https://www.orpingtonfolkclub.org.uk/Interviews_&_Articles/Interviews/001.html
Here’s an interesting article about the most famous player of Frank Bond dulcimers. If you haven’t listened to him, you should!
Briefly... (maybe). The 6 1/2 fret is not necessary for chording or playing more modern music. Check out the playing of Robert Force, Dan Evans and the late Roger Nicholson, none of whom use/used a 6 1/2 fret. Is the 6 1/2 convenient? You betcha. I have more instruments without the 6 1/2 than I do with (I think) and tune to 1-5-8 as much as 1-5-5. BTW, If you're in 1-5-5 an interesting tuning is to raise the bass string a whole step giving you a 5-1-1 tuning in the Mixolydian mode. Now, after saying I would be brief, I must go practice and try to figure out what I'll play on Sunday.
Yes, Pluck is a must read book. My student gave me copy on Thursday night and Monday morning I was finished. I didn't think I'd like the lay-out but it was really good. Only wish a couple of people who have gone on since David could have been around to add some details. I've read parts of it several times and hope to re-read the whole soon. Get it; read it.
Ken's right; don't bind yourself to round. One of my favorite noters is a rectangular one from Keith Young. Oh yeah, Jim Good's kind of looked like a spoon.
Richard Farina used a chopstick. I had a great big river cane noter made by Bobby Ratliff it had a leather lanyard attached so I could "drop" it and play with my fingers. Looked for it one morning and found the lanyard and some splinters on the floor. Seems my dog, a puppy at the time, decided it was a great chew toy (while it lasted.).
Here's a picture of Jim Good (Mastertone) 5 string with doubled bass.
As an aside, Michael Rugg told me in an email that he'd rather have the 0+ than any other 1/2 fret. Indeed he said he preferred his instruments without a 6 1/2
I'm saddened beyond words. I was looking at his cd's in the rack day before yesterday and was fussing at myself for not keeping in touch with him. He was a wonderful musician and singer and a great encourager to me. I miss him already.
Since no one has yet answered, I'll give my 2 centavos. I use a Schatten Dualie stick-on piezo I've had for at least 20 years. I bought it to amplify nylon string guitars to get that "Willie" sound. That being said, I also run it through a Boss GE-7 equalizer which has a small preamp built in. Like with the guitar, I run it into whatever amp I have available. I was given a Roland Microcube this year and I love it. I was using the Squire version of a Frontman 15, which for what it is, a cheap amp, isn't bad at all. For larger gigs I have a Fender Acoustisonic 150. I haven't yet used a magnetic pickup on a dulcimer, however I'm thinking about building a strictly electric instrument with both a piezo and a magnetic. If you want some input on magnetic pickups, contact Jerry Rockwell. He also has a unique mounting system he invented to move magnetic pickups from dulcimer to dulcimer. Think the old Rickenbacker horseshoe in reverse.
Years ago at an open mic I used to attend regularly, the MC said we needed to do love songs. Being the great rule-follower, I got up and sang "Cocaine Blues" with slide guitar accompaniment. He tried to upbraid me that what I did wasn't a love song. I just replied, "It all depends on what you love!"
Seriously, one of my favorite love songs on the dulcimer (or guitar) is "Would you Lay with Me in a Field of Stone" by David Allan Coe.
When I got my 1st dulcimer nearly 40 years ago I thought you should play over the strum hollow most of the time. I learned quickly that sul tasto (toward the nut) and sul ponticello (toward the bridge) would do the same as on the guitar: a sweeter sound toward the nut, a more metallic sound near the bridge. Like others I used them to vary the sound as I did on the guitar. However, you can do the same thing without a strum hollow. Here's a pic of my Heatherwood, which has no strum hollow:
I believe the Hughes dulcimers were made the same way. Maybe that was a Colorado thing?
That being said, you can see by some old dulcimers without strum hollows people wore down the part of the fretboard over which they were strumming. My problem is not that but wearing the top from vigorous strumming and fingerpicking. My Rockwell is going to look like Willie's Trigger in about a year if I don't watch it. LOL.
Right now it's "Star of Bethlehem," not the carol, but the fiddle tune from Alabama (I think.) I've been playing my Jeremy Seeger, cherry top, mahogany body, no extra frets, tuned DAA for now.
In 2015 I was in the hospital nearly 2 weeks for cellulitis in my right leg. Of course I had a dulcimer brought to me!
Sorry to hear of his passing. He was a great pianist. I saw a pic of him playing his dulcimer. If I find it again, I'll post a link here, but it looked like a A W Jeffreys. It definitely had no extra frets. We'll always have his music!
About time somebody did that. Hope you get a lot of responses and a lot of good stories.
Don's instruments also have the 1 1/2 & 8 1/2 frets. He told me if he had it to do over again, he'd keep the 8 1/2 fret and not have the 1 1/2, for what that's worth. He also said we need to retune to DAA for a lot of fiddle tunes. Now on that, he's right.
John, I hope to catch up with you and get their cd's really soon!
Yes, thanks, Robin. You came up with a winner there!
The Sears & Roebuck dulcimers were made in Korea by Hondo, at least in the same factory (with the same specs) as the Hondo dulcimers. Not the first ones imported from the East but pretty good ones.
