woah, I live on Sycamore Haven Drive in Nauvoo, Illionis and there are soooooooooooo many Sycamore trees here. hummmmmmmmmmm. I'll be learning more about that wood FOR SURE. thanks for the photos.
Yep, that's quarter sawn Sycamore. Very often it will appear to look like snake skin.
Another vote for sycamore.
Ken
"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."
Fair Flower of Northumberland is Child Ballad #9, and hails from the old English East March a.k.a. Northumberland, which is south of the River Tweed (at that point the border between England and Scotland). My ancestors, lived along the north bank of the Tweed, in the Scottish East March. John's rendition is quite beautiful.
Ah! Thank you Randy! I was a bit confused since Robin posted it.
How beautiful! We will all miss John...and as Robin said- Fare Thee Well.
Lisa....that's John playing the dulcimer there...I'd recognize that index finger anywhere!
[jrEmbed module="jrSoundCloud" id="112"]
Fair thee well John P - you are sorely missed.
Robin, did you perchance compose that pretty tune in memory of John Phillips?
It's so pretty to hear you play it!
Mike, I need a repair made to a tuning peg on one of my dulcimers-- due to life circumstances, I haven't yet gotten to it. Your dad posted step-by-step instructions for how to proceed with the fix. Whether I attempt the repair myself or take it to a luthier, your dad's instructions will be with me.
Ayup -- sycamore. Not "bird's eye" which is a specific pattern, but as Dan see "highly figured".
John came up with his own way of explaining and simplifying the sometimes wild and deep talk about modes.. made superb sense talking about "home fret" and "gapped scales"....playing 2 or 3 or 4 modes in one tuning.....clarified my thinking f'sure...
Just found Folkcraft's website where they have wood sample photo's under Dulcimer building supplies............John and Dan are on the money.........Sycamore.
I vote for sycamore. My Noah's Ark dulcimer is sycamore, and the color and figure look just like that. Almost a fur-like appearance.
Sure is pretty! Mr. Mize made nice instruments, beautiful workmanship.
I don't know much about wood, so I'm afraid that I can't help you...but you have one beautiful dulcimer there. Congratulations and enjoy!
Possibly a highly figured sycamore!
I was amazed on my frequent searches on E Bay, that I found a Bob Mize, 2001 4 string dulcimer in absolute perfect condition, either very cared for or never played. The workmanship is amazing, but I have no idea what the top wood is, there was no info at all on the listing other than it was a 2001 Mize.
Please take a look at photos of the top and would appreciate any feedback on what you all may think it is, I've had several friends who have worked with various woods, but they can't nail it down. The most frequent choice right now is possibly birds eye maple, whatever it is, it's gorgeous. Great tone, yet soft quality.
If I could, i would run the conversions on the IPad (vs my aging Macbook) but discovered Ipad cannot currently open the wma file when I tried sending that attached to email or via Drive...does Audacity function for this?....or, any chance you know of app or download that could support managing these conversions or edits within IPad format? Thanks again, E
Erin, I am not sure about apps or downloads or even iPads, but there are plenty of free audio conversion websites where you upload an audio file and specify what format you want the file in. IF you just Google something like "online audio converter" you will get several options. One I have used is available here , which allows you to specify the format you want the file converted to and also the quality (which equates to size) of that file.
Erin, I record my videos with a little canon vixia camcorder and load them to my computer using the "Image Browser" software that I think came with the camera. Then I use a free app called "Any Video Converter" to edit out all the bad takes etc. and to convert from MP4 to MP3. MP4 is usually too big for this site. Then I load the MP3 on to Youtube and voila from Youtube I can share it here on FOTMD.
Patty's right about that, Erin- you can set your video to private, semi-private, or public on Youtube, but you won't be able to have it selectively view-able to only certain people here on FOTMD- it has to be set to public if you add it here on FOTMD. I'm talking about if you want it to be in our site's general Video section.
Adding audio/music files to FOTMD Music section:
1) upload either an MP3 (and if it's too large a message will say so)
OR 2) Add it as a Soundcloud clip. (you have a Soundcloud account where you've already uploaded your audio clips) -Soundcloud is like Youtube but for audio clips.
Adding a video to FOTMD video section:
1) Follow the instructions to add a YOUTUBE video that you've already uploaded onto your Youtube account.
