Forum Activity for @dusty

Michael, what you are referring to is called pick clack. It is more pronounced with thinner picks, so you might try heavier picks.  Heavier strings, and a softer strum. 

And make sure you are not hitting the fretboard with your pick.  Just strum or pick across the top of the strings.

When you strum you don't want the pick to get down into the strings but merely skim the top of them.  Angle the pick ever so slightly so that the tip points toward you when you strum out and away from you when you strum in.  Also, angle the pick ever so slightly so that it is the edge of the pick that hits the strings. Assuming you are right-handed, the left edge should hit the strings when you strum out and the right edge should do so when you strum in.  These techniques minimize the amount of the pick that comes into contact with the strings.

One final question.  Where was the microphone when you recorded yourself?  Conventional wisdom is that pick clack sounds louder to the performer than it does the listener.  You can test that by putting the mic right in front of the dulcimer and recording yourself, then moving the mic progressively further away and seeing what happens. Presumably, the notes will ring out louder than the pick clack, so that the further from the instrument the listener is the less noticeable is the pick clack.

Chuck, first remember that there is a difference between single-instructor events and larger festivals and gatherings.  To add an Event, you start from your home page and click on "Events."

Once you are on your Events page, you click the "+" sign to add a new event.

Then you will get to a screen where you can put in all the information for your event. When you are done, don't forget to click "Create Event."

 Thanks, Brian, for that link to the Great Canadian Tunebook. There are loads of great tunes there.

Kristi, "Four Strong Winds" was written by Ian Tyson in the 1960s and is surely copyrighted, so Ken cannot post his tab here.

You can easily find lyrics and chords for it on the internet, though.  And just noodling around I was able to find the melody pretty easily. In DAA the melody ranges from the open A string to the 6th fret.  You can also play it in DAd on the melody string if you have a 6+ fret.

As Ken suggests, FOTMD member Marc Mathieu  is the one to contact here.  Check this out:

I think I remember him sharing some information, including tablature, for this song somewhere.

There are also plenty of fiddle tunes of Canadian origin that have entered into the standard old timey and bluegrass traditions.  " Saint Anne's Reel " is one that comes to mind.

And it shouldn't be hard to create tab for the Ian and Sylvia Tyson classic "Four Strong Winds," a tune I would consider the Canadian "This Land is Your Land."

Thanks for reminding us all of this date, Patricia.

Folks who have listened to the Hearts of the Dulcimer podcast on Neal Hellman know that when he was still in New York he prepared a book of tablature of Richard Fariña's music.  A few year's back, he made that book available free online as a pdf.  You can read Neal's blog and download the pdf here .

Rod was the first one who welcomed a lot of us to FOTMD.  He was a true gentleman.  I remember fondly playing with him as well on the Tuesday Dulcimer Club on Paltalk.  After his passing I just found it too sad to continue joining that online gathering.

Patricia and Wayne, I finally had a chance to listen to the Neal episode. Even though I've seen your film countless times and enjoyed innumerable conversations with Neal directly, I still found the podcast both informative and entertaining. You managed to get some details out of him that he doesn't often reveal.  Your choice of music is also impeccable.  Although I have all of Neal's CDs and many of the Gourd Music titles (including the Shaker trilogy) I still came away from your podcast with a renewed respect for the "sometimes folk, sometimes classical, always acoustic" or "folk baroque" vision with which Neal infuses all the Gourd Music recordings. 

I haven't seen you guys in a while but I hope our paths cross again soon.

 Look out, Dana's gone electric!  She's gonna be playing Pete Townshend power chords soon and rockin' the neighborhood.

Thanks for posting that Molineaux piece, Rob.  That's superb playing.    I can't count high enough to play anything in 9/8 time!  But those partial frets are surely interesting.

One possibility if you want the option of extra frets but don't always want them on your dulcimer is the flexi-frets that Dwain Wilder at Bear Meadow has developed.  I have a friend here in Cali who has all the extra frets installed as flexi-frets, so he can go from a purely diatonic to a fully chromatic dulcimer or anything in between.  I was skeptical that they would work at all, but they actually do.

George, I write from the perspective of someone who uses a 1+ fret regularly in my own playing. I have dulcimers without it, but I use them mainly for teaching, since beginners get confused when my fretboard does not look like theirs.

If you have vintage dulcimers of any monetary or historic value, I would not add the extra fret.  But feel free to add it to modern dulcimers or those whose values you don't er . . . uh . . . value.

