Hi Kevin,

thank you very much for your nice comment.

Karel 

Excellent playing Kevin and thanks for demonstrating this Thomas repro. with mean tone.

Uhhoo, sounds so sweet, I love it!

Thank you Kevin for using the info on mean tone fretting I sent you to such good effect , I repeat, I am well pleased with my 'Messenger' Pritchard !!!, and equally pleased that you and others are giving mean tone fretting a go in new projects.

beat wishes

John

Thanks JH for explaining it much better than I did. I don't fully understand how it works , but, I In sure do like hoe it sounds.

Assuming that a VSL of 27" is marked off on a batten, and then fret positions for equal and mean tone scales are marked out side by side, it can be seen that the differences are small, and I would hazard a guess, well within the range of errors in fret slot cutting sometimes found on dulcimers ???

This is certainly true once you get to the higher fret numbers.

Here's a table of the difference between Equal Temp and Mean Tone at 27"

Hello Mary ! Just to extend a little the reply Kevin has already made ? Mean tone scale can be seen as preserving the sweet aspects of the natural scale while still allowing us to play in many useful keys. Although sounding good when played in a solo setting, questions are always asked whether such an instrument can play in tune with other instruments ? Instruments that do not have fixed pitches, such as some early instruments, harpsichords, violin, fretless banjo, and of course voice, work well. Mean tone will of course be out of tune with a piano ! It should be noted that that some equal- temperament instruments, such as guitar and banjo, are often played with fiddle and voice, and guitar and lute with harpsichord, any minor disagreements in temperament are small, transient, and unless one has absolutely perfect hearing and is pitch perfect, not very noticable in the played music.( many tunes which are played on badly tuned instruments sound far worse?) This is my opinion, but I have had it reinforced by some top rate players since I first started experimenting with mean tone fretting, Assuming that a VSL of 27" is marked off on a batten, and then fret positions for equal and mean tone scales are marked out side by side, it can be seen that the differences are small, and I would hazard a guess, well within the range of errors in fret slot cutting sometimes found on dulcimers ???

JohnH

without wishing to embark on extended discussion , I hope that this has been of some small help ? I should state that the reason I mentioned mean tone on this site in the first place was that I kept being asked the question in pm's "why does your dulcimer sound different ?" I sometimes wish I had'nt bothered to answer, but stand by the opinion expressed by Sam Rizzetta in a DPN article in 2001 "Mean-Tone Temperament fret placement for dulcimer? All in all I would.nt have my dulcimers any other way"

Thanks Mary, mean tone is a method of fretting, that is more intone than Equal temperament . It plays a little sweeter notes when played noter drone on the dulcimer,but, chording not so much. It is in between just and equal temperament.

John Henry, That JH can play the heck out of a dulcimer, I just try and emulate . The mean tone fretting just sounds right to me. Now that I have John P's fret calculator I can use any vsl i like. Thank you for having me try this mean tone thing out. Actually I have it strung .013's on all three, had intended to play it as Combs did in ddd . But it seems to like other tunings as well.

Sounds the business Kevin !!! (0.013s and 0.020 ?) Good to see that you are trying 'mean tone' , what do you think of it?

best wishes

John

(don't know about this 'JH' , should'nt pay no attention to him, play what you like in the manner that suits you, lol)

Thanks James, Let me know when you are ready for one .Patty, thank you,and yes you will not only see it ,you will get to play it.

Wonderful Kevin!!! You did good!!! I suppose we'll get to see that Thomas at Wartz?

great job Kevin. One of these days, I need a mean tone fretted instrument.

Thanks John, it is that sound I was trying for when building the Thomas. Jim thanks ,my timing was a bit off ,so it was probably hard to play along with me. Ken thank you too, you should come on down to Hindman in November, you can play it all you want.

Sounds good, Kevin. Thanks for posting the pics as well. Makes me miss the original Thomas I had.

Nice job, there Kevin. The Thomas repro is sounding good for sure. I was playing along with ya.

Kevin, your dulcimer has a wonderful classic sound to it!

Thanks much Ken, for the kind comment.

The Thomas repro sounds really good Kevin. Thanks for sharing this.

Ken

"The dulcimer sings a sweet song."

Thank you Paul. I just recently started building with the meant tone fretting and I really like its sound.