges is 'real'  -- they are both far too long and extend way past the sides of the fretboard, making it difficult to play without snagging yourself on the,
* If that first dark "bridge" is set into the fretboard I agree that is most likely the actual bridge; a simple test will prove it.
*  As Strumelia says, the top & back being wider than the sides is called a "fiddle edge" and is a common feature especially on older dulcimers.
*   The Wide and Narrow (not Tall and Short) fret spacing is a true Diatonic fret layout.  It's your dulcimer, you can of course add a 6+ fret..  But Why would you want to?  This dulcimer was obviously designed to be played in a traditional manner, not modern Chord-Melody style.  Why not appreciate it for what it is?

If it has more than diatonic frets, or more than 3 courses of strings, technically an instrument is no longer a dulcimer, it is a Fretted Zither.  "Tomay-to tomaatoe", but diatonic fret spacing is part of what defines a dulcimer.

Here's my take.  The triangle is, as John sez, a Russian balalaiki.  The light topped round body is a bouzouki (either Greek or Irish).  The light rectangle is a "cigar box" style guitar.  The two hourglass instrument are indeed variations on the epinette/Applachian dulcimer. The two electric instruments are a bouzouki and a mandolin (short neck).

Beautiful playing.  The instrument doesn't look like the 1880 patent, but I think it may embody the same concept -- an "extended" fretboard that allows notes below the "low do" of the normal fretboard...   

An old dulcimer building friend once built an instrument with 4 frets below the low-do on a single fretboard.  You tuned it by capoing at the 4th fret from the nut and then tuning to DAA or DAd...You then removed the capo to play.  

Great heavy duty construction.  I had one of her double bags, and used it steadily for close to 20 years before the zipper wore out and the inner lining got a couple of tears.  Repairing it would have cost as much as a new bag, and I couldn't afford either at the time.  Can't recommend them highly enough..

Basic rule of dulcimer -- There is No Right Way or Wrong Way to Play the Dulcimer -- there is only what works best for You.
Never let anyone -- teacher or friend -- tell you that you MUST play a given way.

I spent decades strumming "outie only".  Then one day, for some unknown reason, I back-strummed.  And it didn't sound bad. So I did it again,  And again.  And suddenly I was strumming both ways.  Today I still tend to be an out-strummer, especially on slow songs.  But I also strum both ways.

Frank --  in The Dulcimer Book, if I remember right, Jean notates the tunings in reverse order -- Melody, Middle, Bass... not the way we name them today -- Bass, Middle, Melody. She recalls her father's tuning the same way -- bim, bim, BOM...

Because I make and play a variety of instruments, I prefer a  chromatic electronic tuner which shows me not just the Note but the Octave that that note is in. 

These  days there are several that fit that bill, but I still love my Seiko SAT501 handheld.

There have never been any 'classical works' written for the Appalachian dulcimer either.  Leonard Bernstein has been bust with other projects.   IMHO "lower class peasant instrument" is a bit harsh.  No, they were not instruments of the major cities -- Vienna, Paris, Milan -- nor were they "favored" by the hoi polloi of those cities and cultures.  But that doesn't make them 'lower class peasant instruments'.  

Sadly, I have other commitments that weekend.

Age of the instrument doesn't mean  thing when it comes to installing an after-market "built-in" mic.   Not anything you want to DIY for the first time.  

Yep,  build and play psalteries of several kinds.