You ask what notes you get. Obviously the answer to that question depends on the tuning. In a DAd tuning, you get the lowered (or minor) third (meaning an F natural) on the bass and melody string and you get the 7th (meaning a C natural) on the middle string.  Just being able to play a 7th chord down low without jumping up to the 6th fret is really nice. And the lowered third of the D chord is also the 7th of the G chord, so you get D7 and G7 very easily.  With that C natural, you can also play a C chord, which is found not only in modern music but also traditional tunes such as Old Joe Clark, Red-Haired Boy, Salt Creek, and more. I often use the 1+ fret on the melody and bass string just to add a little bluesy sumpin in the middle of a short solo, but it also allows you to play the minor pentatonic scale, so you really can play the blues in D without a capo and without retuning. And of course, you get the entire D minor scale as well.

We should really create a discussion in the Extra Frets group about why people like the 1+ fret.

I have to admit that I'm jealous of those of you who can attend week-long festivals in general and KMW in particular. Between work and family I just can't get away for that long.  Someday . . . when I retire . . .

You may want to record the instructor playing the pieces you are working on.  Usually, he or she will demonstrate each piece once before going over it section by section. It can be really helpful to know what things should sound like at full speed.

Did Aaron show you the spider exercise where he moves the fingers of his left hand two-at-a-time?  That's pretty tough at first.  The only person I've met who could do it perfectly the first time is my daughter's piano teacher, and she could do it with both hands.

A tuner and a capo.  Maybe some clothespins or something to clip music onto your stand.  And bring some kind of recording device; a smartphone will do.  I would also bring something to write with and on in case you want to take notes.  

Bring some cash so you can buy CDs and books and stuff.

And I would agree with your dulcimer group leader. Challenge yourself. I lead a free beginner's workshop every month and too many people have been coming for a long time, refusing to accept the fact that they are really intermediate players now. The beginner material is comfortable to them but no longer challenges them.  A good workshop should be just beyond your reach, so that you have to go home and work on the stuff for a while.

You might see what folks in the Music Therapy group have to say about this.

I would stick with instrumentals, myself.

And we'll be able to say "I knew him when . . ."

You are a find ambassador for the dulcimer, Kevin.

Wow! We're up to 14 already?  We just had Neal up here in Sacramento for a workshop and concert this past weekend.  I look forward to taking a break from work and checking out the latest episode.

Thanks for all you do!

 Sheryl, the place to start is the page of the song you want to add to a playlist.  There you will see two eighth notes.  If you hover your cursor over them, it will say "Add to Playlist." 

When you click that, you will see the Playlists you already have or it will ask you to create one.

I notice that a lot of Dana's "rookie mistakes" involved the instrument itself and not necessarily how to play it.  It would be nice if every newbie had an experienced player or two to help them find their first instrument.  How could a newbie know about VSL or action or anything like that?  As some of you have noticed, perhaps, I've been advising people to get a good student or beginner dulcimer to start with and not even think about a fancier instrument for a couple of years. It takes a while playing to know what your preferences are. As Ken says, "the journey matters," and I would go further and say it is all there is. There is no final resting place where we cease to evolve as musicians.

Bryan, sorry I couldn't get back to you earlier; I was out-of-town on a business trip.

You are right that picks are a personal choice and what works for one person may not work for another.  When I first got a dulcimer I bought a bunch of those triangular Herdim picks but didn't like them at all (too thin, too big, too pointy).  So I eventually went back to the Dunlop Tortex picks that I settled on after years of guitar playing. They come in various shapes and thicknesses.  I prefer the standard shape.  I use the blue 1.0 mm picks when I've been playing a lot but sometimes use the green .88 mm picks when I haven't played in a while. When I first started on the dulcimer I think I used a lighter pick, but as I've gotten more comfortable with my technique I've moved to slightly heavier picks.

Part of the trick to my style of play--which is admittedly a guitar style and not a traditional dulcimer style--is to hold the pick between my thumb and the side of my index finger such that only the very tip of the pick sticks out.  That way a lot of the pick is in contact with my skin, making it steadier in my hand.  If I am only strumming and not playing single notes, I might let more of the pick stick out, but to play careful single-note runs as in fiddle tunes, I find I need the control that comes with allowing only a bit of the pick to stick out.

Heavier picks require a softer, more controlled touch, so most beginners have trouble with them. But they are also more precise. Just imagine the pick as it hits a string.  The very tip of the pick will bend, so that it strikes the note slightly after you have made the picking motion with your hand.  The thinner the pick the more the delay between your intended strum and the sounding of the note, since the pick bends more.  So not only does the note sound after the beat, but the snap-back of that bend produces a more pronounced pick clack.  For these reasons I prefer the thicker picks, in particular the blue and green versions.

