|
Arsenic Lupin posted:Tap, I went back and reread your article on citterns, and you didn't mention where to find one. My search resources keep coming up with antiques, zithers, and mandolins. Is there such a thing as a cheap cittern? You're referring to the modern cittern, not the Renaissance instrument?  Citterns, which have five doubled courses are a little tricky: there's a goodly number of reasonably affordable four-course octave mandolins/bouzoukis floating around. Trinity College, Johnson, and Gold Tone (I think most of these are Korean) go as low as $400 new (GT maybe a little more), a bit less used. There Romanian brand "Hora" has been chugging along for years at around $200, they're very light and don't seem substantial, but for the price okayish. Now, those are all four-course OM/'zouks, so reasonably popular due to Irish music (not traditional, a 1960s innovation). Cittern has always been a bit more obscure, and is even more of a made-up modern instrument dimly referring to a Renaissance one. Overall "cittern" tends to mean "an OM with an extra course at the bottom", and has at least some tendency to be in an open tuning (such as DGDAD) rather than mando-like CGDAE. The modern cittern was basically invented by luthier Stefan Sobell in the '60s as a more deluxe and vaguely more Irishy replacement for Andy Irvine's Portuguese guitar. The Portuguese guitar actually is a legit descendant of the old English cittern, so the name's not totally off.  Citterns have been more of a boutique item, so the majority of folks I know who play them have pricey ones by individual named luthiers. So far as <$1000 ways to get one, Bardsong Instruments makes them for maybe $600-700, and Wishnevsky maybe $500-600. Bardsong has a mixed rep, though honestly for the price I was pleased with the one I owned years ago. But maybe worth checking into current reviews; maybe they're better or worse since they reconstituted last year after long hiatus. Wishnevsky is generally described as "crude but serviceable". As kind of a niche option, there's the "waldzither", a German instrument that's like an OM with one single low string at the bottom, and also the Portuguese guitar I posted higher on the page. For what it's worth, Andy Irvine, the guy who really popularised the "Irish bouzouki" back in the 1960s, alternated between Greek 'zook, Portuguese guitar, and waldzither. Portuguese guitars run about $400+ and are pretty cool looking (you might need to read up about what they can easily be restrung to to ensure it's a tuning you'd like). I'm not sure what waldzithers go for, but they pop up on eBay, and there's one there as I post; they tend to be a bit older, so I'd tend to stick to buying them from folks who have credibility in accurately describing instruments vice "found this in the garage, plays good."  If you want a 10-string and don't want to pay too much money or take too much risk, there are folks who just get a 12-string guitar off Craigslist and re-string it, which probably works fine. For some reason YouTube isn't letting me copy URLs, but if you search "12-string guitar cittern" there are some cool examples. Here's one guy who's clip I like who did such a conversion, and a few guys at MandolinCafe discuss it too. Were it me, out of all the above options I'd be most inclined to do the guitar conversion if cost is an issue and you don't care that it'll look like a guitar. If looks matter, I'd check to ensure the tuning you want can be re-strung onto a Portuguese guitar, and get one of those. They're cool-looking enough I'd almost recommend getting one instead of an Irish bouzouki just for cachet. The best place for info is to go to MandolinCafe.com and check the cittern/zook/OM ("CBOM") subforum, so if you have detailed questions about tunings, pricing, calculating what string gauges are safe, they'd be the go-to guys. EDIT: Britgoons, the £35 concertina and £55 one-row accordion I mentioned earlier are still up on Melodeon.net; seriously, if you've been considering getting a toy accordion, get one of those as an even nicer piece of gear for not much more money. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 03:39 on May 25, 2012 |
#
?
May 25, 2012 01:49
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 11, 2024 11:45 |
|
|
Stylophone: Fun little toy or 20 dollar indie band paperweight?