Regal also made a lot of guitars for Sears to be sold under their Silvertone label.
Couldn't figure out to get the photo in here. Great-grandfather on a cattle drive from Texas to Kansas when he was a young man. He lived to be 96 or 97, so it would be in about 1877
Thought I recognized the playing; here's one of my favorites of him:
I had a Keith Johnson hourglass which I sold to another member here. It was well made and sounded good. Mine had handmade pegs instead of geared tuners. I enjoyed it while I had it, and its new owner enjoys it now.
San Francisco Bay Blues, Bird on a Wire, any country song before 1970, Peaceful Easy Feeling was one of the 1st songs I learned on the dulcimer, Desperados Waiting for a Train, Lulu's Back in Town, Ain't Misbehaving (including all the dim and minor chords on a dulcimer with no extra frets.) So many songs.... so little time!
Thanks, Ariane, Terry and Barb. It was a surprise. It's just fun for me to play with these folks and to have me and the dulcimer be accepted by them.
Thank you DT, Ken, Janene, Jim and Cindy. It's been a fun time playing in a band, particularly one of this genre. We may look "fun" but really we're a bunch of crusty old farts (Except Susie and Brian and Christy who wasn't there.)
Sunday we were presented with the Traditions award from the Folklife Center of Fairmont State University. We played for about 20 minutes after the presentation of the award.
Pictures below
It was a great honor to receive it.
You just have to like it. Any can be interesting.
Interesting instrument. I don't know either if it's a tulip or lyre, but my money's on tulip. I know where Volga is, but don't know anyone who lives there. In fact, it's not far from here in Barbour County. I have an hourglass made in the county seat of Barbour Co. and it's 4 independent strings as well. Have you started with the bridge set the same distance from the 7th fret as from the nut to the 7th and see how close the intonation is.
I believe it's in the "Hits of the Beatles" book by Neal Hellman.
2 dulcimers is a great way to go to jams. If you're in DAA then raise the bass string to E and your A melody & middle strings are in A mixolydian, EAA (Like DAd.) If you're in DAd then lower the A string to G and you're in G ionian, DGd (like DAA.) If there are some songs in C then take the DGd and capo on 3. This will get you started in jams.
Nigel, as others have mentioned, picks are personal. I have a bag of picks of all kinds in my case, most of which I never use. Jerry Rockwell turned me on to "Pointless Picks," round ones that I really like for some things. I have a V-Pick "Bing" for use when I need to "stand out." Some Hercos including the one Ken H mentioned and some Dunlops. Even tho' I have a couple in the bag, I hate floppy picks. Floppier the pick, the less control you have. Bottom line: try out a bunch (another fav of mine is the Star Pick, the green ones) and buy more of what you like and put the others in a bag. When you find other dulcimer players who didn't bring a pick you can whip out the bag and say, "Well, here's a few." LOL
That's a pretty cool discussion. I hadn't started playing the dulcimer again when it took place in 2010. Oh to know several years ago what I know today about older dulcimers and players, etc. I'm ordering my copy of Anne Grimes book today!
Oh, and Jeff's dulcimer is an old Dennis Dorogi that was given to him. Note that there are no 1/2 frets on it. Also, Jeff told me he never plays in DAd. He uses a lot of tunings, but for some reason that's not one of them.
They are really good, aren't they? And Jeff (dulcimer) and Susan (banjo) are such nice folks, too. Anyone who gets the opportunity to see them live shouldn't miss it.
Well, Dave, they can be tuned numerous ways. When I got my 1st it was tuned DAdd. Now, I usually use DAAd. However DAdc is a good one for minor key tunes (Aeolian mode.) Then there's always DAdA, the Jean Ritchie tuning. Have I just confused you to no end? Well pick either of the 1st 2 and start playing. There were no beginner's books for 4 independent strings when I started, and I don't know of any now, either. Janita Baker has some books for 4 strings using her tuning DABbd (I think.) Seems like it would be a cool tuning for solo fingerpicking like she does.
Having been involved in the 1st 3 Homecomings, I am very saddened that they are having to cancel after scheduling it this year. I hope they will be able to set something up for next year and keep it regardless of the perceived attendance. They were a fun time. Even the last one when there was no water was a good one. Let's see what we can do.
I guess someone didn't pay the omeka.net bill. Shame. Pretty good pics of some interesting instruments.
Don, Ken steered you right with the link to the Farina book. I've downloaded it a couple of times to make sure I had a copy. Joan Baez's folk stuff will be found in a lot of books, I'd think. You'd have to look for it by song title; some might be on the usual tab sites. However, Dylan's stuff and Joan's original/modern songs would still be under copyright and might be hard to find. I know Andy Beyer teaches a workshop on 60s folk songs (which I took) but I now have no idea which songs he covered. LOL. Oh, yeah, you might want to check out Ralph Lee Smith's books including the one on Greenwich Village Days (I think that's something like the title) for the folk songs which were common in the 60s folk revival.
Thanks for the "like," Carole. I'd forgotten about this one. May have to learn it again. lol
In the 1981 Directory of Contemporary American Musical Instrument Makers Thomas F Johnson is shown as a full time instrument maker since 1967 with one employee. He made guitars and dulcimers. I don't think the North Texas State instructor is the same one.
cowboy Ed.pdf - 146KB