Forum Activity for @dusty

Hi @Silverstrings.  When I first started playing the dulcimer I played with a double melody string because, well, that's how my first dulcimer was sold to me.  I was advised by more experienced players to remove one of them because it would be "easier" to play with just three strings, but I arrogantly ignored that advice, thinking that since I had played mandolin and have a 12-string guitar, the double strings would not be a problem for me. One day when putting on new strings I decided to leave the extra melody string off to see what it would be like, and I immediately knew I liked the sound better.  A single melody string just makes for such a cleaner and less cluttered sound.  I never put a second melody string on a dulcimer after that moment.

There are other benefits to a single melody string which you point to: it is easier to perform hammer-ons and pull-offs.  And it is nearly impossible to bend strings well with a double melody since the two strings do not bend at exactly the same rate.

Luckily, you don't have to make this decision permanently.  Switch to a single melody string, play for a while, and see how you like it.  If you don't you can always put the extra string back on.

I understand that noter/drone players enjoy zinging up and down the fretboard, and supposedly the double melody strings create a better balance between the melody and the drones.  But if you fret across all the strings, using a single melody string actually creates that balance since all strings play the melody more or less equally.

If you search through the past discussion here at FOTMD, you will find that several address this very issue.  Here is one of them .  (And looking through that old discussion, I realize that I posted nearly the same comments I added here.  At least I'm consistent.)

That's a good question, @RonD.  I'm surprised that tune isn't more common in the dulcimer community.

I did find this noter/drone version by Cecil Moody , but the melody seems to be a simplified version that misses out on the more eerie, minor-sounding parts that you here in other versions by Joan Baez or, most recently, Chris Thile .

I also found some lyrics sheets with chords , which are (happily) in the key of D.  I haven't worked through the whole tune yet, but at least the beginning can be played on a dulcimer tuned DAA or DAd.  If you play noter/drone, tune DAA, since the melody begins on that A note for "Don't" and then moves up to E (either 4 on an A string or 1 on a D string) for "songs."

I may work out a version of this tune over the next few days.  If so, I'll post again.

Ronald, you are actually asking two questions here.  The first has to do with traditional dulcimer styles and the second about modern, chord style players.

As Ken has explained, traditionally, the dulcimer was only fretted on the melody string and the bass and middle strings were left to drone. Many fine players still play in that style and achieve the haunting, ancient sound of traditional folk music.  In that style of play, the tuning of the melody string has to change depending on the mode or scale on which the melody of a particular song is based.  DAA and DAd are the two "major-sounding" tunings. Before the addition of the 6+ fret, DAA was the only tuning that could be used to play songs in what we call the major scale, so it was more common.  The addition of the 6+ fret allows us to play that same scale in DAd, but as Ken mentions, if you only play on the melody string, DAA allows three notes below the starting note of the scale. 

But if you play in the traditional drone style, you don't just keep one tuning all the time. The tuning is determined by the melody.  In the key of D, Angelina Baker can only be played in DAA.  Going to Boston can only be played in DAd.  Shady Grove can only be played in DAC, and so forth.

Modern chord players who fret across all the strings and also have a 6+ fret can often (though not always) get those different melodies without retuning.  But both DAA and DAd have exactly the same notes, so neither one has an advantage in that light. Rather the difference between the two has to do with chord voicings.  Chords in DAA are more compact and chords in DAd have greater range, meaning the notes might come from two different octaves.  But one is not better than the other.

At some point a few decades ago, dulcimers tuned DAd with a 6+ fret became a kind of standard for modern dulcimer players.  That is how I play, but there is admittedly something rather arbitrary about it. Had most people tuned DAA when I started playing, that would probably be my main tuning.

Ronald, the Kens have already highlighted the most important obstacles: the chromatic fretboard, the placement of the bass string, etc.

