Forum Activity for @ken-hulme

Welcome to our musical family.  Great purchase as a first instrument.  Here's  link to an article I wrote several years back for folks in your position

https://fotmd.com/strumelia/group_discuss/2316/ken-hulmes-i-just-got-a-dulcimer-now-what-article

The article is called I Just Got A Dulcimer, Now What?  It's an illustrated glossary of dulcimer terms, so we all talk the same jargon, plus answers to many beginner questions about tuning, playing, care and feeding of your new best friend.

Enjoy your journey -- you're in for a fabulous ride!

I don't see why it would.  The difference of distances between frets is pretty small.  So finger placement even with a 3" difference in VSL isn't  that critical, IMHO.  This table compares the distance between frets on 25" VSL with 28" VSL, and there seldom more than .2 difference in fret spacing between 25" and 28" VSLs.  

I saw a 16" VSL instrument tuned DAd once, but the strings were monsterously thick! Almost like an autoharp.   Not fun to play.

I don't consciously "practice".  I just play, stream-of-conscious from the bank of songs and tunes stuck in my head.  No set number of times through.  I'll go back and re-run a sticky bit perhaps.  But I just play.

Jeannie -- so happy to hear from you again after such a long time, an such trauma!  Heal with your music!

Welcome Barlow45 to our happy little corner of Musical Paradise!  We'll gladly give you lots of advice on getting your wife started on this musical journey.  I might suggest that you start a new topic here in the General Mountain Dulcimer forum as more folks will see your query there than in this Introduction thread, and later folks will find our answers to your questions more readily.  

There are literally more than a hundred possibility solutions to your basic question.   In general we recommend avoiding "mass manufacturers" who in other countries, who sell "deals" on Ebay and such.  Brands like First Act come to mind.  

Most of us recommend you start with "Student" model -- dulcimers made specifically to play well and sound good, but which don't have some of the 'bells and whistles' of more expensive dulcimers.  You can find two or three builders of Student models who sell their works for $100 to $175. 

Another option is a cardboard dulcimer.  Yep -- cardboard.  The body anyway.  The critical part of any dulcimer is the fretboard and the accuracy with which the frets are spaced and installed.  Without a good fretboard all you have is what we call a Dulcimer Shaped Object -- suitable only for wall-hanging.  There are, I think, 3 makers of cardboard dulcimers, all of whom make really good fretboards, which can -- after she really loves the instrument -- be installed on a wooden body.  

We can, and will certainly help her learn to play as well.  There are thousands of written and video lessons, song books, audio files and much much more.

Several years ago I wrote an article for beginners called I Just Got A Dulcimer, Now What? which is an illustrated glossary of dulcimer terms (so we all talk the same jargon) plus answers to many beginner questions about tuning, playing, care and feeding of their new instrument.  You can find an electronic copy here:

https://fotmd.com/strumelia/group_discuss/2316/ken-hulmes-i-just-got-a-dulcimer-now-what-article

Lois -- check out the olde version of Shady Grove, called Little Musgrave.  No spooky or lonesome but a great "origin story".  I often perform Musgrave and then explain how lyrics and tunes change over hundreds of years.

The vast majority of the revival and pre-Revival instruments had only 3 courses of single strings -- melody, middle drone and bass.  But pre-Revival luthiers experimented will all sorts of numbers of strings. 

The 4 string, doubled melody course was popularized in the Revival as a way to get more melody volume compared to the mid and bass drones.  

The 5 string, with two doubled course pretty much came from the same era.  They are not common in the dulcimer world today, but not unknown, either.   The idea that all dulcimers must have 5 strings is ludicrous at best.

6 strings -- all courses doubled -- were known a "church"  dulcimers.  The idea being that they had enough volume to be the instrument for services in one-room, backwoods, churches.

Scheitholtz and similar fretted zithers of early America and Europe had as many 16 strings arranged in double, triple and quadruple string courses, as can be seen in the University of Leipzig Instrument collection on-line.

I would hollow.  Or even make the fretboard from three pieces of 1/4" wood in an open box shape.  The fretboard is a massive brace running lengthwise and anything you can do to lighten it up will improve not necessarily volume, but overall sound quality, because more things can vibrate.  

Only 3???

Lay The Bend To The Bonnie Broom -- an early version of Child Ballad #1 Riddles Wisely Expounded, which we know as The Riddle Song

Massacre At Glencoe -- Scottish 'dirge'. "Cruel is the snow that sweeps Glencoe and cover the grave of o' Donald..."