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2012 05:20
|
|
|
skooma512 posted:Stylophone: Fun little toy or 20 dollar indie band paperweight? We have a few goons who owe them here; I've owned about 40 of them, but that's because I bought them on closeout from Urban Outfitters for $5 each. I'd be curious to hear whether the other owners have gotten a lot of use out of them, or more a fun novelty. You certainly can do cool things with them, just not sure if it's something people do for days and days on end like playing other instruments. They are indeed fun; not necessarily a great solo instrument, but fun in groups or for playing along with your stereo, almost as a musical puzzle game to be able to hit the right pitch and make the right leaps. At $20 they're pushing their value; any much higher than that and you should check out the Korg Monotron. Those sell for as low as $45 shipped, and overall seem a more serious product. 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2012 12:20
|
|
|
I actually ended up buying a pair of a Monotron Duo and a Delay (while shopping around for a wind controller yes I'm still on that). They're both pretty neat. There are a couple of videos on Youtube, but they have tend to involve a lot of editing/looping. Like so! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYA_2koNLNs
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2012 13:21
|
|
|
zachol posted:I actually ended up buying a pair of a Monotron Duo and a Delay (while shopping around for a wind controller yes I'm still on that). They're both pretty neat. Do you find them fun to play with just on their own, or do you more plug them into the computer and play them over loops, or turn on the stereo and jam along with that? They do seem to have a lot more control over tone and effects. Do they also feel pretty sturdy/professional; feel you go your money's worth? Now to a topic that's actually an upcoming decision for me: Arab frame drums  It's summer now, and DC has several major drum circles, including some within walking distance for me. I used to play dumbek in Seattle drum circles, just because a good aluminum full-size dumbek was like $30 then, they sound pretty good and are durable as hell, and though they weren't uncommon they also weren't as omnipresent as the African drums. After a while though I got tired of carrying drums around, so I'd mostly play tinwhistle at drum circles; if you blow into at least your third register, you can use it sort of like a more versatile samba whistle to get some really high/piercing rhythmic riffs. I was thinking to get back with drums though, and I wanted to get something reasonably priced, durable, and not too overly common among hippies. I reckoned that a frame drum might be a less conventional choice in the US, so was looking at some of the basic synthetic Remo frame drums. The huge 22" ones are only like $50, so pretty tempting. However, it turns out that both Remo and Meinl have started putting out some new models of the frame drums of the Islamic world, particularly the tar (also called daf and the bendir, which is almost the same thing except it has a snare (the Remo daf has a ton of tiny jangling brass rings).  Up until this afternoon I knew exactly what I was getting: Remo 22" tar with the synthetic head with the screened-on goatskin pattern. However, then I realised that Meinl also makes tars, and I've had good experience with my Meinl udu. The Meinls are also tunable, which though I'm not sure how much I'd use it seems it would be nice to have in reserve. But then, hold the phone, both those guys are offering bendirs (with the snare). Catch is that the bendirs don't go anywhere near 22", max of 14" for Meinl and 16" for Remo. The Meinl run a bit over $100 in most sizes, the fixed-tuning Remos a little less.  It's been hard to tell by clips: my impression is the Remo folks spent more time/money filming, because their clips sound way better, but I don't know that they actually are better than Meinl, who has a good rep too. - Remo 16" bendir (their bendir also sounds way more snare-y than the Meinl): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btBCi-3OLqM - Remo 22" tar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b76SFt7aW64 - Meinl 18" tar (huge deep 4" body): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sXFyQz1PzQ If we have any hand-drum experts here, I'm open to suggestions, but I do want to have a new drum in the Sunday after the holiday, so I do need to decide soon.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2012 22:27
|
|
|
TapTheForwardAssist posted:Do you find them fun to play with just on their own, or do you more plug them into the computer and play them over loops, or turn on the stereo and jam along with that? They do seem to have a lot more control over tone and effects. Do they also feel pretty sturdy/professional; feel you go your money's worth? It's very difficult to actually get interesting music out of them. The size of the ribbon limits what you can do. However, you can get a lot of control over the sound you produce. Especially with the Duo, messing with the split tones has gotten a lot of familiar sounds. They feel like something I'd want to use to make notes or short series of notes that I'd then manipulate, like with a sequencer. Unfortunately, I don't have anything like that. Most of what I've done so far is twiddle the knobs to see what kind of sounds I can get, or run the Duo through the Delay to make fun echo-y nonsense. They do feel pretty sturdy, not like toys or anything, although the design looks a little silly.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2012 03:13
|
|
|
It's my birthday, and my wife got me a trio of musical gifts. I ask now the proud owner of an alto recorder and a kazoo to go along with my soprano recorder. The alto sounds great. It has a haunting sound and my wife likes hearing me play it a lot more than the soprano, which she calls piercing. Also, a month's rental of a flute. Which I'm not sure I'm blowing correctly, as there's a lot of wind noise at the mouth piece. (Is there a flute thread?)
