Forum Activity for @dusty

I doubt it. But that's a good question.

Yes. Absolutely. You cannot play tunes based on the mixolydian mode otherwise. So "Going to Boston" and "Old Joe Clark, " for two common examples, necessitate a 1-5-8 tuning.  My guess is that people referred to the tunings by common tunes. So 1-5-8 might have been referred to as "the Old Joe Clark tuning" and 1-5-7 might have been "the Shady Grove tuning."

More generally, I think you are right to connect full-length frets with extra frets.  The 6.5 fret allows the 1-5-8 tuning to get the major 7th note of the major scale, but melody notes below the tonic have to be played on the middle string.  So the 6.5 fret alone would not necessarily allow a drone player to play in the ionian mode.  (Not trying to scare anyone with fancy terms, plagal melodies require using the middle string in 1-5-8 but authentic melodies do not.) My point is merely that only if we are fretting across the strings can we make full use of a 6.5 fret.

Having said that, some drone-style players do indeed make use of extra frets.  Don Pedi has both a 1+ and a 6+ on his Modern Mountain Dulcimer dulcimer, although he often uses more traditional dulcimers for demonstrations.

Jerry, I don't think there is a specific time.  It was a slow evolution. According to dulcimer lore, sometime in the late 60s Howie Mitchell and Richard Fariña both independently put 6+ frets on their dulcimers. Slowly over the next 40 years or so, it became more popular and is considered standard today. 

I wonder if the same evolution will happen with the 1+ fret (which I use).  It is still in the minority now, but some luthiers are offering their standard dulcimers with the 1+ and 6+ frets, and you have to specify if you want a traditional diatonic fretboard.

I once asked Neal Hellman when he started using the 6+ fret and he couldn't even remember.  He acknowledged that his first dulcimers were all diatonic and that his later ones all had the 6+ fret, and yet he couldn't remember when he first starting using the fret.  Apparently the change for him was no big deal.

I hope this conversation can stay focused on the timing of this change rather than turn into a debate on the merits of different fret systems and styles of play.

The direction of this discussion exemplifies why Nate's original question is so hard to answer: there are a lot of variables.  He started out asking if modifying the way the strings attached to the dulcimer might increase the tension of the soundboard, thus increasing volume.   But the conversation moved on to the tension of the strings themselves and now how the fretboard is attached to the body of the dulcimer.  The "floating" tailpiece or, as David Beed calls it, the " decoupled tailpiece " surely affects the tension of the soundboard, but more importantly, by reducing its contact with the soundboard, it frees the soundboard to vibrate more, which changes both the volume and the timber of the dulcimer.  Again, that is adding another variable to the equation. Dwain and John mentioned bracing and sound posts, which add even more variables to consider

I am not a builder, and I haven't studied physics since high school, so I might be way off base here.  But I wonder if the issue is not the whether tension increases or decreases volume, but where the Goldilocks sweet spot is.  On guitars, too little or too much bracing will reduce the responsiveness of the instrument.  On a dulcimer, I presume, too much or too little tension (or stiffness of the wood) would not produce sufficient volume. If we were to map out the relationship between tension and volume, the result might not be a straight line, but something resembling a parabolic arc.

Hey LP.  I know Stephen Seifert has tab for it in his Join the Jam book, and I think I've seen @Mark-Gilston share tab for the tune as well. 

At the website dulcibertab.com, which compiles all the tab that used to be on the old Everything Dulcimer site, you can find the tune out of DAd with a capo at 1 .  I can't vouch for the quality of the arrangement, though.

@John-Petry, the 2024 Hindman Homecoming livestream on YouTube is streaming Hearts of the Mountain Dulcimer during their lunch hour.  I didn't catch it live, but it's still there.

Thanks, @phil-myers, but I can't take credit for the tune.  I found a short fiddle demo of the tune online, with an indication that it was written by Susan Reid.  I found a few videos online of the Vermont Fiddle Orchestra playing songs by her, so I wrote a letter to her c/o the Vermont Fiddle Orchestra, and included the dulcimer tab I had created.  I heard back about a month later.  She gave me permission to teach the song to my dulcimer group and also to post it online.  It's a cute tune indeed, and fits perfectly on the dulcimer from the open middle string to the seventh fret of the melody string in a 1-5-8 tuning.

