Forum Activity for @susie

My husband built me an oak "entertainment center" (as I call it) for my instruments. This picture was taken a while ago, and I now have 3 instruments that don't fit. So, this winter he'll be building a second unit for the "overflow". The shelves on top can store 2 instruments each, so the dulcimers all go on the top part. I like to store them in their cases for protection. All the instruments get played quite a bit....takes no time at all to pull one out. The whole music room is humidity controlled (as well as each floor of the house).

 IMG_20141208_091006.jpg - 100KB

K0k0peli, Interesting lyrics. Jimmy Buffett would be proud. Glad you found your avatar. I can almost see you strumming around your house amid your many musical toys, but maybe a little less blue. 

Ken H., thanks for string guage calculator idea. According to that, CGG on my 27"VSL would need a 22 on the bass and 15's on the rest, rather than the 14's I have on now. Even with the wrestling match involved, it's worth a try.

Wow, i'm so happy we have a little group of us now here having fun learning to play!

Helen, though the grooves help keep the bones from sliding out of your hand slowing while playing, I think as yuo get better you may find you don't need them.  The advantage of not having grooves is that you can more easily change the positions of the bones experimentally, and you will find that this changes the tone and volume more than anything else- more than the type of wood even.  I have several different types of wood bones, and any type I can make louder or softer, crisper and ringy or dull and mellow- simply by changing their position in my hands.  Try experimenting a lot with that.

Yay!

I use an unwound bass on a couple of mine: a Keith Young hourglass and a John D Tignor large hourglass. Keith Young and the Schillings (Jean & Lee) sold and McSpadden at least sell "squeakless" strings with an unwound phosphor bronze bass string. True, you lose a little sustain, but it is an interesting sound.

I am about to switch to .011 on my melody string, .013 on my middle, and .024 from .012- .014- .024. My VSL is 27, but I will stay with DAd (probably spelled that wrong) as I am playing with so many other players who are in that tuning. These string gauges were recommended to me by a respected instructor at a recent workshop I attended. He played my dulcimer, appeared thoughtful, then told me to try those gauges. He's either a genius, or well, not. We'll see!   

For anyone wondering, Wahine (wah-Hee-neh) is my moniker on the   Ukulele Underground  forum. It's Hawaiian for woman, or female. Seemed appropriate. 

k0k0peli, what is the meaning of your screen name? 

I play N/D and flat picking. I like both styles. I don't do fingerpicking very often, but I have done it.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

Hi Ken L., thanks, are you playing N/D?

No callus on my thumb because I generally don't use it much.  Pretty solid calluses on my other four fingers.  But I also play guitar, which is how I got them in the first place.

On my Folkcraft I have 0.011s on my melody strings. I have no problem playing in Cgg with this configuration. The Folkcraft has a 27 inch VSL.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

Sheryl-  haha you got me on that one.  ;D

One would have to used UNWAXED floss, and any filament or hair would need to be rosined up I think.

Same places as you D, but since recently recruiting my little finger, I am working on building one up on the side of my pinky too.

Strumelia, What about your shortest middle finger?  

K0k0peli, Just joined the UU forum. Beginner Uke player, with lot's to learn. Looks like a great place to do it. Thanks for your recommendation.  ~Wahine

I just play with the index finger on the melody string, mostly sliding, and build up a callous on the left hand side of my finger tip.

Must have something to do with how I hold my finger down that gives the lop sided effect.

If I've been playing a lot then it can get to the point where the strings start to catch or dig into the callous, helpful on pull offs but better to file it down some.

Oh sorry, all,I see I put a typo in my post. I meant CGG, not CGC. Not enough coffee...

Friend of mine has written Florida-specific lyrics to Winter Wonderland.  "Walkin' in a winter wonderland" has a whole new meaning on a beach in December

Hi Ken.Thanks, but I want to go from DAA to CGG, ( or is that Daa/ Cgg?)  just one step down. The melody strings I have on there are 14's, but I find them just a bit loose/slack/flat. Tune to DAA and this dulcimer is heaven, but I need one I can sing with more easily in my alto range.

Annie -- you can use the Strothers String Calculator, here http://www.strothers.com/string_choice.htm  to find out which strings are appropriate for a given tuning and VSL.  For CGc (not CGC which would have two bass strings) and a 27" VSL, you'll want:

C = 22 wound

G = 15 plain

c =  11 plain

C is the C below middle C;  c is middle c itself.

Hi Robin, what string length is needed for playing CGC, please? Switching to heavier strings on my 27"inch dulcimer has not worked out, and I want that lower tuning for singing...thanks.

k0k0peli, looks like one only needs dental floss or fishing line or ribbon to bow a piano,

Jan, we did that for Christmas a couple of years ago and it turned out kinds neat. 

I saw a video of Jean Ritchie yesterday in which she was using a REALLY huge pick--larger than I've ever seen a professional use.  I think that just underlines the point, "Do what works; use what works."

Glad to hear you are making progress on getting your dulcimer repaired.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings sweet song."

Ken, thanks for both answers. I wasn't sure who was a member of either group so hopefully posted in both places. Your suggestion for the Old Town School of Folk Music was great. I'd completely forgotten that. I'm thinking of turning my Blue Lion into a baritone which Janita said could be done. There's only a 1" scale length difference and a 3/4" length difference between what I have and their baritone. 1" width difference & 1/4" body depth difference. Still thinking about it but I've found a baritone suits my voice better. Just called OTS of FM store and got the info I need.