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2012 20:07
|
|
|
sliderule posted:It's my birthday, and my wife got me a trio of musical gifts. Glad to hear that a change of key has brought you increased marital harmony. In fairness, I would consider playing a kazoo in the house to be an affirmative defense for spousal abuse. Your recorder issue is kind of like I mention with G vice C ocarina above: the smallest/cutest option is not always the best option, as some small instruments are a bit shrill. So far as the flute issue, is this a modern silver/Boehm keyed flute, or a wooden keyless trad flute? If the former, there are a few modern flute forums, though I'm not sure which is best, if the latter, Chiff & Fipple has an Irish flute forum. I checked SA's ML:NMD subforum, but no flute thread there. I got an eBay buy in the mail last night, a Bastari 20-button Anglo concertina. The seller didn't mention the key, but I checked in and its CG; it's not perfectly A=440, but A=437 seems awfully close for a basic student box. Overall pretty good shape, though the action and bellows are a little stiffer than the Concertina Connection boxes. A bit of cosmetic wear, and a slight bit of seals leak, but for $99 I'm pretty pleased. I'll stick with my CC Duet concertina for the long haul, but in the short term I'll play around with this, and in a few weeks sell it here on SA-Mart for what I paid for it. I thought to take a moment to talk about diatonic free reeds (button accordion/melodeon and the Anglo concertina) for backing up voice. You don't see a whole ton of solo 'box and voice on YouTube, which I think is a shame since it can sound awfully good, and has at least some history. There's a good writeup in a review of the album Wake the Vaulted Echoes explaining how folk music bad-boy Peter Bellamy reshaped people's conception of the Anglo concertina for English folksong (article) and it raises a lot of interesting points about the style.  Bellamy was a lively dude, and apparently a good number of people in the English Folk Revival thought he was a colossal tool-bag up until he offed himself with tranquilizers and booze in 1991. Personally I've always liked Bellamy's work since I discovered an old vinyl album of his Kipling ballads back in the 1990s. If you like Anglo concertina and like singing, his work is really worth checking out. I'm having trouble finding YouTube clips of his playing, but here is a really rough older VHS, and a younger guy doing a good Bellamy imitation (but lovely recording techniques): - Eddie Dwyer sings Bellamy's "Back to the Army Again" (based on Kipling) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ze0gE8M55Fw - Crappy VHS of Bellamy playing concertina in an interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIDkhEIUveQ - No video, just pics, but clear recording of Bellamy, again playing a Kipling poem, "They're Hanging Danny Deever in the Morning": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0du09QoNs0 Bellamy wasn't necessarily a technically proficient concertinist, but he had a knack for backing up his voice with simple and plaintive chording that really shows that Anglo bounce. One-row accordion (Cajun or otherwise) is pretty legit for backing up voice, and there are just a couple guys on YouTube making a good showing of it. It is my vague, vague impression that melodeon was relatively popular for backing up voice among lower-class people about a century ago. Two relatively-known people that happened to play melodeon include IWW union organiser Joe Hill (killed by firing squad in 1915) and famous ex-con blues guitarist Lead Belly (it was called a "windjammer" in his scene).   Here are a few guys on YouTube who specialise in solo voice and squeezebox. I'm not the hugest fan of either's voice, but they're both fascinating on a technical level, and also choose some really good songs. Check out their other clips if you're into this. - Catmelodeon plays the old-time ballad "John Hardy": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cyz5E-5rUCM - Astromusic plays an old sailor's song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QawdUGaCgo - Astromusic playing a bluesy song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gi1eUNNrRKY - Gavin Atkins, no video of him in action, but playing a good early 1900s blues song "Frankie and Johnny": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wX30KqNP-IY - CajunPicker doing the old Lead Belly tune "Pick a Bale of Cotton": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43Z2NqRmFqE - Audio of Lead Belly himself on accordion; I hadn't known that they actually recorded him playing windjammer instead of guitar, but glad to hear it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMbVOb4xqR0 It's a niche style these days, but if any goons are into old-school blues, this would be a unique style to revive. EDIT: If anyone is looking for a Chemnitzer concertina (which plays sort of like a really huge Anglo concertina), there's a Bastari "Stradi" model Chemnitzer concertina up on eBay for just $100. It's not something I'd pay $500 for, but I could see going as high as $300 or so on it if I were interested in Chemnitzer. I already have one, which I've been meaning to sell since it's cool but I mainly play Hayden system. Here's the eBay item (closing in a few days): Sales link Here's a clip of me messing with my Chemnitzer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyH59guqYow And here's someone far better than me playing church music on the Chemnitzer. This was actually the original intended use for Chemnitzer and Bandoneon, for German churches too poor to afford organs. But then the Chemnitzer ended up getting used for polkas in Chicago beer-halls and the Bandoneon for playing background music in Buenos Aires brothels. Funny how that works out. But here's "Adoramus Te": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKPOQ7-Kzz8 
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 22:12 on May 26, 2012 |
|
#
?