Dan, I seem to have offended you, and for that I am sorry.  I do not consider "dulcimore" a "term" but rather a local pronunciation of the word whose spelling has now been standardized as "dulcimer." All those variants that I list above are clearly different local or regional pronunciations of the same word.  These pronunciations most likely developed in the late 19th century before free and compulsory education in most of the country, so spelling would not have been standardized. But all those variants were clearly referring to the same instrument.

It makes perfect sense that you use the term "dulcimore" for your traditional builds as a way to differentiate them from the modern dulcimers I play (with frets across the entire fretboard, large boxes for a guitar-like sound, extra frets, electronic pickups, etc.). But in 1890, when one person pronounced the word "dulcymore" and another in a nearby region said "delcimer," they were referring to the same instrument.

For the record, John, I bought a legit copy from Patricia and Wayne when they had them available.  My student went on her own to the library to request it and was able to view a copy.  But what that means is that there are library copies floating around.  

Well I do have a copy of the DVD, but there is no way I will part with it. I'm sure you understand, John. 

One of my dulcimer students was able to request a copy from her local library.  It took a few weeks, but that interlibrary loan process still works, even in this digital age.

I wonder if we should encourage Wayne and Patricia to get a digital license for it so they can make it available on their site as a download.

Happy IADD, everyone!  Here is a short rendition of "Tune for a Sunny Day" written by Susan Reid of the Vermont Fiddle Orchestra.  I found a simple demo of the tune on the fiddle and wrote a letter to Susan at the asking permission to share it on the dulcimer.  I was delighted about a month later to hear from her.

I just recorded a video. I'll be sharing it with y'all this Saturday. I hope lots of you do the same.  Happy IADD!

I think Ken's correct.  It's pretty clear that all those different spellings of what we now refer to as a dulcimer -- delcymore, delcimer, dulcimer, dulcimore, dulcymore -- reflect local or regional pronunciations of the word.  Especially among people with low literacy rates, few people would have seen the word in print, so there was nothing like a "standard" pronunciation.  In the same way that folk songs varied from one region to another, so would the pronunciation of a word vary.

As for dulciwhacker or duckslammer?  

Interesting stuff to think about, at least for us dulcimer geeks.

It is not just the timing that is variable, as Mr. Adams suggests, but it is impossible to actually tune two strings to exactly the same pitch, despite our best efforts.  So in practice, we have two strings not plucked at exactly the same time and not tuned to exactly the same pitch.  The sum total of all of that would be an increase in sound, whether you call that volume or "fullness" or whatever.  

This should not be hard to test, Nate.  Turn on some kind of recording device or software and watch the input needles.

What if the two melody strings were not the same gauge?  What if one were .010 and the other .014?  Would the difference in tension result in greater volume?

Thanks for sharing that article, Ken.  What a great way to honor Rob's life! 

Thanks for sharing this, Ken.  I want to make sure our Ohio patriot, @robin-thompson sees it.

Hey @traildad. Are you trying to unsubscribe or just notifying us that the link may be broken? (I think you have to already be logged in for that link to work. Otherwise, the site doesn't know who you are and can't direct you to the appropriate page.)

If you want to unsubscribe or change your notification settings, hover your cursor over your username in the upper, right-hand corner of the screen.  Choose "Account Settings" from the drop-down menu.  There are three screens from which to choose.  Pick "Notifications."  You can click "Disable All Notifications" at the top or go item by item to clarify whether and how you would like a notification sent for each item.

I had a similar moment of realization about how to play blues on the harmonica.  I just couldn't figure it out and thought those great blues harmonica players were just really good at bending notes. But one day in college I was playing some blues on the guitar with some people and someone joined, playing blues harmonica really badly .  She was not good, but she was doing it, and on a break I asked to see her harmonica.  Indeed, @jim-yates, as you say, it was an A harp and we were playing in E. Aha!   Cross harp, what a concept! To play straight on the harmonica, your tonic is the 4th hole, but to get those blue notes, your tonic is the 3 hole.  I still can't play like Sonny Terry, but I can manage some amateur blues and have fun.