Play around with this stuff and with different picks for different styles of play. I would never tell anyone to play like I do unless you purposefully want to play in a guitar style. I did a flatpicking workshop with FOTMD member Erin Mae (formerly Rogers) and she dumped a whole bunch of different picks out for us to play with, including one made of genuine turtle shell and one that was one of the $75 BlueChip picks.  Each one had a different feel and a different tone. But at one point she did admit that before she got serious enough to spend on those expensive picks, the Dunlop Tortex was also her choice (sorry, I don't know what style or thickness she preferred).

Of course, if you get tired of all this, you can always just play with your bare fingers!

Just a few thoughts here.  

First, thinner picks have a lot more pick clack than stiffer/heavier picks.  In general, beginners start with thinner picks and as they get more experience and control they move to heavier picks. Anyone annoyed with pick clack might simply try heavier picks. Your playing will become a bit more precise in the process.

Second, you can minimize pick clack (but not get rid of it entirely) with a different technique. Hold the pick loosely, not tightly in your hand, and think of it as gliding over the top of the strings rather than getting into each one and really plucking it.

Third, some folks claim that pick clack always sounds louder to the player than it does to the audience. I supposed you could test this by making a series of recordings with the mic in different places, but I've never tried myself.

Fourth, a leather pick (or those felt picks that some uke players use or even rubber picks that I use for an acoustic bass) would all have less pick clack than a plastic pick, but that doesn't mean they are equally versatile. Although I think you could probably strum OK with a leather pick, I am not sure you would have the control to flatpick, meaning playing long single-note runs.  So if you always strum across all the strings it might work OK, but if you want to play a fiddle tune or a filler lick the leather might not provide enough precision.

I encourage everyone to experiment with as many different types of picks as possible.  Eventually you will find the one for you.  I use a standard guitar pick (the Dunlop Tortex picks) and the only ones that I prefer more than those are way too expensive (like the BlueChip picks that range between $35 and $75 for a single pick!    ).

Erin, I am not sure about apps or downloads or even iPads, but there are plenty of free audio conversion websites where you upload an audio file and specify what format you want the file in.  IF you just Google something like "online audio converter" you will get several options.  One I have used is available here , which allows you to specify the format you want the file converted to and also the quality (which equates to size) of that file.

Hey Ozarklady.

I can't explain why, but the Seagull is made with one full octave, meaning it goes to the 7th fret. However, it has no 6th fret. Instead, it has only a 6-1/2.

Seagull is a fine guitar company. They make very good and affordable instruments. I have a 12-string Seagull that I like a lot. I've also heard that many Merlin owners love that instrument as well. Think of it as a stick dulcimer like the McNally Strumstick, which only goes up to the 10th fret or something. If I were going to get a Merlin, though, I would have a 6 fret installed.

You might consider poking around in the Stick Dulcimer Group here at FOTMD. I'm sure some folks there are more familiar than I with the Merlin.

Jim, that's a good point. Basically, there is a slightly different VSL for each string.  On some bridges that difference is accounted for not in the angle of the bridge at the bottom where it meets the soundboard, but at the top where slight differences are created for each string.  And some of David Beede's dulcimers, for example, don't actually have a single bridge at all, but three distinct nubs placed in the perfect place for each string.

John P embodied what is best about the dulcimer community: an interest in helping others, the joy in sharing music, a general kindness and willingness to take time explaining things to newbies.  He was always eager to share his knowledge of modes and never seemed to get irritated by those like me who never could quite grasp them.

It may seem odd to be so saddened to hear of the passing of someone I've never met, but such is our community. I feel as though I've lost a friend.

Just a day or two ago I was perusing the photos John had posted and was struck by a couple of potted flowers.  I am not sure why I was so taken by them, but I think they reveal a joy in simple things. The flowers themselves--though quite pretty--were nothing special, but John's interest in them and sense that they deserved to be photographed reveals, I think, a sense of the wonder in our everyday lives.  John clearly enjoyed those flowers, and he clearly enjoyed explaining modes over and over to those of us a bit slow on the uptake.

Rest in Peace, John P., the dear friend I never met.

The original question was how to play grace notes.   I am not sure it is helpful to bring in accidentals, since grace notes may or may not be accidentals. 

As Ken notes, grace notes are often ornamental in nature and not an essential part of the melody. As Robin explains they are usually written much smaller than regular notes in standard musical notation.

Grace notes always appear just before a note and they receive no counted value. The note just after the grace note sounds on beat, so the grace note actually takes away some of the duration of the note preceding it.