I think the biggest obstacle you will have is string spacing.  The strings on the guitar are placed much closer together than are the strings on the dulcimer.  If you are going to play in a modern chording style in which you fret across all the strings, string slots that are next to each other (say the G, D, and A strings, for example), will be too close together for you to get your fingers in there. And if you choose string slots further apart (say the B, D, and low E strings), they will be too far apart and will make chording difficult.

If you want to play in a traditional droning style that string placement will be less of an issue because you will only be fretting (either with a finger or a noter) the string closest to you, so the strings won't have to be equidistant.

But regardless of how you proceed, as Ken states, the slots that exist in your nut and bridge may not work for dulcimer string gauges.

I would suggest another option.  Keep your guitar in playable condition as a guitar.  Find yourself a cheap cardboard dulcimer.  None of them are that loud, but some of them are ridiculously nice and make me feel silly for spending so much money for fancy dulcimers made of fancy woods.  Backyard dulcimer makes a kit and so does Folkcraft.  They take about an hour to put together, or you can pay a little extra and have it pre-made.  You can sometimes find used ones as well.  Those cardboard dulcimers are more than adequate to get you started while you wait for your winter dulcimer.

Yeah, this is really good stuff.  I wish we could separate the audio and hear each instrument separately. Or maybe just get a camera solely on the dulcimer's fretboard. The dulcimer is not playing exactly what the fiddle is, sometimes a simplified melody and sometimes pure accompaniment.  I know it's not traditional, but I like the use of the bass string that begins around 1:14.  It really adds a nice contrast to the fiddle.

That's a beauty, @Susie!  Congratulations.

Several months ago I attended a house concert featuring the superb Irish fiddler Gerry O'Conner .  He was accompanied by a guitarist who played only in DADGAD tuning.  I was particularly intrigued because he played some chords that you rarely hear in Irish or Celtic music.  But when I talked to him after the show he confessed that he doesn't always know exactly what chord he is playing because he often lets the highest strings drone.  Note that the highest strings are A and D.  In other words, he was playing the same drones that we do on a dulcimer tuned to D!  And according to Tony McManus , the DADGAD tuning originated as a slight variation of an open D tuning, so it makes perfect sense that Robin would have found the pairing of the two instruments to work so well.

P.S. I get dizzy just looking at that picture of Robin atop the rock on Lundy Island.

@Skipii, Ken is correct that DAd and DAA are equivalent in terms of the notes and chords available.  Chord voicings are a bit different; they are more compact in DAA and a bit more expansive in DAd.   But you have exactly the same notes available to you in those two tunings, so any claim that one is better for chords than the other is pure nonsense.

There are two main limitations with either tuning.  The first is key, for you can only play in a handful of keys (D and Bm are  easy, G and Em are doable, A and F#m are a stretch, and anything else is near impossible). The second is that you still have a diatonic fretboard (which is why the keys are so limited).  Fretting across the strings allows you to get around some of the limitations of the fretboard, but not all of them.  Personally, I play dulcimers with both a 6+ and a 1+ fret to allow a greater variety of notes, chords, and keys.  You might consider adding those extra frets as well.

The answer to your question is that it doesn't really matter.  Most of us who play modern music tune to a 1-5-8 tuning such as DAd, so you will find more resources for that tuning.  That might be reason enough to tune that way.

I would suggest you listen to the dulcimer players who play the kind of music you want to play and ask them how they are tuned.

Patricia, I like the poetic interpretation, and can even imagine singing the song while holding a baby and then placing the baby into a crib as you sing "down will come baby."  However, I always assumed that in the same way that the old folk tales really were about starvation and death and infanticide (and in the case of Little Red Riding Hood, incest and bestiality), "Rock-a-Bye Baby" was about the dangers that beset infants in the pre-modern era, perhaps even infanticide, which was often due to "exposure," meaning babies were just left outside in the woods (maybe even in a treetop). In the end, we don't really know, do we?

Another sweet episode, Patricia.  It's an honor to be associated with you guys and the Hearts of the Dulcimer Podcast.