Hughie The Graeme -- Scottish Border Ballad which mentions my clan Hume

Three "moderns":

Don't Let Us Get Sick by Warren Zevon, the theme song for those of us over 60

Last Farewell by Roger Whittaker, in the great ballad tradition

Suzanne by Leonard Cohen

Hommel, Hummel, or Humle are also names for Dutch and other Western European versions of the American Dulcimer, and are played the same way.  When you google-search you may also want to include "folk instrument".  It's possible you may find a Hommel maker in the Netherlands even.

http://www.essentialvermeer.com/folk_music/hommel.html

Jimmy -- you're sorta writing that tuning 'backwards'.  Most people today write a tuning starting with the Bass string, not the melody strings.   That helps you know what key the tuning is in.  Also, most folks today do not write the doubled melody strings as 2 letters unless the string are tuned to different notes.    What you have is Aeolian Mode, DAC; the key of Dminor.

Personally I would NOT store a dulcimer in a hot car in a parking lot!!  Corian would probably hold up, but would be almighty HEAVY!   As Banjimer says, store your dulcimer alongside your desk in the office, then take it to the park, rather than storing it in the care.  Everything expands and shrinks with heat and cold -- wood, metal, plastic, Corian.  The trick is finding the material with the smallest expansion.

Nothing wrong with an all wood dulcimer; you just need the patience to spend a minute or two checking your tuning when you get to the park.  

There's a classic photo of an older woman bowing a regular dulcimer.  She sits back from the edge of a table with the tail of the dulcimer in her lap and the body leaned up against the edge of the table directly away from her.  This instrument could certainly be bowed that way.  But who knows!  Maybe it was a John Jacob Niles experiment!!

Bowed instruments are not played with the bow string parallel to the soundboard.  The bow string runs diagonally from the center of the strings to just above the edge of the instrument, on both sides:    /__\

The fretboard is set up so that you have both diatonic and chromatic frets.  Diatonic under all 7 strings, and chromatic only under the first three strings. 

HUGE amount of soundhole area -- far more than is needed. 

The way the fretboard is "radiused" with a ridge rather than a curve (never seen anything quite like that), plus the narrowness of the bouts makes me wonder if it wasn't intended to be a bowed instrument.

A great many of the olde dulcimers from the 1800s had no strum hollow.  In part the function of the hollow is to reduce the weight of that massive brace that runs from end to end which we call a fretboard.  If you have decent strum technique you won't hit the fretboard, regardless of a strum hollow or not.  

The "mathematically correct" place to strum is half way between the fret being pressed and the bridge; which of course changes with each note.  Most of us find ourselves strumming somewhere up around fret 12-14.  Changing the location of the strum can be used to good effect depending on the song.  

As Dusty says, learning to strum both ways is good (it took me 15 years to 'get it').  Learning to strum 'up and out' and 'in and down' will help emphasize the melody string sounds, not lose them in the hum of the drones.   

Enjoy the journey!

You might try ironing out any remaining cheesiness...  put down a soft cloth or even a double layer of paper towel.  Place it over the spot and iron on medium heat.  that should make any grease rise into the cloth or paper towel.  After that, then tung oil should be the perfect finish.  I finish almost all my instruments with tung oil; I like the satin finish you get after about 4 coats.

How big is the speck? 

What kind of 'kitchen grease" (bacon fat, vegetable oil, butter or margarine, etc)? 

How do you intend to finish the fretboard when you're done -- varnish, tung oil, urethane, boiled linseed oil, etc??

Dan's video is "da bomb".  Yes, we use tiny drill bits and sometimes tiny hand drills, but they are readily available and inexpensive.  You have to pre-drill the holes for the staple legs, then bend the staples, and finally tap them into place.  It is simple, but a somewhat lost art, and does take a little practice to get it perfect.

Don -- look on the Strothers Chord Finder __ http://strothers.com/chords.html  or one of the dozens of dulcimer chord finder charts available to download.

Talk to Jerry Read Smith at Song Of The Wood, in Black Mountain, NC.  I understand he has closed the downtown shop, but continues to work out of his home.

If you can find the old ED Discussions by Richard Troughear called An Interesting Dulcimer Experiment, he may have researched and reported on the phenomena.  I use 1/8" normally because I can readily get wood already thicknessed to that dimension.  Sanding doesn't take off much from that.

I'll bet those are the same chord progressions that guitar players use when playing accompaniment rather than melody.