May 26, 2012 21:09
|
|
|
I saw this in the store the other day and couldn't resist going back and buying it today. Its a Banjolele. A ukulele sized banjo. It sounds like a mix between the two of them. Its probably the most interesting instrument I own at the moment.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2012 22:35
|
|
|
Awesome. What do you tune it to? (meaning banjo tuning vs. uke tuning)
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2012 23:20
|
|
|
Usually like a uke.
withak fucked around with this message at 16:36 on May 27, 2012 |
|
#
?
May 26, 2012 23:46
|
|
|
TapTheForwardAssist posted:So far as the flute issue, is this a modern silver/Boehm keyed flute, or a wooden keyless trad flute? Modern silver. I might go to an instructor to get some pointers. I doubt I'll be able to interpret an embouchure through a text forum, I guess. I make myself lightheaded playing it for more than 15 minutes.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 01:12
|
|
|
So my boyfriend is pretty intrigued with my ocarina playing interests, and we were thinking it would be fun to play together. I was wondering what would be something good to go along with the ocarina that he could play on the cheap. Any suggestions?
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 06:26
|
|
|
This thread is a terrible thing for me to read early in the morning on one of those days where it's already hazy and headed for swamp-rear end levels of heat and humidity. Now I really want to go put together a 3-string cigar box and just try and crank out something bluesy. Any suggestions on where to get a decent deal on parts? I'm thinking of winding my own pickup, just for fun, but tuning machines and a jack that are properly cheap would be nice.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 15:00
|
|
|
Liquid Communism posted:This thread is a terrible thing for me to read early in the morning on one of those days where it's already hazy and headed for swamp-rear end levels of heat and humidity. Now I really want to go put together a 3-string cigar box and just try and crank out something bluesy. CBGitty.com is probably the best deal going. Unfortunately, their store appears to be down at the moment.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 16:15
|
|
|
Arsenic Lupin posted:Awesome. What do you tune it to? (meaning banjo tuning vs. uke tuning) As withak said, its tuned like a Uke.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 16:43
|
|
|
LeJackal posted:So my boyfriend is pretty intrigued with my ocarina playing interests, and we were thinking it would be fun to play together. I was wondering what would be something good to go along with the ocarina that he could play on the cheap. Any suggestions? There are a few ways you can go with this, depending on what budget, and what he's willing/able to learn to play:
A few clips of cigar-box drumming: - A fancier drum with mucked-around internals to change tone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePinrjJYv8w - Basic hand drumming on the box: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSfdNmcZvxE - Similar custom-made product: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wlBtuDMX0Q - Lest you think this is a cop-out, note that the Carribean cajon is quite a serious instrument for Latin music, and the cigar box is just a smaller and quieter version. Here's some real cajon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9va-mBs4-g  If you get another melody instrument and want to do duets, you're going to have to find tunes that fit into the ocarina's range. And don't be afraid to transpose; e.g. if a tune is a one-octave range but in G, and your ocarina is C, just pretend you have a G ocarina and play the equivalent notes at your own pitch. A lot of books of medieval/Early music are written for multiple parts and have limited range, so those would be worth checking out. Note also Susato produces a $6 book called Tune Book Two: 104 One-octave tunes, dances and duets for Gemshorns, Ocarinas, Recorders, Tabor-Pipes, Crumhorns, etc. Worry about the music later