I have to count myself among those who was never enamored with "Rock-a-bye Baby" because of the image of the baby falling from the treetop.  I don't know if I'm entirely convinced of Julia Soto Lebetritt's interpretation, but she has me thinking about it.

Thanks for all you do!

Some years ago I bought a limberjack from Keith Young and another (more expensive one) in the shape of a dog from someone on Etsy.  As Ken says, there are several sellers on Etsy, but the search engine there keeps changing "limberjack" to "lumberjack," so you might do a Google search for "limberjack on Etsy" or something like that.

You guys can have all the rocky mountain oysters you want. I'll stick to just plain oysters. No cooking necessary. The smaller the better. Paired with a cold and crisp white Bordeaux.

@cbrown, you might want to contact @bob-stephens. He is a luthier who had been making steel-string dulcimers for a while but recently developed a nylon-string model.  I think he tried unsuccessfully to simply put nylon strings on his older models so he designed a new model specifically for nylon strings. I don't know enough about instrument construction to understand the differences, but I think his nylon-string dulcimers have many different design elements, from bracing inside the box to the way the fretboard connects to the rest of the instrument.

I won't enter into the fray about the origin of the scheitholt, but at least we know the epinette des Vosges is from, well, the Vosges. 

Proedrick, the issue with the terminology is not a big deal.  If the strings sit on top of the box, the instrument is in the zither family (like the dulcimer or autoharp). If the strings extends past the box, we call that a neck, and the instrument is in the lute family (like a guitar or mandolin).  

In the picture you posted, the head of the dulcimer extends past the body, but the fretboard sits on the box itself, so technically it has no neck.  

Incidentally, this is one reason why purists don't consider stick dulcimers to be dulcimers. The "stick" is the neck of the instrument, so from an organological (fancy word, huh ) point of view, the instrument is in the lute family rather than the zither family regardless of whether it has a diatonic fretboard or not.

Hey Phroedrick, I guess you have to call this a time-consuming lesson. I have no knowledge of lutherie, so I would have no idea how to fix fret buzz. But when I've brough an instrument in to a shop for that reason, the luthiers always eyeball the fretboard first, looking to see how flat it is.  I would think that actually working with the frets would be the last adjustment to make. I'm sure it's been frustrating for you.

And hey, River City Dulcimers is meeting this Saturday in Roseville if you want to make a drive.  I know it's a schlep, but you'll have folks to commiserate with. You're more than welcome to join us.

Sounds delicious and comforting. Your words remind me of that Greg Brown tune "Canned Goods" .

Let the wild winter wind bellow and blow

I'm as warm as a July tomato.

There's peaches on the shelf, potatoes in the bin

Supper ready everybody come on in

Taste a little of the summer

Taste a little of the summer

Taste a little of the summer

Grandma put it all in jars.

@butch-ross, you're just gonna have to change the lyrics. "Old enough to retire but I'm still a waiter/'Cause I like singing folk songs."

By the way, I hear Juneau's paying $50 now.

Honestly, it's a great tune, Butch.  You gotta find a way to keep it alive.

Hi @tatts.  If you hover your cursor over your username in the upper right corner a drop-down menu will appear.  Click on the first option, "Account Settings."  Under your profile picture you will see an option to "Upload a New Image."

Hey @Dedicated-DAD, first you should know that there is a whole group here dedicated to 4 equidistant strings .  YOu might consider joining, perusing the old conversations and perhaps starting a new one.

There are a number of ways people tune for 4 equidistant strings. Some just add another in the same pattern, so they might tune DADA.  Janita Baker tunes something like D Bb A D.  That gives her a chromatic scale, enabling her to play blues and ragtime and jazz. But she only fingerpicks, never strumming across all strings.  I recently learned that Neal Hellman often tunes DAdd.  Those two high D notes are not played together, but rather he plays in a drone style in that tuning and gets an extra high D drone that way.

I'm sure there are other variations, too. All of them equally "proper."  Again, I urge you to joint the 4-Equidistant Strings group and pursue your interests there where you'll find more expertise.