I'm only a tad taller than Wally, but when I have to sit in a chair that doesn't allow my legs to make a perfectly flat support for the dulcimer, I position the dulcimer comfortably by using a strap.  The strap not only provides some flexibility in sitting positions, but also enables me to angle the dulcimer a little bit so that it is not sitting flat on my lap.

That slight angle of the dulcimer also helps create a more natural angle for both left and right hand. When I first started on the dulcimer I laid the instrument flat on my lap and developed pretty painful tendonitis in the elbow of my strumming hand. Using a strap and changing the angle of the dulcimer cleared that up right away.

For your fretting arm, your entire forearm and hand should make a straight line pointing slightly down, with no angle at the wrist.

Take a look at Aaron O'Rourke here and notice both the way the dulcimer is propped up a bit off his lap and also the straight line of his fretting arm: https://youtu.be/EPClQt6v0Z0?si=08QnvmAx6vM0v60-&t=118 .

They always say there is no wrong way to play the dulcimer, but when I first started and developed tendonitis, and when you found you were straining your wrist, well those are clear signs that we were doing something wrong (at least for us) and needed to alter our approach.

Nate, I agree with the consensus here.  And I know you responded to my post elsewhere about exercises I'm doing to strengthen my fretting fingers.  Basically  the way you are fretting the strings, you are using your arm to push down on the strings rather than your fingers themselves. If you strengthen your fingers, you won't need your wrist or arm and can just have a relaxed hand, letting the fingers do all the work.  My daughter's old piano teacher (well, I mean ex-piano teacher; she's no older than I am ) used to tell her to imagine that a delicate egg was under her hand.  The hand should be curved to protect the egg while her fingers hit the keys. I think the same principle works on the dulcimer.

Contact me by PM and I'll send you a sticker that should help:

When you work on a song, you get better at that song. But when you work on your technique, you get better at every song you play.

I'm a total OCD dulcimer nerd right now. I tabbed out a few fiddle tunes that make for great finger exercises.  For 2-3 days I've just been playing " Harvest Home " over and over, forcing myself to use my pinky for anything on the first fret, middle finger on the second, and index on the third across all the strings. And that's the range of the arrangement, from open bass to third fret on the melody string. So the left hand never moves, requiring the muscles in individual fingers to do all the work.

Both A and B parts of the song have four consecutive triplets are really tough.  I'm forcing myself to use a metronome and play really slowly.  Maybe someday I'll speed up a little, but I'm not there yet.  Sometimes I only play that triplet measure over and over. 

My goal is not to play the song well (or event at all), but to use the song to strengthen my pinky and develop greater finger independence and flatpicking accuracy.

But I do feel like I'm getting a bit geeky and losing touch, like Jack Nicholson huddled over his typewriter in The Shining .

@bing-futch just shared his lesson on Shaving a Dead Man here at FOTMD . What timing!

Sorry to hear that, @greg-gunner.  The website lists a phone number; have you tried calling?

Newest on top is very convenient when you are an active participant in an ongoing conversation.  That way you can join and see quickly the comments added since your last visit. Easy peasy!

@wildcat, you click or tap the gear icon and then choose "playback speed." 

YouTube added this feature a couple of years ago. It slows things down but keeps the same pitch, so you can learn tunes really easily. 

On a PC, that gear icon is on the bottom of the YouTube screen, but on a cell phone it appears on the top right.

Edit: Woops!  It looks like @salt-springs types faster than I. 

It just so happens that the next episode of Bing Futch's Dulcimerica (#687) will feature Bing Futch playing and teaching Shaving a Dead Man.  Check it out in a day or two whenever it drops.

I don't think the song is under copyright.  It appears to have a long history as a clawhammer banjo tune, but at one time the title was different and included a racial epithet.  From what I can figure out, by the 1970s, folks were calling it "Shaving a Dead Man" or "Protect the Innocent."  There's lots of banjo tab out on the tune as well as discussions about playing it in different keys and tunings.