Knowing those progressions would certainly save on the reams of paper that most people collect of jam tune tabs and carry around with them.  Save having to sight-read or memorize words and tunes as well.

Until you get a capo, you can use a short strip of blue painter's tape to hold the loop in place while you change a string.  Probably best not to remove ALL the strings at once.  Pull one, replace one... and repeat. If the bridge is not in a slot on top the fretboard, and you remove all the strings, getting the bridge back in the correct place to the nearest millimeter can be a major problem.

I re-tune my zither pin dulcimers and other instruments all the time.  As long as you don't pull/push the exposed part of the pin to the side (bending the exposed pin or putting excess pressure on the buried pin) -- and the pins are firmly embedded in a HARD hardwood like Walnut, Maple or harder, then you should have no problem retuning with some frequency.  

Still, if I were you, I would experiment with tunings on an instrument with geared tuners -- until you settle on 2 or 3 tunings that you find useful for most of the tunes you play

Personally I'd regret not getting the Keith Young instrument.  I was considering having him build me on of his Virginia traditional dulcimer, when he up and passed away...

If you have very sensitive acoustic recording gear like an oscilliscope, I believe that you can see the difference between an hourglass (especially a wasp-waisted design) and an hourglass -- the soundwaves would show two peaks -- one for each bout. If I remember, Richard Troughear, the scientific luthier down in Australia demonstrated this.  However I do not believe the human ear is capable of such discrimination.  

Lisa --  

Like many things dulcimer, it depends... on what you consider "short" and "inexpensive".  Personally I would not touch a First Act dulcimer.  We'd had far too many reports here and elsewhere about poor fret spacing and shoddy workmanship making them mostly unplayable.  Same thing with the Seagull Merlin stick instruments.  

We seldom even think of dulcimer in terms of their overall length. But a 30" overall dulcimer will probably have a VSL of under 24".  There are several that fit that size criteria including Dave Lynch's Travel Dulcimer at Sweetwoodsinstruments.com , David Beede's Eedy Beede model, and McSpadden's Ginger.  But they are not "inexpensive", with prices from $225 to over $500.

Inexpensive but not short are the cardboard dulcimers, from a couple different makers, with about 27" VSLs and corregated bodies.  Overall length perhaps 34".  Priced from $75 to $90.  They have superior fret spacing so you get good, clean notes, but are basically the same size as conventional dulcimers.

If you have relatively simple woodworking skills you can build a simple box dulcimer with any VSL you want for about $50 in materials  -- two sides, two ends, top & bottom, staple frets and autoharp tuning pins.  Although technically a zither, not a dulcimer, I am just about to start building one similar to the attached photo.  It's going to be 24" overall, 4" wide, and about 1" deep, with a 20-22" VSL.  I'm building it specifically to fit in a suitcase for upcoming trips to England and Scotland, where I've been asked to play and there are no available loner dulcimers.

 Scheitholt.jpg - 12KB

Irene -- sounds like your friend got a great dulcimer, and maybe not such good advice from her local club.  You should encourage her to set the dulcimer back up as a 6 string; and encourage her to learn to play in other tunings beside DAd.  Playing noter & drone style in DAd on a dulcimer with a 6+ fret does not give the player the same advantage as it does chord-melody players, plain and simple.   I played noter & drone on a six string (no 6+ fret) for a number of years, and it gives you a GREAT sound (but needs a bit more care because you have to fret two strings not just one).

String gauges -- as Ken Longfield says -- you MUST know the VSL to get the right string gauges.  Then use  the Strothers String Calculator.  Packages of strings are sometimes labelled -- DAA or DAd -- and they'll be close for most VSLs between 25 and 27", but not necessarily right.   If she buys packages of strings, she should get 2 packages and replace ALL the strings (one at a time -- never take off all the strings at once).

Send your friend a copy of my I Just Got A Dulcimer, Now What? article.

Pondoro -- As Ken Longfield said, you can play noter & drone in any tuning with any dulcimer.  But the vast majority of tunes out there in Dulcimer Land do not require the flatted 7th note which is what distinguishes DAd from other tunings.  DAd tuning with a 6+ fret does not give a noter & drone player any advantage the way it does modern chord-melody players.

If you're serious about wanting to learn to play Noter & Drone style,  the Berea Traditional Dulcimer Gathering is just what the dulcimer doctor ordered!  The Gathering focusses only on traditional dulcimers and dulcimer playing -- noter & drone or fingerdancing.  As we say --  "no chord playing allowed" -- and 99% of the people who tune DAd play chord-melody style which is not traditional.  Most traditional dulcimers were set up to play in DAA, Ddd or ddd -- or their other key equivalents.  So, we are gently "discouraging" people who habitually tune DAd because the focus is going to be completely on Traditional dulcimers and dulcimer playing.   

