Forum Activity for @steven-stroot

Many thanks to you dulcimer veterans for sharing your knowledge!  Once again, you have given me helpful direction in my dulcimer journey.  I will heed your sage advice.

One other thing, the doubled melody string produces a different sound/tone than a single melody string. 

Why not give yourself both options.  As Dusty Turtle has pointed out, many builders are slotting the nut and bridge to allow either four equidistant string spacing or the double melody string option.  So there's no need to limit yourself to one of the options.  You can have both if you want them.

With that being said, I prefer a three string instrument for the majority of my playing.  I do, however, own a couple of four string dulcimers that are slotted for both four string equidistant spacing or four string double melody spacing.  The extra bridge and nut slots are barely noticeable.

Conventional dulcimers have three courses of strings -- melody, middle drone and bass drone.  Any one or all of those courses can have 1, 2, or even 3 strings.  They are played, and often tuned, exactly the same regardless of how many stringare in each course -- CCCGGGccc, CCGGcc, CCGccc or CcGgcc are all played the same way that CGc is played  

4-Equidistant strings are a different ball of wax.   They have 4 courses, and that 4th course adds an additional note to the  tunings and the creation of (by dulcimer standards) some 'exotic' chords that are unlike conventional chords.

I suggest you spend some time joining and reading the posts in that Four Equidstant Strings Group

Most dulcimers made nowadays have notches in the bridge and nut so that you can string them with four equidistant strings or with three courses and a double melody.  You can switch back and forth and don't have to choose!

There is a group here devoted to playing with four equidistant strings .  You might consider joining that group and perusing the discussions to see the variety of ways people tune with four strings.

I'm enjoying my three string dulcimer but am considering acquiring a four string instrument (can't have too many instruments!).  Most four strings have a double string but I've seen a few instruments in which all four strings are spaced equidistantly.  Should I stick with the standard double string arrangement or go the equidistant route?  Any input greatly appreciated. 

Having met both Kevin and Howard at the Redwood Dulcimer Day, I can say they are both kind, friendly folk.  Howard is always tickled to meet someone who plays one of the old Capritaurus dulcimers.  (Of course, he likes new orders, too!)

The Germantown Dulcimer Society was organized in June 2016. We are in SW Ohio and meet near Middletown/Germantown Ohio area.

We meet the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month at 6pm. Meeting place is Union Chapel United Methodist Church, 8284 Keister Rd, Middletown, Ohio. We generally have a traditional jam where we go around the circle and each person chooses a song. Sometimes we learn new songs, help newcomers with techniques, or discuss club activities. Bring your own tablature. If you want to be on our email list and receive more details on the meetings and new song tab just let me know thru this site.  

Hope to see some new folks!

Meeting dates for summer are    June 14, 28    July 12,26      August 9,23

---Debbie Simpkins

Wow, Ken, that's pretty cool you got to visit Mr. Rugg!  And you have a fun story about how it came to be, too.  :)

Thanks Robin. That was a delightful interview. Six years ago I had the good fortune to visit Howard in Felton. It was rather serendipitous as my wife made a mistake in navigating our camping trip. She booked us in to a campground about a mile from Howard's shop in Felton rather than finding a place closer to the Monterey peninsula where we were headed. I had a great visit with Howard. He is just as you see him in this video with Kevin and Bosco.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

Mr. Rugg is 86 years old and has been building mountain dulcimers again.  

Yes, the beauty of it moved him to tears.

I remember that day he tried to play fiddle...brought tears to my eyes too!

Thank YOU Robin!  I didn't have to do much of anything- i just applied a new update. Looks like the both you and the developers spotted the bug independently, and they put out a fix for it yesterday. Solved!  

That was easy.

Lisa, I got notifications for all your most recent responses-- yay!  Thank you!  

Hi Robin. Just as I was about to ask for some help on this, I saw that a bug fix was released for our Comment module concerning notifications. It seems quite possible that this will fix our problem, so I applied the update.

I just now made new comments on one each of your photos, audio clip, and videos.
Please let me know now (again) if you receive notifications today for these 3 new comments I made.
Again, thanks for your help in testing!

Thanks, Strumelia!  

I realized I was not getting notifications, maybe, a couple weeks ago?  Yet thought it may be a temporary issue involved which would resolve.   

I received no notification for your comment on my photo, Robin.

Now that we have the issue narrowed down a little, we know it's a coding issue related to comments on media items, not a 'video' or 'audio' function issue specifically.
I'm going to see if I can get help locating the exact problem tomorrow. Usually this kind of thing is a matter of one of my custom modules needing updating in order to function correctly again with another module, like it used to.

Thank you so much Robin for noticing this, and for helping me test out where exactly this is happening (and not happening).
It's often hard to notice something that's missing, as opposed to some obvious problem that's immediately visible..

I'll respond back here when I find out more, hopefully tomorrow sometime.

Every chromatic dulcimer comes with a free diatonic hidden in plain sight. Ignore the extra frets until you need them. For some people this is no problem at all. For others it's confusing and it sounds wrong and they just don't like it. Either opinion is perfectly valid. It's your dulcimer.

I play chromatic. I play diatonic. I play half-breeds with 1.5 and 6.5 frets. Since you asked why NOT buy chromatic, here's what I got:

Chromatic is harder to play. It has wrong notes. This is not insurmountable. Think about the guitar players you know; are they all rocket scientists? If they can manage a chromatic fretboard, so can you. However, if you hate to practice scales you will probably be happier with a diatonic.

Noter speed bumps. Do you play with a noter? Can't stand the idea of your dulcimer sounding like a slide guitar? This is a dealbreaker for some. And some could not care less. Know thyself.