@Redwolf, there are a few different options for you.

I would advise against continually pulling the strap off the strap button.  That will just loosen the hole and it won't be so secure after a while. 

Personally, I just pull the strap over my head without loosening it. It's a tight fit, but that way the strap stays adjusted perfectly for me.

There are also some quick release straps you might try.  Folkcraft offers a couple of models, ( 1" and 2" width) and Sue Carpenter also sells them in multiple colors.  A few other dulcimer folks sell Sue Carpenter's model as well, so they are not hard to find.  The quick release straps allow you to unhook the strap without taking it off the strap button.

Thanks, @Robin-Thompson.  Those sites are definitely worth adding to the list, although they are a bit removed from my current project.  Je te remercie!

Thank you, @Redmando and @Ken-Hulme! You've added very helpful sites to my list.

Hi all. I am nearing the completion of a small project on music from the British Isles dating from 1500 to 1800, and I am including a list of online sources for traditional music.  I offer it her for two reasons: 1) some of you might find the list helpful; and 2) some of you might know of some important websites that I have not listed but should.  Please let me know what I've left off the list.  Mille grazie!

Folk Tune Finder https://www.folktunefinder.com/

Hetzler’s Fakebook http://hetzler.homestead.com/index.html

Old Time Fiddle Tunes (Penn Sate University) https://www.mne.psu.edu/lamancusa/tunes.html

Old Town School of Folk Music https://www.oldtownschool.org/classes/adults/fiddle/tunes/

O’Neill’s Music of Ireland http://www.oldmusicproject.com/oneils1.html

Rampant Scotland http://www.rampantscotland.com/songs/blsongs_index.htm

The Session https://thesession.org

Tin Whistle Tunes (formerly Clips & Snips) http://tinwhistletunes.com/clipssnip/index.htm

Traditional Music Library http://www.traditionalmusic.co.uk

Traditional Tune Archive https://tunearch.org/wiki/TTA

Folks might be interested in the free pdf book Be Different: Play the Kantele by FOTMD member @Peter-W.  Peter makes and plays the instrument.  (And in the interests of full disclosure I should say he asked me to do some copyediting at the very end stages of the writing process.)

Well Lois, aren't you the sleuth!  I can't believe you found that!  The irony is that I was the one who posted that pdf file, but it was never intended to be public. I posted it on a hidden page of my website and with no identifying information.

As you can see from the first response to my thread, Maddie Myers in Australia very generously offered to send me her copy of the book.  I am still grateful for that.  Shortly afterwards, someone else I've known for a few years asked if there was anyway I could share it.  So I scanned the book and posted it as a "secret" link on a semi-hidden page of my website.  My plan was to share the document with a single person, not to make it available to the public at large.

Since the book is out-of-print, making copies is legal.  But I am still uncomfortable with the ethics of posting a free copy online, so I've taken the link down. Apologies to those who were hoping to get a copy.  If there is enough interest, perhaps we should contact Randy directly or Kicking Mule publications or whoever owns the copyright.

Congratulations to all the winners and thanks to everyone for helping to make FOTMD such a warm and welcoming place for greenhorns and greybeards and eveyyone in between to share our love of this special instrument.

ooh the excitement is too much  . . .

Patricia, I look forward to the new episode (have to finish some work before I can indulge!). 

People in the States don't know Rick Scott too well, but I met him a few years ago. A truly unique player with a vast store of cool kids tunes.  He shared one tune (I wish I could remember it) that was in a strange tuning. When I asked him about the tuning he explained that he had an old dulcimer with friction tuners that would often slip. But sometimes he kept playing rather than retuning and discovered some interesting tunings that way. What a character!

By all means, make use of our additional verse.  When I sing the song there is a horse named Pinto, a dog named Chili, A fish named Jelly, and a friend named Yuman.  

Do you think the cobbler could survive being mailed to the west coast? I'll gladly take some off your hands.

