400 members coming up..
OFF TOPIC discussions
Leftover Christmas Turkey anyone...........?tongue in ckeek, honest!JohnH
Forum Activity for @john-henry
OFF TOPIC discussions
Leftover Christmas Turkey anyone...........?tongue in ckeek, honest!JohnH
400 members coming up..
OFF TOPIC discussions
Kind folks have showered us with candy-- toffee, chocolates of different kinds, bull's-eyes, Tootsie Rolls, and more. Y'all are welcome to any we've got; I won't hold back the stuff I like best. :)
400 members coming up..
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I just pulled a big bowl of fresh carrots from my garden today...the very last harvest from the garden this year. Glazed carrots! :D
400 members coming up..
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Potato latkes with sour cream and apple sauce, and just plain salt and pepper, in case you like them plain the way I do.
400 members coming up..
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Wow as Razyn pointed out our next member will be number 400.. we just keep growing.. Razyn said he was bringing Blackeyed Peas..so what is every one else bringing... I have some Chocolate Fudge and Ginger Cookies... :) :)
updated by @rod-westerfield: 01/13/19 05:09:18PM
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
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Hudson shows up well in the snow! Good looking dog!
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
OFF TOPIC discussions
Season's Greetings and Best Wishes for a Merry Christmas and Great New Year to our friends here at FOTMD from a windy and snowy northwest Pennsylvania.
Michael Vickey and Hudson
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
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Happy Hannukkah, Joyous Solstice, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone on at FOTMD.
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
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Once again the Sun has overcome the darkness, friends; and soon we will celebrate the turning of the year ... a better year to everybody, full of love, joy, and music.
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
OFF TOPIC discussions
Merry Christmas to everyone at FOTMD. Ditto here on what you said Randy. A lot of good people and even better, we're friends. Happy New Year...
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
OFF TOPIC discussions
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
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Happy holidays and a joyful new year to all - What a wonderful group of people!
updated by @strumelia: 12/19/25 10:09:09AM
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
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The Best of the Season and a Happy and Healthy New Year to everyone.
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
OFF TOPIC discussions
I echo Randy's sentiments about here-- a wonderful site with welcoming folks! (I've got one of Randy's necklace noters on a cord wrapped 'round my wrist right now. My Prussia Valley Music Box is on my lap and I've been playing!)Happy Christmas and new year to all!
A Very Merry Christmas to all my New Friends
OFF TOPIC discussions
Just wanted to wish all on the Friends of the Mountain Dulcimer site a very Merry Christmas and a Great New Year. I wanted to thank all of you for such a wonderful site and making me feel so welcome. Thank you
updated by @randy-s-bretz: 01/13/19 05:09:18PM
Bess Lomax Hawes, 1921-2009
General mountain dulcimer or music discussions
I had the privilege of getting to know Bess and her son Nick at the Idyllwild Music Camp in California in the early 60's. I was brand new to to traditional music, having come froma Jazz and classicla background. She was a very wonderful and giving person. Her warmth is what really stands out in my mind, both in her performances and just talking with her. Seems like way too many of these pivotal figures have now left us. I would see Nick around LA more than Bess but it was a true gift to have known her.Ken Bloom http://www.boweddulcimer.com
Bess Lomax Hawes, 1921-2009
General mountain dulcimer or music discussions
Well, not so much a span of years, but a cast of characters -- and they got off the ground in the late 1930s. Almanac Singers (Bess was one), Weavers... Burl Ives, Pete Seeger, Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie, et al. A few influential regional festivals (such as White Top, and the one Jean Thomas traipsed around) were begun a little earlier than the public careers of these New Yorkish types -- but they didn't really cause any national movement, that I can see. Since actual folk music was alive and well in the 1930s, it didn't need to be revived; but The Folksong Revival was a national pop culture phenomenon -- and those take something like air time on the (radio) networks, coverage in the major print media, and all that.What did Allen Smith say ("Pre-Revival Dulcimers")?
Bess Lomax Hawes, 1921-2009
General mountain dulcimer or music discussions
Thanks for this, Dick. Folks on the Ballad-L list have been saying over the past several months that 2009 was a particularly painful year in terms of losing many people who helped keep traditional folksong alive and well.Just curious- what span of years would you personally feel to be the "original folksong revival"?