Lack of instructional materials. This is a big one. There are a few books and videos for learning chromatic dulcimer, but not nearly as many resources as diatonic. When an absolute beginner asks me about dulcimers, I usually steer them toward diatonic.

Modal scales get difficult. Dorian is my favorite mode for improvising, and it's so easy on a diatonic! Dial in the right tuning and off you go. Whereas learning all the scales on chromatic is a major learning curve.

Other dulcimer players fly into a panic. Seriously. A friend gets a dulcimer and wants to play together. Bring out a chromatic and they'll yelp in terror. It doesn't look the same. It's too complicated! I have to keep a diatonic around or I won't have any dulcimer friends.

It's not traditional. This matters to many people. And sometimes (living history events? tapping into your personal memories of dulcimers past?) it may matter to you. If the sound you fell in love with is the sound of a traditional silvery noter/drone modal dulcimer, a chromatic is unnecessary and will make it harder to replicate that old-time sound.

That said, if you already have a diatonic dulcimer and you're considering chromatic, and if you have the time and inclination to learn something new, then my advice is go for it.

Done! 

Ok, can you please leave a comment on one of my photos now?

I received notifications for the Group discussion, the Forum discussion, and this thread.  No notification for a comment on a photo.  

You're welcome, @strumelia! 

Before I try to get this fixed, I would like to test this on other types of 'item' that you created Robin...

I just left 'comments' on three more items you created: a photo, a Group discussion, and a Forum discussion.

Can you tell me which (if any) of my new comments generated a new notification for you?  Thanks!

Thanks Robin!

You're right, Strumelia-- I was notified about the "likes"! 

Robin- aside from not getting notified about 'comments'...

I just now 'liked' an audio and video of yours. Can you tell me if you get the usual private message notification for my two likes?  (i suspect you will get them for 'likes')

A couple of other points I forgot, a chromatic will probably be a bit more expensive to buy and much harder to sell.

Both Ken and Robin are correct.

Your instrument is personal.

As Jerry Rockwell says: It’s a possibility box.

Look at lots of video clips of folks playing a variety of music on a variety of different fretted dulcimer configurations and, perhaps, that will give you an idea of what approach you'd like to take to making music.  First and foremost, lean into what music is in your heart to make and get the tool (instrument) with which to do it best.  It's a process and it can be lots of fun to explore.  

Strumelia, I have left comment on one of your videos and one of your audio clips.  

I looked at my settings for notifications and all looks fine there.  

TRADITION! 

When asked about dulcimer with “extra" frets, Jean Ritchie replied “In a strict sense it has a different finger board, it’s not quite a dulcimer anymore.”    

You can find all the notes in the dulcimer's range, but you have to be willing to re-tune at least one string to do so (takes less than 30 seconds, with practice).

If you want a chromatic instrument lay a guitar on your lap and play that.  Or I can build you an  "acoustic lap guitar". Just don't call it a dulcimer.   Part of the essential definition of Dulcimer, to many of us, is the diatonic fretboard.

If you are playing mostly "classic dulcimer songs" especially from tabulature rather than SMN, it will be 'more difficult' because the fret numbering convention is different, and you'll have to find the fewer diatonic frets among the plethora of chromatic frets.  You won't be able to simply count 1,2,3,4... to find a tab numbered fret.  With a chromatic instrument that becomes
1/2,1,1-1/2, 2, 3, 3-1/2, 4, 4-1/2, 5, 6, 6-1/2,7......



Also, IMHO the 'sound' of a chromatic "dulcimer" is different when you slide from note to note -- because of all the intervening chromatic notes between diatonic notes -- I hear those slides as 'muddier'...

Anyone else having this issue, who used to get notifications and are no longer?

Robin, perhaps you can leave a comment on one of my audio clips and one of my videos, so i can see if I get the notifications? (my personal settings are set to send me an email upon such comments, as opposed to getting the notifications in a private message, so not sure how good this test will be.)

Have you double checked all your 'notification' settings to make sure they have not changed and are as you like them?

Hey y'all--  

I've noticed I get no notifications for comments posted on my audio and video clips.  They've always shown up in my private messages yet in recent weeks, no notifications.  I'm wondering whether others are not getting notifications from audio or video, too?

Thanks!   

Shhhh!  I have traditionally fretted dulcimers, some with 1.5 6.5 and some that are chromatic. And two with nylon strings.

My favorite dulcimer is the one in my lap.

I think many of the reasons will be be focus on tradition and your music interests which will include style of play [N/D or chording] and need for the extra frets.

It will boil down to what you want plus a bit of DAD [dulcimer acquisition disease].

I am NOT a traditionalist but I find I play mostly traditional [diatonic] music most of the time when I play with others even though my main MDs are chromatic. I use the chromatic side mostly when playing by myself.

I forgot to add, there are 'chromatic tunings' such as DAA#d, but they are 4 equi-distant strings. These are done on the standard diatonic MD.

I am looking to purchase a new dulcimer and am considering getting a chromatic.  It seems the benefits of being able to play any note within the dulcimer's range is a big plus, but I am looking for reasons why I would not want to get a chromatic.  Can anyone provide some insight here?

For instance, does having a chromatic make it more difficult to play classic dulcimer songs, is it generally more confusing, etc...?

Convince me why getting a chromatic is not the way to go, and why a diatonic is better.

Thanks!

Sorry to see the Bill Taylor tab collection is no longer available unless you are a member of the Knoxville dulcimer club. I've used it a lot in the past and am sad to have lost access to it.