Nate, this won't help answer your question at all, but you might find it as interesting as I do.  I am reading an ethnomusicology text, which stresses that in western culture, we tend to value pitch exactness. That is indeed what prompted your question here.  Like most of us, you try to get your notes as close to the exact pitch as possible.  But in certain other traditional cultures, that is considered ugly, and they aim for a shimmering or pulsing effect when the pitch of a note hovers around what you and I would consider the exact pitch.  Think of the way a sitar player uses tremolo, or the vocal stylings of Arabic music.  The text gives an extended example of Balinese gamelan, in which the tuning of the instruments themselves is intended to create that shimmering effect.

As I said, I find this really interesting, but it's not going to change my search for exact pitch.

Nate, I think most of us don't know how to answer this question.  We use electric tuners (A= 440, as Ken says), so we generally accept the tuner when it says we are on pitch.  Of course, those tuners are not all equally accurate, though the Peterson tuner that Robin mentions is supposed to be one of the best.  One of the issues with tuners is their display. Even if the mechanism inside can be trusted to 0.05 cents, the display may not be that accurate.  If there are 10 LED lights equally spaced between C# and D, well, you can do the math.  If there were 20 LED lights, the display would be twice as accurate, right? We often think about how easy or difficult those displays are to read, but few comment on the relationship between the display and the accuracy of the tuner in practice.

I have a couple of really accurate strobe tuners which I use at home, but when I'm out and about I trust a D'Addario violin tuner which I keep attached to my dulcimer. 

My own ear varies.  Sometimes it is very sensitive and I can hear very small imperfections in my tuning, even when the tuner says I'm in tune.  Those times are not enjoyable because I never like the sound of my own dulcimer.  But other times my ear is a bit "lazy" and anything close sounds good.  That is a much more enjoyable space to be because I can just strum away in blissful ignorance.

@Bob-Stephens really does use a floating neck that does not come in contact with the soundboard.  His dulcimers also have a false bottom, so both top and bottom are free to vibrate. You can see some pictures here on his website and also in some of the pictures he has posted to FOTMD . He uses a metal rod that runs the length of the neck to enhance stability and reduce the need for excessive bracing of the soundboard.

He is a member here and has explained the evolution of his design principles elsewhere, so I won't go into more details (which I don't understand, honestly). One of those discussions is Floating Fretboards .

David Beede uses the same floating fretboard principle on his octave dulcimers.  (Or rather he did, until he stopped building.)  The fretboard is attached to the body with two or three metal dowels that drive sound vibrations directly into the sound chamber. I have one of these little dulcimers and am constantly amazed how much volume can emerge from such a small instrument. It's like the dulcimer version of Taylor's GS-Mini.  The "decoupled tailpiece" principle that David used on his full-size dulcimers is similar to a "discontinuous" fretboard to which Ken refers.

I have not yet played a dulcimer by Bob Stephens but I have a wooden, nylon-string dulcimer on order and will surely post a video or two after it arrives. (I have to specify "wooden" because he is now making dulcimers using 3-D printing for nearly everything but the top.)  I ordered one because I love the idea of a dulcimer specifically designed for nylon strings and look forward to exploring the different tonal possibilities of that instrument. Bob worked with Aaron O'Rourke on the nylon-string dulcimers and has been working with Butch Ross on the steel-string dulcimers. You can find them demonstrating those models on YouTube if you search for a moment or two. 

And here is Steve Eulberg demonstrating an earlier version of the nylon-string dulcimer .  When he turns the dulcimer on its side with the camera from above (1:17-1:27), you can see the space in between the neck and the soundboard.

It's too bad that this conversation, which started with such a reasonable question (even if it demands a parallel conversation on reasons to get a chromatic) has descended into a series of diatribes in which people offer differing definitions of an instrument that has been innovative and evolving for its entire history.  None of this has anything to do with the original question.

Yes, as Nate says, "qualifiers."  

There are guitars, 12-string guitars, solid-body electric guitars, tenor guitars, baritone guitars, etc.

There are dulcimers, baritone dulcimers, octave dulcimers, chromatic dulcimers, electric dulcimers, etc.

No controversy needed.

