Forum Activity for @noah-aikens

Yes the Tinwhistle is very similar, but has less notes and not as strange cross fingerings as recorder. I learned tin whistle before recorder, but I think going from Recorder to Tinwhistle will be easier than what I did.

I Find that wind instruments vary much more than stringed instruments. Sure, guitars all have their differences, but the difference in tone between different fipple and duct flutes. For example I have a NA flute that while not quiet (it's actually my loudest one), is my softest in tone (it's cedar). I have one made out of maple and one out of mahogany, they both have much clearer, more direct sound. The wide variation of timbre between instruments is what holds my attention to them. While the difficulty and range of notes is what holds me captive to playing guitar. Not that penny whistles aren't difficult, its's a different type of difficulty. 

 IMO, low humidity is more of a danger than high.

Humidity will affect most woods the same way. The wood will swell then contract if quickly (for a long period of time) put in dry weather, resulting in cracking.

I have never experienced humidity problems with any of my instruments. My dulcimer stayed in a humid climate (Alabama, Georgia, and Florida) for twenty years. Never had a problem with it cracking because of humidity.

Just make sure it stays in your house for most of it's life and that your house's air conditioning doesn't get turned off with it for long periods of times.

If other people say that Hawaii's humidity is greater than the 100% humidity of Florida, you can keep it in a case and they make tools to take and give humidity to instruments.

So if you play it outside A lot (like ALOT like 15 hours like Mr. Ken Longfield said) you might have trouble once you bring it into a SUPER Dry area.

More than likely you will have no trouble though!

My Grandpa has a robert mize dulcimer with 4 strings but 6 notches so that equidistant stringing can be used.

just beautiful.

An elder in my church has a dulcimer very close to this shape from a builder in Georgia, but his has a lot more ornamentation than this one. I will have to ask him the name of the builder as I cannot remember (I was told once). As long as it plays nice it should be a fine instrument.

When I was in a handbell choir we highlighted the notes that were for the bells we played. It's not so far fetched of an idea at all! I find I don't have very much trouble automatically seeing the intervals in my head, especially on a diatonic instrument. But what works works!

Many of the old time albums that are produced have many of the same staples on them. Maybe he's just referring to these songs not appearing as often on "mainstream" old time albums (if old time is ever mainstream) ?

I found these from an article mentioning artists who are shaking up the old time movement.

http://www.thebluegrasssituation.com/read/5-artists-shaking-old-time-music

This is an old time music group that I just found. They're pretty great. 

also check out Squirrel Butter

 I'm having a hard time getting it to post so here's a link - 

My dad and I built a NAF! Key of A minor. Western Red Cedar.

 image.jpg - 120KB

Why is it embarrassing to look in your harmonica drawer? I don't have a harmonica drawer -  they just lie all over the place!  But I do have a briefcase for gigging.

Memorizing the melody is the easy part. Memorizing timing and lyrics is the extremely hard part for me.

I just found this guy called Erik the flute maker . He makes great sounding whistles. But get this - A wooden saxophone!

now I play dulcimer either with a very thin dunlop nylon pick or my fingers. but when I play guitar I like to use dragon heart picks. But they cost 10 dollars and I lose picks alot.

I was talking about playing in what's called first position by harmonica players - playing in the key that the instrument is tuned to. A penny whistle is tuned major while naf's are tuned minor. To my understanding most standard naf's (5 hole) are tuned to the minor pentatonic scale. I'll see if I can make a video about it. Any of these instruments can be tunyed differently than the "standard" flutes.

I play the pennywhistle and I think the difference is that the tinwhistle is the major scale while the american flute is the pentatonic.

This is where you can watch a live stream of one of the largest old time music festivals in America.

http://dtc3.tv/

schedule of events

http://smithvillejamboree.com/

The dulcimer Outlaw wouldn't be how you describe yourself, but it would be your stage name.  Willie doesn't just sing outlaw country music. think Always On My Mind and Hit the Road Jack.  Those songs are one of the reasons he's still considered outlaw.

This is a dulcimer my great grandfather built. I haven't been able to find any dulcimer pictures that show this distance from the nut to the headstock. Just wondering if there is a certain style of dulcimer that He could have seen and decided to copy.

 IMG_2531.JPG.jpg - 87KB

if you make a playlist they will

I found and read those articles and what they seems to be the case. The frets are flat to accommodate for a noter.

it appears to be just an Applecreek.

Well that's good. I changed the strings to equidistant (still 1-5-5) and had fun with that, but the 3rd fret and 7th fret are just too flat for that. It is better playing noter drone.

My grandpa on my mom's side owns an all cherry Mize dulcimer.  We moved their stuff up to tn over the weekend (they are moving up here later this week) and I have gotten to play this dulcimer.  The dulcimer's frets have a strange intonation I haven't come across before. They are greatly flat and the 7th fret is more flat than the others. What intonation is this and why did Mize tune it like this? Maybe it's Just, but I didn't think Just was this flat.

There seems to be confusion with terminology - so let me put this a different way. How many people tune their dulcimer (no matter what mode) an octave apart starting with the bass string.

Okay lets play a game called - Tune With Me! (are we excited? ) Okay, imagine- or don't- that we are in the standard key of d in ionian mode. Now fret fret number 1 on the bass string and tune the other 3 strings to that; then take the bass and tune down until you can play the fourth fret bass string and match all the other strings. Yay! We are all now in what I referred to as the low low key of A. ( a.k.a baritone tuning) now it does not sound like baritone at all, but a low standard MD. This mode tuned so low is good for slow,quiet, and mournful songs if you tune the melodies to the 6th fret of the bass.(now aeolian mode) Now can you do this same procedure reversed to tune in the same key an octave higher? I can, (if you try to go higher you will probably break a string). the tuning of this mode that we are in isn't alto tuning, but it is higher than most people tune to, right?

why? Granted it can be harder to press the strings down, but this is solved by noter- I don't really like using a noter, but I can use one. ( I like my God-given one ) I have one or two books (and have seen online) that most dulcimers don't tune to this higher tuning- and I haven't seen many people do it because of the so called "reverse ionian" (which is not technically a mode, not being a 1-5-and so on) So is the dulcimer world scared of tuning up here? Do they not like to tune up there because of tradition? If your strings broke during this exercise maybe you should consider getting a lighter gauge.

P.s if tuning Mixolydian you may not be able to get this high or aeolian because you really do have too long of a vsl or too thick gauge strings.

P.s.s- the rule is that for tuning your dulcimer the clouds are the limit not the trees. (:

I am talking about ionian, but my dulcimer can do it in different modes. The g I am talking about is the g above middle c, and the a is the a below the a below middle c. I normally play drone but do cross handoccasionally.

I have noticed quite a bit of "propaganda" of people saying that this vsl is good for this tuning and this gauge is even better so on and so forth- but my dulcimers-both 28 1/2 in vsl, tune and play very well from the low,low key of A and the high, high key of g. The string gauges I use are 12-14-22 nickel loop end- why does everybody think that they have to have different gauges for different keys? Sure tone is fine, but are people just afraid there strings will break? Or is 28 1/2 the perfect vsl?

that is a good idea

I don't yet, but i will. I do play diatonic

I just want to know what your favorite songs are, Maybe I could get some ideas for songs.

i am in