2) OR... Follow the instructions to add a VIMEO video that you've already uploaded onto your Vimeo account.
Note- you can upload an MP3 directly from your computer to the Music section. You cannot upload a video directly from your computer to the video section.
Audio files: Convert them to .mp3 as the files are much smaller and more compatible with just about every application. There are a number of free packages that will do this. I use Audacity, it's fairly user friendly and means you can edit your recordings to improve the quality as well as save them in different formats. Sort of photoshop for music!
Video files: Upload to Youtube or Vimeo and then link to them from here.
Robin
There have been a number of discussions about the Seagull over on ED, and in spite of the company's reputation as a guitar builder, the consensus is that the Seagull just isn't "up to sniff". The fret pattern is 'strange' at the very least. It reminded several people of the problems with the 'made offshore' First Act dulcimers a number of years ago...
Hey Ozarklady.
I can't explain why, but the Seagull is made with one full octave, meaning it goes to the 7th fret. However, it has no 6th fret. Instead, it has only a 6-1/2.
Seagull is a fine guitar company. They make very good and affordable instruments. I have a 12-string Seagull that I like a lot. I've also heard that many Merlin owners love that instrument as well. Think of it as a stick dulcimer like the McNally Strumstick, which only goes up to the 10th fret or something. If I were going to get a Merlin, though, I would have a 6 fret installed.
You might consider poking around in the Stick Dulcimer Group here at FOTMD. I'm sure some folks there are more familiar than I with the Merlin.
Jan happy that you and your husband can go to this event together.
Y'all have a great time, learn allot and have fun.
Great video. MM is a top notch musician with mind boggling talent. Thanks for reminding us of her work.............
This kid is as cute as a button!
(and she grew up into a popular and talented country musician)
Gotta love it...
Shorter scale dulcimers will sometimes need heavier strings to keep the pitch at DAd, and this could be where an element of the little loss of sustain mentioned by Joy comes into play. Personally, I tend to pitch up a little on shorter instruments. If you are playing mainly by yourself then there's no reason at all not to go to EBe on a 26" and just pretend it is in DAd. Remember on an acoustic guitar with a 25.5" scale it is common to play a 0.013 as the high 'e' with a medium gauge string set. So taking a 0.012 to high 'e' on a 26" dulcimer is not an issue. I was actually playing a 27" in F recently and it sounded lovely (I think that was with 0.010 melody strings). Every dulcimer behaves a little differently, so if you want a shorter scale, it is certainly worth playing around with string gauges and pitches to find out what sounds best on the instrument.
For some reason we all want to stay in the key of D but in reality we probably spend only a very small proportion of our playing time in situations where we must be in DAd. So if you do own dulcimers of different scales then I would recommend experimenting with different string gauges and different pitches to find what sound best on each one.
Jim Woods is correct. For all intents and purposes the measurement between the nut and the bridge is VSL or scale length, but it varies slightly from instrument to instrument. If you measure from nut to octave fret and from the octave fret fret to bridge and add that together, that's the true VSL or scale length. In 30 years or so of playing bass (both bass guitar and upright) the small differences in measurement between instruments depending on how you measure makes no difference. (I know this sounds like gibberish, but think about it and you'll get it :-).)
John's got a good point. I hold the pick between thumb and middle finger, not the index. I dunno why; but it works. Robert Force taught me his thumb-and-two grip, and I migrated from that to thumb-and-middle somehow.
Thanks Rob. I love my big ol' Fender pick when I play on the Gallier.
Fret spacing and scale length are fixed amounts. Compensation will add a millimeter more or less but has nothing to do with fingering. Once your string gauge and compensation is set you can forget it and get on with the fun. I tell people all the time to take advantage off all your fingers. Over time you get the dexterity to play equally well with every finger. Once you get there scale length doesn't matter much... Robert...
Robert Force, in one of his Youtube videos, shows his way of holding a large pick with the thumb and 2 fingers. I've tried it a little and it seems to work. I'll try to find in which video it's in.
Not everyone holds the pick against the index finger or "between the fingerprint and thumbprint." If after the procedure and the healing your old way doesn't work, be open to alternatives in the way you hold the pick.
Post has some nice help, good luck finding your new way to strum and with your finger joint.