On a stringed instrument, a grace note would be plucked with the right hand, but the left hand would employ a slide, a hammer-on, or a pull-off to play the main note after the grace note. I do not think many of us could actually pick both notes fast or smoothly enough. But the important point, again, is that the note following the grace note falls exactly on the beat, so the grace note precedes it without itself receiving any counted value.

Below is the first line of my arrangement of the old Quaker hymn Beech Spring.  Notice the three grace notes.  In each case, I suggest playing it as a hammer-on.  If this were arranged for noter/drone play in DAA, I would suggest a slide in the first case and a hammer-on in the second and third since the grace note would be the open string.  And note that none of these grace notes are accidentals.

Thanks, Dana.  "Lee's Waltz" is a pretty special tune. 

Actually, Bing Futch's "Rosin the Beau," which he says he learned from Stephen Seifert's CD, was the first tune I learned on the dulcimer.  Even before I had my own dulcimer, I watched Bing's video so much that when I first got a dulcimer I was able to play the tune almost right away.

Fascinating indeed. I showed the video to my daughter, and the more we watched it and understood the variety of sounds the machine was making the more impressed we became. Aside from the detail that went into construction, it is the original vision of this thing that astounds me.  How do you even come up with this idea?

It's great to hear of the "go-to" songs people rely on.  Many of them are standard fare for dulcimer players, meaning songs that would be commonly heard at dulcimer jams. Others are more idiosyncratic.  Several are on my "to learn" list.

Maybe I could change the original question a bit?  Originally I asked what your "pocket tune" was, meaning the song you play when someone asks, "Oh, you play the dulcimer?  Play a song for us!"  What if the person asking the question is her or himself a dulcimer player?  Does that change your choice of song? I mean, if another dulcimer player requests a song you don't play Bile Dem Cabbage, do you?

The reason for my question is that I will be playing a very short set at a dulcimer festival later this spring, so the audience will be other dulcimer players.  While I want to stay within my "comfort zone" to reduce performance anxiety, I also want to play something other than the same tunes everyone else plays.

That thing is insane. I am going to have to watch about a dozen more times to figure it out.  How someone could envision this is just beyond me.

The conventional wisdom seems to be that for those who chord a lot and have smaller hands, a shorter VSL around 26" is better than a more standard VSL around 28". And although 2 inches in total VSL might not seem like much, it makes a significant difference in fret spacing.

I would just make two points here to qualify that conventional wisdom.

First, our hands stretch. It might seem at first that playing a 1-2-4 chord on an instrument with a 28" or 29" VSL is a bit of a stretch, but remember that that is probably the hardest chord to finger and also that as you play more your hands will stretch. Even after 40 years of playing the guitar and 6 years on the dulcimer I started doing an exercise last month that was a real stretch for me.  My fingers and the spaces between them were sore from playing it so much. At first I didn't think I'd ever be able to make those stretches cleanly and without pain. But now I can do both.  The muscles in our hands need to stretch and exercise just like the other muscles in our bodies.  Don't jump to a shorter VSL without actually working on your fingering and stretching your hand muscles first. You might surprise yourself.

Second, in addition to the decreased sustain that Joy mentions, a shorter VSL means smaller frets. That may seem like an advantage down low toward the nut, but as you play up the neck, some of those frets will get awfully small, and playing there will be a real challenge.  Most beginners don't find themselves playing up that high, but as we progress and feel more comfortable with the fretboard, we do indeed jump over those hurdles and start fingering the fretboard well into the second octave.  Watch Guy Babusek, for example. He often plays high up the fretboard, and I would bet that he would not be able to do so as successfully on an instrument with a shorter VSL.

What about you, Strumelia? What do you aspire to with your music?

I've played music my whole life, and not once did it occur to me to ask why. I just assumed that people play music.  My grandmother growing up in Brooklyn used to buy the sheet music to the top hits as soon as they were released and she and her sisters would sing the songs on the streets for spare change.  My mom and her two brothers play guitar and other instruments, and at all the family gatherings, after a day of swimming and eating and catching up with relatives, we would sing around the campfire.  It never occurred to me to play music for a reason; making music is just something you do, like hugging your children or telling stories or sharing delicious recipes or complaining about the political process.

But later in life, I did get a bit more ambitious. At one point I tried to play bluegrass mandolin and bluegrass guitar.  My goal was just to improve my technique enough to be able to play at those bluegrass jams.  That effort led directly to my discovery of the dulcimer, and although I abandoned the bluegrass obsession with speed, I have continued to try to actually work on my playing, to practice enough to actually play songs without really obvious mistakes, to develop a steadier right hand and a more flexible left hand and to slowly understand the fingerboard. Until recently, my goal as a dulcimer player was just to continue to improve, something measured by my own ears, not someone else's.