though, first figure out what he might be interested in playing. If getting another wind instrument, it'd help to check back in here as to what model to make sure you're getting keys that harmonise well. quote:Awesome. What do you tune it to? (meaning banjo tuning vs. uke tuning) As noted above, people generally tune them to uke tuning. That said, I like to use banjo tunings on uke, primarily Open C (GCEG) and C Sawmill (GCFG). Having some clawhammer banjo background, I find that makes it easier for me to transition to clawhammer uke, but given that plenty of far, far more talented clawhammer uke players use standard tuning, it's certainly optional. - Aaron Keim, the guy who really made clawhammer uke popular on YouTube, playing clawhammer on a resonator uke: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5V4mtZ-0qg But you can, of course, just strum the banjo uke as a regular uke, which was historically how it was used. Clawhammer uke is mainly a modern hipster thing. Uke in general was hugely popular in the Jazz Age, to include banjo ukes. And then they became terribly unpopular through most of the rest of the 20th century until maybe about 5 years ago. Here's one of the early adopters of the mid-2000s: - Mercedezzz soloes on "I Will Survive" on banjo uke: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pwUmSNHUgY This is still one of my favourite YouTube clips of all time. Though Lanikai builds a good product, for folks looking for a banjo uke in the future, consider Waverly Street Ukuleles (http://www.wsukes.com/). One-man shop that does custom work, including banjoleles, quite affordably, and with a wide variety of custom options. Though, were I to get a b-uke from him, I'd figure out a jazzier looking peghead than in this pic:  quote:Now I really want to go put together a 3-string cigar box and just try and crank out something bluesy. To save cash, and in keeping with the DIY vibe, if you have any decent musical instrument stores in your area (ones that actually do repairs) odds are they have bins full of old scrap parts. If you drop by and ask nicely if you can buy a few scraps for a CBG, odds are they'll sell you three tuners for something like $3 or so. Plus that way you can get some cool vintage-looking ones, matching or deliberately non-matching as you like. You can also find other scrap parts like nuts, bridges, tailpieces, etc. if you're into that, and the jacks and such and any pickup parts you want to cannibalise. Just make sure the tuners you like turn smoothly and don't feel shoddy. How are you looking to set yours up? Fretted or fretless? If you already have string background, I'd go fretless and play it with a finger slide for blues coolness. - Fretless electric CBG: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXlEmK7XAbw
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 19:03
|
|
|
TapTheForwardAssist posted:To save cash, and in keeping with the DIY vibe, if you have any decent musical instrument stores in your area (ones that actually do repairs) odds are they have bins full of old scrap parts. If you drop by and ask nicely if you can buy a few scraps for a CBG, odds are they'll sell you three tuners for something like $3 or so. Plus that way you can get some cool vintage-looking ones, matching or deliberately non-matching as you like. You can also find other scrap parts like nuts, bridges, tailpieces, etc. if you're into that, and the jacks and such and any pickup parts you want to cannibalise. Just make sure the tuners you like turn smoothly and don't feel shoddy. I do know a really good luthier shop here, I'll try them. I don't have a great deal of string experience, but fretless slide sounds way too much fun, and I can always put frets on later!
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 20:44
|
|
|
TapTheForwardAssist, how do you keep in practice for all these instruments? I get that a plucked string is pretty much a plucked string, ditto a fret, but how do you maintain a decent woodwind woodwind, brass, and whistle embouchure, pipes breathing, and whatever a drummer needs simultaneously?
