Forum Activity for @john-c-knopf

Art, that looks like a nice one.  Not sure of the bridge-bar either, but it may be an adjustable bridge, with the "real" bridge there just to set the height and spacing?  Like a zero-fret at the other end?

Sitting here looking at a dozen or so instruments...staples, frets, wound wire, straight wire, oak, maple, rosewood. No two are alike, yet I would call them ALL dulcimers. If I spoke in elizabethan english I may say "dulcimore", and if I was a kid in the mountains I might say "that stringy thang"... And guitars with hollow bodies, solid, whammy bars etc are ALL guitars...But as for men with only a mustache and no beard.....well...."technically".....

Nice looking instrument,4 equidistant strings.The fact that you found it in St.Jacob's got me excited,laugh-a Mennonite-Pennsylvania Dutch dulcimer...No.It's a modern dulcimer and I bet it will sound great by the look of it...all the best.

I picked this up in an antique store in St Jacob's Ont. No markings. Very nice shape other than  the bridge and nut which I will replace, and some damage to the scroll head. I'm not sure what the bar in front of the bridge is all about. I've not seen that before. I hope the frets are correct.

Any information or comments would be welcome.

 20240128_170818small.jpg - 38KB

Let me help you with that, Ma'am!  The misty dulcimore past is calling out to you...

I guess I don't have any mountain dulcimers.  waaaaaahhh!   😭

@nate Your perspective was one I hadn't considered-- I'm glad you wrote of it!  

Colloquially, although my newer Jean Ritchie model Blue Lion has "extra" frets, I'll still call it a mountain dulcimer.    

Happy strumming, y'all!   

If it has more than diatonic frets, or more than 3 courses of strings, technically an instrument is no longer a dulcimer, it is a Fretted Zither.  "Tomay-to tomaatoe", but diatonic fret spacing is part of what defines a dulcimer.

A guitar player friend once said about my dulcimer: Too bad some of the frets are missing. But then, too, are some of the strings, compared to a guitar. I wanted more strings, but instead of getting a guitar, I built a dulcimer with five separate strings. Is it a dulcimer? I would say it is 'quite' a dulcimer.

Just for fun, I added frets to a 4-string dulcimer to make it chromatic, and I can now play tunes that would otherwise be impossible. For strictly diatonic tunes, I use one of my diatonic dulcimers (well, they all have both the 6 and the 6+ fret, but I still consider them diatonic--that has become the tradition). 

Those of us who have been playing for a while probably have more than one instrument. Meanwhile, I play five dulcimers with different string/fret configurations: 3 strings, 4 strings with the double melody course, 4 separate strings, 5 separate strings, some with the 1+ fret, one chromatic. Each of those instruments has its own allure, its own possibilities and restrictions. I see no reason not to get a chromatic, and no reason not to call it a dulcimer.

great thanks!  So maybe this was more like the 1933 patent.  

In an interview by Graham Hood, John explains that, in the original dulcichord configuration, he added a complex mechanism of pedals and levers acting on the shorter neck, but that the result was too noisy to use. This can be seen on the record sleeve.

 Douce-Amère.png - 135KB

Here is a short bio on John:

1947 Born in Los Angeles, California
1950 Family moved to England
Instrument - making
1972 - 74 Training : Newark School of Violin Making. Pass with distinction
 
Music and Story-telling
1963 Met traditional music through Folk Clubs
1965 Started giving concerts, solo and in groups
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1976 Moved to Brittany

1978  LP  "Douce-Amère" : traditional songs and instrumentals
(mostly with Appalachian Dulcimers)
1978 - 82 Member of the JOHN RENBOURN GROUP (vocals, dulcimers, violin,
mandolin). Tours + 3 LPs with the group.
since 1978 Solo concert tours: U.S.A., Germany, Ireland, England,
Italy, Hungary and France.
1985 LP  "Spice of Life" : personal and traditional tunes and songs
(with Dan ar Bras, the Josquin des Prés Quartet etc.)
since 1996 Tours throughout France with the story-teller Alain Le Goff
for the story and music show ‘‘Baleines, baleines’’
2000 Creation of  " LEGENDARY AIRS " , a solo show of ‘Stories told by Music itself’ (for all, rec. min. age 7 yrs ).
         CD compilation of «Douce-Amère» + «Spice » (Kerig KCD185) : awarded "BRAVO"  label from Trad Magazine.
2002 Creation of  " WOLF ? " : a one man show, where the wolf is revealed through stories, with some music (for all, rec. min. 7 yrs ).

2018 Creation of  " DREAMCATCHER " :

Great video! Thanks.  I didn’t pick up on the range of that dulcichord, the basses are rich sounding.  But, so it still makes me wonder what the other fretboard is for? It’s such a short scale.  

Thanks for that link. Although I don't speak French, I found the video interesting. I'll search among my friends to see if anyone speaks French to do some translation for me.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

A link to a 1979 French TV program (in french, sorry...) in which John introduced the dulcichord (watch from 9 minutes 30 seconds)

Douce Amère : John MOLINEUX - YouTube

Here's my take.  The triangle is, as John sez, a Russian balalaiki.  The light topped round body is a bouzouki (either Greek or Irish).  The light rectangle is a "cigar box" style guitar.  The two hourglass instrument are indeed variations on the epinette/Applachian dulcimer. The two electric instruments are a bouzouki and a mandolin (short neck).

Your method for finishing the peg end sounds meticulous and will certainly contribute to an attractive pegbox. I appreciate the detailed instructions, and I'll follow the steps you've outlined for the sanding and polishing process.

That triangular one looks like a balalaika (Bal-al-LIKE-ah), a Russian instrument like a mandolin.