The dulcimer is a young instrument. For its entire history, it has been evolving.  Those first dulcimers had frets only under the melody string.  Does that mean that dulcimers with strings across the fretboard are not dulcimers?  Those first dulcimers also used friction tuners.  Does that mean dulcimers with mechanical tuners are not dulcimers?  Those first dulcimers were likely made solely of local hardwoods.  Does that mean a dulcimer with a redwood top is not a real dulcimer? Any effort to define a dulcimer by a limited number of construction characteristics is random and denies the long history of creative innovation among dulcimer builders and players.

The Jean Ritchie model dulcimer (made in that great Appalachian state of California!) has a Honduras mahogany fingerboard, rosewood overlay, ebony nut and saddle, mechanical tuners, and a 6-1/2 fret.  Those first dulcimers on which Jean learned had none of those elements, yet she recognized that they improved the instrument and supported them.  The rest of us might do the same.

There is no music you cannot play.  There is only music that you cannot play yet !

One thing I forgot to mention is that you can practice your strumming without playing songs and worrying about left-hand fingering.  Just lay your left hand over the strings to stop them from vibrating but not so hard as to get a tone out of them, and strum with the right hand.  Put on your favorite music and strum along with the beat.  You will just be making a percussive scratching noise with your dulcimer, but you will be able to concentrate solely on the right hand.

The short answer is "yes."  You should strum inwards and outwards.  But you are right to ask because you will want to start in one direction until you get it steady, and then you can strum in both directions.

There are both "in" strummers and "out" strummers, but what that means is which direction you strum on the main beat.  Most of us who started on other instruments such as guitars or ukuleles are "out" strummers, whereas many who started on the dulcimer are "in" strummers.  Neither is better than the other. What is important is that you develop a steady beat and that you eventually learn to strum in both directions.

Start by strumming once per quarter-note beat:  1 - 2 - 3 - 4.  Whichever direction you choose, do that for every strum.  Do not change direction.

Once you can do that steadily and smoothly (which may take an hour or may take 6 months), you are reading to add strums in the other direction.  Now you will count 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &.  You will still strum in the direction you chose on all the numbers, but you will strum in the opposite direction on the &s.  Again, do not vary.  Either go out-in out-in out-in out-in or in-out in-out in-out in-out.

Eventually (as in years from now) when you are really smooth with that eighth note strumming patters, there will indeed be exceptions when you can vary from this pattern, but for the foreseeable future, stick to the pattern.

Let me add that while it is important for you to learn to strum steadily--first in one direction and then in both--that does not mean that when you play a song you have to strum on every beat.  You should be able to do so, but you will also want to skip beats to vary your playing.  You're not there yet, but you will be soon!

Definitely get a chromatic tuner, not something called a guitar tuner or dulcimer tuner.  There are lots of affordable models in the $10-20 range, but some are better than others.  I agree with John that the Snark is one of the better ones in terms of accuracy and ease of use.  Because of their low profile, I personally use the D'Addario tuners.  One is a headstock tuner that can work on a flat head.  But on my scroll-head dulcimers I use the same D'Addario tuner that's for violins or violas.  I attach it across the fretboard just left of the nut, where a lot of people keep their capo.  If you look at any of my videos when I play the McCafferty dulcimer, you'll see it right there.

If you want to spend a little more, perhaps the most accurate clip-on tuner is the Peterson Robo-Clip.  It uses a simplified strobe display that is much easier to read than older strobe tuners.  I use that on my guitar.

I also have an app on my phone called G-Strings, which is free and very accurate.  The only downside is, like the handheld tuners, it won't work at a jam or whenever there is significant ambient noise.

Just yesterday I enjoyed a presentation by Aubrey Atwater at the Dulcimoon Virtual Dulcimer Festival on the playing styles of Jean Ritchie.  One important point that emerged was the way Jean accompanied her singing.  She neither played the melody on the dulcimer nor strummed chords (obviously), but played a "counter-melody."

Watch her play "Lord Thomas" here , paying attention to what she is doing on the melody string while she sings.  She is not playing a harmony in the way we understand it in modern pop music with parallel thirds or fourths that follow the melody, but rather a different melody, one less elaborate than the melody, but a different melody entirely that accompanies (or runs "counter" to) the song's melody.  If you keep watching the video to hear "The Cuckoo," you'll hear the same thing.