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 21:49
|
|
|
Arsenic Lupin posted:TapTheForwardAssist, how do you keep in practice for all these instruments? I get that a plucked string is pretty much a plucked string, ditto a fret, but how do you maintain a decent woodwind woodwind, brass, and whistle embouchure, pipes breathing, and whatever a drummer needs simultaneously? Well I certainly don't play everything in the thread, though looking at my (slightly behind) table of contents I've at least picked up and messed with maybe 75% of the instruments mentioned there. And of course my skill varies considerably amongst these instruments, and the skills fluctuate over time depending what I'm messing with. I'm not bad on strings overall, though I'm heavily weighted towards playing certain styles (Anglo-Celtic-American trad) and very weak on others (jazz). Pretty much anything with plucked strings I could pick up and at least sound passable on. For winds I mostly stick to fipple instruments, with the exception of bagpipes, and for free reeds I stick to melodeon and duet concertina. For percussion most of my skills are the really basic "can keep a beat and googled up a few basics of technique" so I claim nothing special there, nothing a decent musician couldn't pick up in a few hours. There are things I've liked to play, but just admitted are far enough out of my zone that the time necessary to sound decent would be better served getting better on strings, winds I already play, or concertina. These include winds with embouchures that require skill (Irish flute) and brass instruments in general. I'd vaguely like to play trumpet or something, but trumpet isn't big in any genre I'm really into, and brass is a whole different ballgame. The only brass I really lust after is the serpent, which again I suggest all brass players take a squint at because it's loving awesome looking, trippy in technique, and due to one single guy doing some bangup R&D are like $600ish in fibreglass these days.  Clip of Michel Godard, the serpent master: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmbI8XdHBKM . Seriously, those are the coolest brass instrument I've ever seen. I had briefly considered getting a pocket trumpet, partially because they're just so drat cute. But then I realised that a) I don't play any style that involves trumpet b) though there are cheap pocket trumpets on eBay, non-shite ones cost as much as real trumpets c) it really isn't any different from a regular trumpet except for looks. It's the same thing just coiled tighter, and everything I read basically said their entire utility is to add some novelty to live shows by looking chic. Which, to be honest, they do:  Moving on to instrument ideas, I did just run across something I'd never heard of before, which is always fun. This instrument is inexpensive (US$150 or less), neat new design, durable, and getting great reviews. Pbone (plastic trombone)  The long and short is some dude designed a trombone made almost entirely out of synthetic materials. The slide is fibreglass (misquoted as carbon-fibre on many sites), and the body almost entirely plastic except for some metal joints and the like. Runs $150 in the US, might be a bit cheaper in Europe. I've read a number of reviews (just google "pbone review" there are dozens of good ones, written and video), and the overall consensus is they're great buys for the money, and a great choice for beginners, marching bands, ska players, travelers, etc. On one forum someone raised the question of durability/cracking, and a guy chimed in to say that his group had a sales rep visit them to show one, and he used it to whale on a table until they complained he would damage the table, and then threw it across the room repeatedly, so apparently they're durable. At least on dude on YouTube has taken to strapping it to his backpack to take it hiking. I will admit I was somewhat tempted, because trombone is pretty cool. It's like the brass equivalent of a fretless instrument, where you can hit every micro-interval in the scale. But as noted above, learning brass probably is a bit far out of my lane. For those of you who play brass, and have considered trombone or used to play one and no longer have one, these do look pretty sweet. These also weigh under two pounds (less than a kilo) which is amazing.  The reviews give some basics, but the main comments I've seen are that you should replace the stock mouthpiece with a better one ($15-30), and that the slide is rough at first, but it breaks in as the metal joint smooths out the burrs on the slide. If anyone gets one of these, a good review here would rock. Again, I cannot personally comment since I haven't messed with one and don't play brass, but the reviews have been overall high, the price is low, and the idea is just so drat cool. FAKE EDIT: I got curious about the proper spelling and the etymology of "to whale on" something (to beat it), and here's your answer: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=wale&searchmode=none EDIT2: Table of contents in OP updated up to page 18 TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 05:46 on May 28, 2012 |
|
#
?
May 28, 2012 01:45
|
|
|
Damnit, TTFA. I used to play trombone in high school, and couldn't afford to buy one since.
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2012 02:00
|
|
|
I saw the Pbone while idly flipping through a Musician's Friend catalog and have wanted one ever since. I'd have got one by now, but I'd feel guilty getting another brass instrument with my ol' trumpet sitting unused for all these years.
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2012 08:00
|
|
|
TapTheForwardAssist posted:If anyone gets one of these, a good review here would rock. I got my pbone this Christmas. Best present ever, and it's not close. It's light, you can drop it (unlike a real trombone where the slide will ding and you're hosed). Tonally, it sounds like a Canada goose, but in a good way. It's a rough sound and it's never going to replace real brass but it has a genuine edge and has its own character. And it's a proper trombone, if you learn on this you'll be able to transfer. I couldn't play trombone when i got it and now I can to an ok degree. Don't whatever you do try to use valve oil on the slide though. Speaking of which, the slide is maybe the only disadvantage, it's not very smooth at all but it's still very playable. I use a cheapish baritone mouthpiece and it sounds fine, but honestly not that much different from the plastic one. It's a proper musical instrument. If you're going to take the time to learn it, then freaking go for it. If you're not it will still be a waste of time. Oh and they come in a nice shoulderbag.