Thanks for the quick response Ken! Makes total sense though, one definitely has 2 (seemingly) matching bass strings like you said!

I’ll try to get some clearer pictures tomorrow, I’m assuming there’s a better way to upload VS just attaching them to the post since I had to compress the image to 2mb.

Any earlier patents than 1880 out there?

All your comments make a lot of sense!  

It appears in the first photo that there are four strings over the fret board which would be tuned to any standard dulcimer tuning where the melody string is doubled, DAdd or DAAA. I can't see the strings that off the fret board very well, but they might be drones perhaps a bass version of the melody string an octave or two lower and the other a the same of the middle string. The second photo shows a doubled melody string which four equally distant placed drone strings. Again, you could use a standard dulcimer tuning with bass octaves on the other two strings if they are thick wound strings.

This is just my guess and others may provide better information.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

John is correct, and like him, I have no idea about the plexiglass strip.

Ken

"the dulcimer sings a sweet song."

Good evening everyone (or whatever time it is for you all!)

New to the forum here so a quick intro, I’ve been playing guitar and any other instrument I could get my hands on for a while now, all because of my Grandaddy, who started building instruments in the early 90s and gifted our family an acoustic guitar. Through out the years I’d get something new from him, and recently he gave me my first dulcimer. 

I went to visit this Christmas and he said “Grammys complaining that we need more closet space so come and see if you want any of these instruments” and then proceeded to blow my mind. 2 of them he said are based “eppinettes” but are pretty much dulcimers…..but they both have slightly different fretboards and 6 strings! I haven’t been able to figure what they actually are, what tuning they’d need to be in, or any examples of some music played on these things.

i ended up going home with 7 new stringed instruments and only really know 3 of them well enough to play (an electric mandolin, electric 5 string banjo, and a 4 string banjo that’s built like a guitar)

I wanted to find a place where I could ask what the heck these things are and get some direction on what to do with them! Thanks everyone!!

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If you read lines 27 through 31 in the patent description, it appears that the instrument is intended to be played by two people like a courting dulcimer. It appears to be nothing like the dulcichord (five string table dulcimer) the John Molineux is playing in the video. I did enjoy the video. Very nice playing.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

Cool to see the patent drawing from 1880.  

Thank you for the recommendation, @john-c-knopf !

That patent art needs to be on a t-shirt! Terrific stuff !

@ken-hulme , "The instrument doesn't look like the 1880 patent..."

Agreed.

Beautiful playing.  The instrument doesn't look like the 1880 patent, but I think it may embody the same concept -- an "extended" fretboard that allows notes below the "low do" of the normal fretboard...   

An old dulcimer building friend once built an instrument with 4 frets below the low-do on a single fretboard.  You tuned it by capoing at the 4th fret from the nut and then tuning to DAA or DAd...You then removed the capo to play.  

That was wonderful 👏 thanks for sharing.  What talent and what an instrument!

Congratulations!  What a beautiful instrument!  I don't know what the plexiglass strip is for, but I can help you with the second question.  I think the nut and bridge slots were cut so you could set it up for either equidistant spacing or for doubled-melody string setup:  String 1 stays in slot 1, string 2 goes in slot 2, string 3 goes in slot 4, and string 4 (bass) stays in slot 6.  Have fun!

Hello - I was happy to recently find a 2000 John Stockard dulcimer. Am hoping some of the experts here can help me answer a couple of questions. Hopefully my pix come through so it’s clear-ish what I’m talking about.  

The dulcimer was built with a plexiglass strip alongside the fretboard. What’s that about? I’ve seen it in photos of others Stockard built, so know it’s intentional (and possibly very useful!)

Also, right now the dulcimer is set up with four equidistant strings - a nice feature. I see how you can move the second string close to the first, but am not sure which slots the other two strings would occupy in a more traditional set up.

I’ve been looking a long time for one of John Stockard’s dulcimers - now that I have one I’m eager to learn more about these features. 

Thanks in advance for any knowledge you can share! 

Pam

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I agree Robin, the sound is lute-like.  I have an album of his music.  What is interesting is that somebody made a comment that he built a replica of a patented dulcimer.  I thought it was the pedal dulcimer from 1933, but I think it might be this one from 1880 although the second neck looks unfinished.  
https://73decb.a2cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Patent-1880-Double-neck-Dulcimer.pdf

Beautiful!  The sound hits my ears like it's a lute being played. 

https://youtu.be/sdAg3B5gAx4?si=4SW3rZFGlF9U-0a9

sounds good and interesting playing.

@spotter DITTO!

Many Thanks to all your replies. Its much appreciated. Its a beautiful instrument and I just need to get the fundamentals correct before racing off. Thanks again.

Ken thank you, it's nice to get such good, and consistent feedback. 

Now to see what their turnaround time is. I know they are staying busy.

Nice job! Watch out about the string winding on the bass peg: if it gets all the way to the pegbox wall it can interfere with tuning and setting the peg.

If you ever have to do another peg setting, ease up gradually on the final reaming, then turn the reamer backwards to burnish the wood. The object is to have about 1/32" of the little end sticking outside the pegbox, so that future peg wear will give you plenty of peg left in case you need to enlarge the hole a bit. And fhen finish the peg end to a nice domed button by rubbing its end in a 1-1/2" diameter circular motion on a soft sanding pads, from 100G down thourgh the grit range to 320G. Then finish off with red rouge on a polishing wheel. (Mineral spirits clean up the rouge very well). That results in a very attractive pegbox.

I'm sort of overwhelmed with commissions now and not accepting any until I get the backlog cleared. I can refer you to one of my students, though, if and when you like. (Or who knows, maybe I'll have the backlog well on the way to completion by the time you're ready!). But as I get older I work slower and more carefully, so each instrument takes longer than the previous one.