 The simple answer is yes. I don't know how close you are to Chicago, but if you are near there, you could call the Old Town School of Folk Music and ask who in your area could do a repair for you.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

The cross is really lovely, Charles.  It's neat you know what the various elements symbolize.  

I always get my biggest callus right at the tip of my longest middle finger.   I laugh because when I recently got into my bones playing frenzy, I actually got a small callus started on the side of one of my fingers where the bones rub against it. 

I play with a noter so I don't have to develop any calluses...

Barbara, I gave you an extensive answer in the other place you posted your questions.

I have a Yocky baritone dulcimer that I love but saw two small areas that have come unglued over the the past 5 years. Is there a way to get this fixed? The dulcimer is in perfect shape but I don't know where to begin or who to go to for this. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. It's my favorite dulcimer and has the most beautiful 'voice' ever. Thanks again. Barb

This cross was decorated by Huichol Indians with very small beads affixed with a mixture of bees wax and pine sap. The red symbols are scorpions. The story is that if you are stung by a scorpion God is is sending you a message, if you die from the sting God wants to give you the message face to face. The circular symbols at the top are peyote buttons, which the Huichol use in their religious rites. 

So where have y'all developed your callouses? 

My most seasoned callous (much to my surprise) is the side of my thumb. Next in line is the slight side of my middle finger then the side of my ring finger and barely..well, not really on my pointing finger.  I have no idea why the callous is to the side. Now I'm going to have to watch my fingers and see what's going on, ha!

In chronological order: piano, violin, cello, guitar, mountain dulcimer (!), autoharp, guitalin [www.guitalin.com], Great Highland Bagpipe, mouthoblown smallpipes, bellows-blown smallpipes, biniou, washboard, harpsichord (!).  I can no longer play guitar or violin due to arthritis in the fingers, but other instruments are still doable. I love playing in groups.  We have a small family ensemble called "May Milling Company" composed of myself, my husband (on washtub or bodhran), and our nephew on recorder. 

Don't ever let anyone tell you you are too old to learn an instrument!  I have a good friend whose father played the clarinet all his life.  In his 90s he took up the bassoon!  Etta Baker was a fine bottleneck guitar player in the Piedmont of North Carolina.  We had the pleasure of seeing her at Merlefest back in about 2004.  She was in her 90s and had just taken up the banjo.

 k0k0peli, I looked into using a stick to flex and tie horse hair on it but I wanted to do something special for my neighbors. That's why I decided to make a psaltery bow. When I did research on bows for the violin uke and psaltery I did come across instructions for making a simple bow. ( http://dennishavlena.com/psaltery.htm )  I'm not sure how well a Popsicle stick would work as it is very short and I don't think it would be that easy to put string on it without having to cut slots etc. Just my uneducated opinion. Other than the scroll saw (I already had one) I didn't spend that much money making the bow. I already had tung oil, sand paper, fine steel wool and paste wax from a previous project. I didn't spend much on the synthetic hair, rosin, glue and poplar wood. In fact, I purchased an extra piece of poplar wood just in case I messed up. It wasn't expensive at all.

I would think she could test out the switch before actually buying a left handed dulcimer by flipping the dulcimer around and just going through the motions of making chords and strumming in her opposite hands...without paying attention to any 'wrong' sounds that result in the test.  The question would be if she can make and hold down chords with her hand that has tremors.  One other thing to keep in mind is that it's a little harder to resell a lefthanded dulcimer than a normal one.

I would think a large flexible pick made from cutting a big triangle out of a stiff plastic deli container- try the side, the bottom, and the lid for different stiffnesses.

I know our wonderful FOTMD member Lexie might be able to give some excellent advice here- i hope she jumps in! 

Thanks so much, Tumbleweed.   :)

Wout said:

"My ten years old son just hides my bones, but I have a rather large collection."

That reminds of the joke:  "Our parents moved around a lot when we were growing up. But we always found them."   lolol

Wow Lisa Lisa that was GREAT!

Regarding an unwound bass string - Noter drone players may use an unwound bass string of 18-20 gauge plain steel (guitar, banjo or piano wire).  This string is never fretted but used as a drone.  And used this way a plain bass string produces the high silvery timbre many noter drone players want from certain instruments in their collections.  I use plain gauge bass strings on some of my noter drone specific instruments (usually made from piano wire).  If you do intend to fret a thick plain gauge string at a relatively low tension then the intonation will be poor to awful   Thick plain gauge strings also have reduced sustain compared to their wound counterparts - so if you intend to fret the string up the fretboard you'll tend to just get an out of tune 'thud'.

Regarding back fretting noise:  A slightly higher action at the nut or using a dampening finger kills this.

Regarding an octave lower bass - You can do this but will need quite a thick string (around 0.054) and higher action, plus wide nut and bridge slots.  However, the dulcimer body itself is not capable of producing the fundamental low frequency D2 (or D3 for that matter!!!!)  So the string will sound 'boxy' rather than rich.

Basically, the mountain dulcimer, at the body size, shape, VSL and pitch we use today was never designed for playing chords in DAd or CGc.  Our modern instruments are based on the size and shape of older instruments that were played in noter drone style with a different set-up, tunings and strings (for which the box size and shape sonically work well).  So contemporary chord melody playing is always going to be a compromise.  As you say, it is not expensive to play around with string gauges and set-ups so it is well worth you experimenting to find out the set-up that will suit your style of playing the best.