As a noter & drone player you're going to want to learn to play in ALL the common Modes (Ionian, Dorian, Aeolian & Mixolydian) and Modal Tunings; and maybe other as well.  N&D players re-tune frequently (it's only 1 string that is re-tuned after all; and only takes seconds).  Many of us play a set of tunes in a given tuning, then switch and play a set in another tuning.

As far as noters -- I recommend to my students that they use a hard wood stick ( not a hardware store dowel) about the same diameter as their Index finger -- 3/8" to 1/2" or a bit more.  I make a lot of noters from "pen blanks" that I buy online, and they are 4-5" long -- a comfortable grip for most hands.  The harder the wood, the better.  River cane Bamboo makes great noters.  Here's a link to my Noter & Drone article/booklet called Get Noterized .

https://fotmd.com/strumelia/group_discuss/2317/ken-hulmes-get-noterized-article

Strings are strings -- as long as the gauge is right.

Lisa -- secret to not breaking strings when tuning is to always tune a "singing" string.  Hold the tuner knob you think is the right one.  Pluck the string and turn it 1/4 turn.  If the singing string does not change pitch -- STOP -- you have the wrong tuner.  

Hi Lisa;  Welcome to the wacky world of dulcimers.  I think you're going to fit right in!  A Cardboard dulcimer is a good, inexpensive place to start -- the frets are accurately place which means the notes are true.  Later, if you like, you can have a wooden body made (or make it yourself) and put the fretboard from your cardboard dulcimer on new body.  I did that recently for a student of mine, and it was pretty inexpensive to do.  

Here's a link to an article I wrote several years ago, called I Just Got A Dulcimer, Now What?   It's an illustrated glossary of dulcimer terms (so we all speak the same jargon) plus answers to many beginner questions about the tuning, playing, care and feeding of your new friend.  Good reading while you wait for your dulcimer to arrive...
https://fotmd.com/strumelia/group_discuss/2316/ken-hulmes-i-just-got-a-dulcimer-now-what-article  

 Body for CB Dulcimer.JPG - 75KB

Sad.  So young...

An Embarrassment of Dulcimers?

Several episodes of the TV series Daniel Boone, where Fess Parker actually played (rather than just faking) a dulcimer for his wife.

Several music related TV programs where Cyndi Lauper plays her dulcimer.  Taught by David Schnauffer.  She composes all her tunes on dulcimer. 

Mark -- first thing you'll learn in the dulcimer world is that there is not such thing as "best".  The 'best' anything is what works for you... not someone else.

With 40 years experience as a dulcimer builder and player, my advice is to start with a "Student" model dulcimer such as the one made by Dave "Harpmaker" at www.sweetwoodsinstruments.com His student model is an excellent starting place without being terribly expensive.  There are two or three other student models out there.  I own one of Dave's and use it as a loaner. 

If money is a real issue, start with one of the cardboard dulcimers for about $75.  The fretboard is the important part of the instrument, and those fretboards are spot on.  When you decide you like the dulcimer, you -- or someone you know -- can make you a nice wooden body, to which you transfer the fretboard from your cardboard starter.   I did that recently for one of my students...

Builders like Dave will play their instruments for you over the phone, but generally don't have other builder's instruments to compare.  Without much knowledge of dulcimers, listening to "the sound" isn't that useful because instruments in different tunings will sound different and you won't recognize the difference.

Where are you in "the Northeast"?  We might be able to point you to someone.  Chances are you'll not find dulcimers walking into music stores unless they specialize in acoustic music, and then you'll probably only find one "brand".  A dulcimer Festival is the best place to check out lots of different dulcimers, but it will be a couple months before 'festival season' kicks in.

There is a ton of information here at FOTMD; start reading. As Lisa suggests, join the Beginner Group and start looking there.

Pondoro -- did I give you copies of my articles for newcomers? I Just Got A Dulcimer, Now What?  is an illustrated glossary of dulcimer terms so we all speak the same jargon, plus andswers to many beginner questions about tuning, playing,care and feeding of your new instrument.  Here they are 

Get Noterized.pdf - 87KB

I'm not sure that any single person actually makes any one McSpad.  I understood that the group collectively makes the parts and performs the assemblies and at the appropriate time maker's labels with different names are applied to each instrument.