Bess Lomax Hawes, 1921-2009
General mountain dulcimer or music discussions
I was on the road around the end of November, and didn't catch up with the news very well when I got home. I had missed the fact that another former colleague, who was one of the last surviving members of the original "folksong revival" cast, had passed away. I've looked at several of her obituaries, on Mudcat, and I think this one from the Huffington Post is the most complete and sensitive: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-dreier/bess-lomax-hawes-1921-200_b_373423.html Almost all of my dealings with Bess had to do with NEA Folk Arts grants (applying for them, accounting for them, reviewing others' applications for them, etc.). But I knew her earlier, when she was still teaching at Cal State Northridge; and the last time I ran into her, we were in the produce section of a Safeway -- we lived in the same Arlington neighborhood after she retired. She was a fine person -- not as well known as her flamboyant brother Alan Lomax, but having many of the same gifts and credentials -- in conjunction with an open, pleasant personality.
updated by @razyn: 06/09/16 08:21:50PM
Bobby McFerrin: The power of the pentatonic scale
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Pentatonic rules!! The Natural Scale!
Bobby McFerrin: The power of the pentatonic scale
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Hey - I really liked that!!!!
Robin
Bobby McFerrin: The power of the pentatonic scale
OFF TOPIC discussions
We saw him in London a couple of years ago when he toured the UK. If you ever get the chance DO go.He has a phenomenal vocal talent and a joyous love of singing that is absolutely enchanting and infectious. He gets the audience to do all kinds of things with him, he had a community choir on stage for part of the show, with whom he had done a day's workshop. He was also joined by his son who did stunning beatboxing as a duet with his talented dad. It was a lifetime experience for us.This clip is great - it is interesting that he claims that this works ANYWHERE in the world.
Bobby McFerrin: The power of the pentatonic scale
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It wasn't until he hit the third note that I heard a second note. The first two are just too close together for them to really register a difference. Perhaps if he'd use another sound than BAH the second BAH would have changed for me.
Bobby McFerrin: The power of the pentatonic scale
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It knocked me right out.Putting aside the nature/nurture thing altogether, this piece is powerful evidence that music is somehow wired into our brains.
Bobby McFerrin: The power of the pentatonic scale
OFF TOPIC discussions
Bobby McFerrin shows, in a muscial experience conducted with a live audience, that the audience has an internal sense of a pentatonic scale after being taught only two notes of the scale.This isn't a lecture. It's a short, riveting musical performance that is relevant to diatonic performance and especially to melody-drone-style playing.
updated by @flint-hill: 01/13/19 05:09:18PM
Today I painted a plain wood frog limberjack I bought. He was cute unpainted, but I wanted him green. I got him from musician MaryLee Sunseri .
I am trying to memorize the old ballad Froggie Went a' Courtin' so I can sing while making him dance. I'm not much of a multi-tasker, so it's not easy!
Here are the before and after pictures. I decided I liked him frowning better than smiling...
Barrel Organ? Denise Ivy said:
that was soooo awesome-thanks so much for posting-Those were great looking Limberjacks--weren't they?
-Was that a Hurdie Gurdie that guy was playing?
Haven't had too much to practice myself-all my extra practice time has gone to my dulcimette --but looking foward to a little extra time for Lilly to strut her stuff.
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
Keltia, try thinking of the bowed psaltery more like a piano rather than a dulcimer.
You pick a range of the piano keys you want on your psaltery- usually between 1 and 3 octaves somewhere. Then you will have all the notes within that range. There is one string for every note. Each string will only play its one note- just like on a piano.
On a dulcimer or guitar, each string plays many notes through fretting it- therefore you can choose 'tunings' based on the kind of fingerings you are going to use.
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
a draw showing what note is what string could be fine.
Here are a few different tuning charts. Your string notes really depend on what high/low range you would like, on the size of the psaltery in terms of string length, and on how many strings you want:
http://www.juneappledulcimers.com/pages/BowedPsalteryTuningChart/
http://www.apsimplepsaltery.com/tuning_scheme.JPG
http://i153.photobucket.com/albums/s225/nigelum/Hodge-Podge/Psaltery_tuning_chart_resized.jpg
http://tuckasee.com/howto1.jpg
http://www.dulcimershofar.com/skin1/images/psal_notes.gif
As you can see there is no one correct way to tune a bowed psaltery, as they are all different depending on what strings they have.
A 25 string tenor like you show would be a nice typical psaltery. 25 or 32 strings or so, you'd be able to play various types of music on it. I would suggest you get at least 1 1/2 octaves to start with.
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
Keltia said:
Well, true... XD
My questions are about the whole....
1 - strings name/tuning?
2 - specific stuff to do/not do with (to know) ?
3 - hows big is the difference between one from a luthier & one from industry for that instrument (Indeed i wonder for that one) I'd like to hear both & see the differencies but I can dream about...
4 - Where to find tabs about ?
I think those questions are the common ones for any instr. heh Quite normal when yr pretty new at a new instrument... But I thought it was a thread about bowed psaltery but sure as I said: I'll dig more that
psaltery website later.