A hot dog is weird enough for me. Who even knows what it's made of?  Probably all that stuff that @Phroedrick lists as a no go.

Ate smoked duck heart once on a salad in France. It was tasty.

Ordered scrapple by accident in a greasy spoon in Pennsylvania or maybe the Jersey shore.  I won't do it again.

There are lots of Mexican joints around town that serve fresh menudo on weekends. On Saturday nights especially the line to some of these places can run for blocks.  I won't touch the stuff.  Sorry.

Well I learned a mildly clever song from Stephen Seifert.  I think he just called it "Chili Bean."  My daughter and I added a verse.

The main verse goes

My dog Chili likes to roam

One day Chili ran from home

Came back looking not so clean

Where oh where has Chile bean?

Then there's a verse about a horse named Pinto and so forth,  My daughter and I wrote this verse:

My fish Jelly likes to roam

One day Jelly swam from home

Came back purple, red and green

Where oh where has Jelly bean?

Thanks for posting this, Robin. When I first discovered the dulcimer on YouTube about ten years ago, Hunter was already a child prodigy and I learned a lot from some of his videos.  He seems to have stopped posting the last few years, so I didn't know he was still playing old timey music and had added fine clawhammer banjo to his toolkit.

I agree. The string spacing looks really odd and arbitrary. I would suggest a new nut and bridge as well.

@John-C-Knopf is correct.  A six-string dulcimer is just tuned as a three-string dulcimer with each string doubled.  So if it's a standard size, DD-AA-AA or DD-AA-dd would work.

Of course, just because a dulcimer can take up to six strings doesn't mean you have to use them.  I have a six-string dulcimer but sometimes only put on three strings.

Given that true African ebony is basically impossible to obtain legally these days, more and more luthiers are looking for alternatives such as rosewood or synthetic versions such as Micarta.  If Micarta is good enough for a Martin Guitars, it's probably good enough for me.  

Basically, you want the fretboard to be really hard and really smooth.  I've read reviews that praise Micarta for both of those reasons.  According to Martin, Micarta plays faster than Ebony and will never warp.  Some people claim that it doesn't feel like genuine wood, that it feels like plastic, but that has not been my experience, and I suspect that the objection to Micarta comes from those who believe for philosophical reasons that fine instruments should just be made of wood with no synthetics anywhere.

How does the Micarta feel to you?  If you like it, then stick with it.

Micarta is basically colored to look like black ebony.  But I wonder if the stigma against it recedes, will they start making it in different colors?  How 'bout a hot pink fingerboard?

@Phroedrick, this is a hurdle you will conquer and it will cease to be a problem.  

It is rare that the nut is not secured, but a floating bridge is pretty common.  When that is the case, you will want to change one string at a time so that the bridge and/or nut basically stay in position while you put the new strings on.  You can always adjust positioning later if the intonation is off, but changing one string at a time will make things easier.

The order does not matter.

The direction the tuners tighten the strings depends on which side of the post the strings are strung on.  If the posts are horizontal, you want the strings to go over the top of the post.  If the posts are vertical, you will want the strings to go on the inside.  The fact is that it will work either way, but those are the standard conventions.

One trick to keeping the string in place is to use a capo to hold it down.  Put the loop over the brad nail or whatever is there to hold the end of the string, pull it toward the head of the dulcimer, and then put a capo on to hold the string in place while you wind it around the tuner.  I learned that capo trick from @Butch-Ross and am embarrassed that I hadn't thought of it myself.

Here is a video  of @Guy-Babusek demonstrating how to string a dulcimer, and here is a video by @Bing-Futch doing the same.

EDIT:  @Salt-Springs beat me to posting those same two videos.  Great minds . . . 

That's a remarkably pretty sound. I'm pretty sure "Array" is a brand and the instrument is called an mbira.  They are sometimes called thumb pianos and usually only have about an octave range.  I've never seen one that large before.  Pretty cool.