But those goals may be changing again.  I started a dulcimer group a few years ago, hoping to lure out or the woodwork as many dulcimer players as I could who would be able to share their knowledge with me. Instead, although I do indeed have a group to play with on a monthly basis, the people that I've gathered are all beginners.  Our monthly gatherings have turned into my teaching them, and I started arranging tunes not for me to play, but in order to share with others. I am now on the precipice of becoming an actual dulcimer teacher and have several beginning students lined up.  So I guess my immediate goal is to continue playing the dulcimer and improving as a player while also devoting some time to refining how to teach others.

Every now and then someone asks me where they can find my CDs or books and I have to giggle. I am just an amateur musician. I have a day job. Still, I fantasize about someday putting together enough tunes for a CD to share with my friends and family or an instructional book (I do have one good idea, in fact) that might interest other dulcimer players.  But with a job, a family, and now a slowly growing number of dulcimer students, I don't know if I'll have time for any of that.  I am just glad that music is an integral part of my life. My life continues to be enriched immeasurably by music, and I have FOTMD to thank in that regard.

Wayne, I love the podcasts you guys have produced and I hope they keep coming.  

If I remember correctly, and earlier version of Hearts of the Dulcimer included a clip of the video I posted above when Joni mentions the "dynamite gal from California" who made her dulcimer.  I think it was on a small TV and you used it as an intro to talk with Joellen.

Hey Blissness, I don't use Finale personally, but I do use Tabledit. It is incredibly powerful but also not very intuitive.  I have gotten to the point where I can tab out an arrangement pretty quickly, but when I try to create multiple endings to songs or indicate chords above the tab or use a capo, it is not obvious how to do all that. I have stopped trying to figure it out on my own and just go online for help. Several of us have begun to use the Arranging for Dulcimers Group  to ask questions about that kind of thing.  There is a free trial version of Tabledit that allows you to arrange pieces up to 16 or 24 measures. You might try it out and see how you like it.

Anne, I am not sure what "reasonably priced" means. I used a Blue Snowflake mic for a long time. It worked great with my PC.  I think it cost about $50 new, but you might be able to find it on Ebay for less than that.  A quick internet search showed me that the slightly larger Blue Snowball is now selling for about that same price.  

I also used a Samson Go Mic  which is a bit more versatile, since you can change the setting from unidirectional to omnidirectional (in case you want to record a group playing) as well a setting that dampens the sound a bit for when it is directly in front of you.  I think that retails for just under $40. Either of those choices will work a lot better than the mic built into your computer or webcam.  The Samson Go can clip onto the top of your monitor but it also comes with a little case. It is remarkably small for its recording power.  (I no longer use it for recording music, but I use it at work when we have to broadcast meetings over the internet. I just put it in the middle of the table and it picks up soft-spoken people 20 feet away.)

Thanks, Ken.  I think I'm going to have to get one of those gun cases. 

Dan, that case looks really interesting since it would basically be a custom-fitted case for whatever dulcimer you have. And the price is cheaper than most hard shell cases around.

However, I am concerned about the foam padding staying in contact with the wood for such extended periods.  Have you had any problems in that regard?  I know bubble pack can very quickly leave a semi-permanent mark on dulcimer finishes.

Just last night I gave a private lesson to a brand new player, and towards the end I explained what a "pocket tune" is.  I then gave her some tablature for a version of Beech Spring that I worked up for my dulcimer group. I explained that it stresses certain left-hand techniques such as hammer-ons, but otherwise is pretty accessible, and sounds better the slower it is played. I played it for her and she got really excited. So we have our first goal: to learn Beech Spring as her first pocket tune.

I think we overcome a major hurdle and reach a new, more proficient place in our abilities as a musician when we can make a mistake and keep playing.  I know I saw something similar with my daughter, who used to just stop playing the piano when she made a mistake. But now she has learned how to keep playing--even making something up--until she gets back on course.  It can be a great confidence boost to know we can make a mistake and not fall flat on our face but keep the music moving along. I was recently asked to play something on the dulcimer at the end of a ukulele workshop that I attended, and afterwards a woman commented that it was nice to see someone really enjoy playing.  What she was referring to was the fact that I smiled and even chuckled at one point. But I did that in reaction to a mistake I had made!  Happily, she misinterpreted my amusement entirely, so a liability became an asset.

I now have a list of about 30 "backpack" tunes. I consider these the tunes from which I would choose to put together a set of music.  I am going to make an effort to play through the whole list on a regular basis to keep rust from accumulating.