The counter melody style of play is similar but not identical to our modern use of harmony; it plays a role similar to chord play in hinting at harmonic changes underlying the melody; and it often offers "filler" licks in the interstices of the song's main melody. In other words, the dulcimer is playing three different roles as we define them in modern music.

This is quite a difficult style of play to master, and it has mostly been lost in modern dulcimer playing.  When we say that a traditional role of the dulcimer was used to accompany singing, I think it important to point out that it was done in this manner that is strikingly different than the way we use the dulcimer today. 

I would also like to point out Jean's right hand.  She is picking (mostly with her thumb), sometimes plucking only the melody string, sometimes plucking all the strings one-at-a-time, and sometimes strumming, either all the strings or the two drone strings after having plucked the melody string.  This style of play is far more varied than modern playing in which people assume you have to strum all the strings all the time.

I think of diatonic and chromatic dulcimers as two roads that lead to different kinds of attractions along the way. One will mainly take you to traditional music, both modal and pentatonic, and the other leads you to pop, blues, and jazz.  Both can cross over a little bit, but they have different emphases.

Of course, I mainly play a dulcimer with 6+ and 1+ frets, so I've chosen a kind of middle path.  I play mostly diatonic music but can occasionally add blue notes or switch keys in ways that would be much more difficult on a truly diatonic instrument.

I would like to caution us all not to assume generalizations hold for everyone.  I played the guitar, mandolin, and ukulele before discovering the dulcimer, and the diatonic fretboard did not make the instrument easier to learn.  On the contrary, the fact that I could not play so many of the songs in my head was very frustrating. It took about 2 years of playing everyday for me to get a sense of what melodies could be found on the diatonic fretboard and what couldn't.  (It may be true that there are no wrong notes on the dulcimer, but that doesn't mean that all the right ones are there!) 

And chording on the diatonic fretboard is more complex.  On a chromatic fretboard, a chord shape will be the same type of chord as you move up and down the fretboard, but on a diatonic dulcimer, that chord shape changes between major and minor.  That fact significantly slows down the development of dulcimer players who wish to play chords.

Hey, @motormike.  I have an autoharp as well, a diatonic G/D that my uncle made for me. I should play it more often. The autoharp is such a magical instrument.

That's a beautiful dulcimer and you got it for a very fair price.  If your buyer's remorse is strong enough, just send the dulcimer to me and ease your discomfort.

I can understand wanting the original tuners, if indeed it originally had tuning pegs.  But the problem is that you don't have those tuning pegs, so replacing the mechanical tuners would represent another modification. And mechanical tuners are indeed much easier to use.

Perhaps @Dwain-Wilder of Bear Meadow would know what kind of tuners the 1975 Sunhearth originally had.

Very sad news.  Thanks for letting us know, Ken.  I just posted on the funeral home website and I encourage others to do so.  I only knew Rob from FOTMD and YouTube, but I will miss our interactions greatly.

@tonyg, if you are tuned Ddd (or DAd for that matter) and play a song in the ionian mode, you should be using the 6-1/2 fret.  The 6 fret would be mixolydian.

If you did not have a 6-1/2 fret, you would have to tune your melody string to A to get the ionian mode, and your base or tonic would be the 3rd fret.

The reason is simply that the songs you have chosen employ the major scale or ionian mode.  Other songs--most obviously Old Joe Clark--employ the mixolydian mode.  Some songs are actually pentatonic, and only involve a 5-note scale. Those can usually be played in either the ionian or the mixolydian modes.  But truly modal melodies can only be played in one mode.

In the key of D, the ionian mode makes use of the C# (the 6+ fret on a D string) and the mixolydian mode makes use of the C natural (the 6 fret on a D string).

To play modal music, dulcimer players get accustomed to changing tunings.  Or, they add frets.  The main reason for the popularity of the 6+ fret is that it lets dulcimer players play in both the ionian and mixolydian modes without changing tunings.

I hope that clarifies more than it muddies.