Keltia, yes your questions are normal for any new instrument, but they require a lot of in depth answers that could easily take days of typing. Donna suggests correctly that all this information is already there for the reading on her site totally dedicated to bowed psalteries- no need to try to explain everything about BP's here. This is a good place for discussing a few specific questions and for having fun comparing our BP experiences here, from the standpoint of being mountain dulcimer players. I do recommend that anyone who wants to learn about bowed psalteries in an in depth way would do well to look at Donna's comprehensive site http://psalterystrings.com/ .
But to try to address some aspects of your questions:
1 - strings name/tuning?
Psalteries can have varying numbers of strings, all tuned to various notes. Mine has 32 strings and is approximately 2 1/2 octaves. Basically, there is a string for every note. I won't name all 32 notes/strings on my psaltery here, but if you like I can point out an online chart for tuning a 32 string psaltery. You do not fret any strings to make notes, you just bow each open string. There are some people who use specific 'tunings' to achieve effects that are not the norm, but mostly the strings are not tuned in 'tunings'- they are just an array of notes (whole and half steps) going up the scale.
2 - specific stuff to do/not do with (to know) ?
To do : practice a lot, concentrate of getting a smooth sound from your bow and a light touch. learn a simple melody line.
Not to do : saw away on it roughly with a heavy hand which produces unfortunate sounds. Be impatient. Try to play 1-3-5 chords.
Not really sure what you mean by this question, but tried my best to answer it. If I'm missing what you meant by your question, please specify and clarify further what you are wanting to know.
3 - hows big is the difference between one from a luthier & one from industry for that instrument (Indeed i wonder for that one) I'd like to hear both & see the differencies but I can dream about...
On Donna's site there are quite a few descriptions and comparisons from various people owning psalteries amde by different people. She also lists some of the makers on the left column of her site, you can look at their sites and what they offer- most of them make nice psalteries that are good quality. Many of their sites offer photos and sound clips. Donna's site also has LOTS of videos of people playing thier psalteries, and you can watch and compare them.
Much depends on how many strings you want - that largely determines what size psaltery you would like to buy. Some are very small with less than a dozen strings- others have over 30 strings. Some have a high sound, some have longer strings and a lower sound. If you want to play very simple tunes then a smaller one with fewer strings might be fun to try. There is no one single type that is best for all people- just like with mountain dulcimers, a lot depends on what kind of music you are wanting to play- knowing that can help others make recommendations. Naturally larger psalteries with many strings are more expensive than small psalteries with only one octave of strings or less.
4 - Where to find tabs about ?
There are some tabs on Donna's site that you can find (Donna can point you to them perhaps).
But TAB is not as useful or applicable for bowed psalteries as it is for mountain dulcimers. Why?- because there is no fingering/fretting involved . No fingering positions to indicate, so basically any tab for the bowed psaltery consists mostly of just indicating which strings to play for each note in the melody. In a way, I feel it's just easier to pick out a simple tune by ear and practice playing it until you 'know' the tune on the psaltery. Once you can play one very simple tune, you can build on that and slowly play other tunes and get better.
In my view, TABs are mostly useful for instruments with fingerings and fingered fretted notes and chords - like mountain dulcimers, guitars, banjos, etc. Otherwise, you can simply use standard notation or else just learn the tune by ear. Start simple .
Hope this helps?
updated by @strumelia: 12/08/24 12:24:51PM
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
Keltia, from what I see of your abilities with other instruments I do not think that the psaltery would offer any problems to you. As Strumelia says above, ask away here, I am sure you will be answered.
JohnH
Keltia said:
I was closed to get one the last time I went to Brittany.... beautiful instrument but still, I wonder about tabs, strings, tuning, etc...
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
Keltia, if you have a specific question it is easier to answer... :)
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
Donna, I recall that the maker was Tish Westman. It was smaller than the one strumelia has shown. Wonderful sound ! It seems to keep on ringing. Donna Malus said:
Hi Sue, where did you try one? Do you know who the builder was?
Sue Simms said:I had the opportunity to play one last week ! so beautiful , I will check out Tish's site.
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
I had the opportunity to play one last week ! so beautiful , I will check out Tish's site.
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
Sue Simms said:
Sue, be sure to join http://psalterystrings.ning.com/ ....where you can drool over b.psalteries to your heart's content!OMG , The Bowed Saltery is such a Beautiful Instrumment. I had the oppertunity to play one last week and Just fell in love with it ! Just a beautiful sound and now I want a new toy ! Maybe Christmas
Bowed Psaltery
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
I recently got a little too busy with all kinds of stuff in my schedule, and I sadly stopped playing my bowed psaltery altogether for about four weeks.
I picked it up a couple of nights ago, dreading how i might sound. But NO!- after about five minutes of shaking out the cobwebs, I was almost back where I had left off. What a kind and forgiving instrument it was!I happily played my favorite practice tunes for an hour, and I seem to have wound up pretty much back where I was again. What a relief. Now hopefully I can get back into more regular practice.