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2012 15:44
|
|
|
BIGFOOT PEE BED posted:Speaking of which, the slide is maybe the only disadvantage, it's not very smooth at all but it's still very playable. What do you use to grease the slide? Back when I played this stuff was always the best. I've got an old trombone in my closet I've been wanting to play for the longest time, but a buddy of mine was a dumbass and dropped the slide, bowing it a little. It'll cost about as much to get repaired as... one of these pbones...
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2012 16:04
|
|
|
Yiggy posted:
The fibreglass slide is "self lubricating" and doesn't need lube other than just wiping it down with a rag every so often. The little booklet that comes with the pbone apparently says "it really doesn't need slide lube, but it's not going to hurt it if for some reason you feel compelled to use it." Again, a very common comment in the reviews was that the slide starts out a bit rough, and smooths out notably with use as it breaks in. At least one guy also washed out the slide bits with water during the process to flush out the eroded grit from the breakin, and thought that might have helped. I'll emphasise that I'm not at all recommending this, but just as a parallel I was thinking of how gun owners break in some kinds of new guns. Particularly for lever-action (cowboy-style) rifles a lot of folks recommended (after triple-checking it's unloaded) just working the lever over and over hundreds of times while watching a movie for an hour or so. Somewhat more aggressively, others would squirt toothpaste into the action of the gun before doing the hour of manipulation, so that the micro-scrubby abrasive granules in the toothpaste can help wear away any rough spots and smooth out the action. I wonder whether there's any equivalent way to either pump your slide for a while to speed up breakin, or add some fine abrasive past to help knock off the rough edges.
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2012 16:15
|
|
|
Liquid Communism posted:This thread is a terrible thing for me to read early in the morning on one of those days where it's already hazy and headed for swamp-rear end levels of heat and humidity. Now I really want to go put together a 3-string cigar box and just try and crank out something bluesy. I just built a CBG and if you go back a page or two you can see it. I'm constantly making little improvements on it and already planning an improved version with a full set of frets. They are addicting because they are cheap, fun to play and fun to build. Mine cost less than $15 including cigar box, strings, mono jack, pot, & piezo. I used some zither pins left over from another project instead of machine heads and copper wire for frets. Currently I'm making a traveler style uke for my wife.
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2012 23:00
|
|
|
wormil posted:I just built a CBG and if you go back a page or two you can see it. I'm constantly making little improvements on it and already planning an improved version with a full set of frets. They are addicting because they are cheap, fun to play and fun to build. Mine cost less than $15 including cigar box, strings, mono jack, pot, & piezo. I used some zither pins left over from another project instead of machine heads and copper wire for frets. Currently I'm making a traveler style uke for my wife. "Improved" is subjective; I'd argue that fretless can be an improvement, or to the opposite end tied-on frets can be awesome.  With tied-on you can set an instrument up for whatever scale you want; that's how a lot of Turkish and Persian instruments manage all the quarter-steps and other intervals of Middle Eastern music. For the "traveler uke" are you doing something like a travel guitar, or something more extreme like the Risa uke-stick? 
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 04:48
|
|
|
TapTheForwardAssist posted:For the "traveler uke" are you doing something like a travel guitar, or something more extreme like the Risa uke-stick? Originally like a traveler guitar but I bent the sides too far tonight and broke one. Now I'm debating building a new neck or trying to salvage it and make it a bolt on. I have this round metal rim thing I found at the thrift store, maybe I'll make a banjo uke. I don't know, so many possibilities. On another note, I remembered some Holly I cut up awhile back, took a piece and ripped out a strip. It's still green enough to bend almost 90 degrees and would make some nice sides if I can get enough. Would also make nice purfling.
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 09:33
|
|
|
Gonna mix it up here just for a little bit: Shape Note Singing  While we're covering instrument, might as well focus on the "sacred harp" of voice. Shape Note is a genre of singing I especially enjoy, and have ever since I first heard it, though I full recognise that to some listeners it just sounds like a bag of assholes. It's very loud, open, and unaffected style, somewhere between Gospel singing and Gregorian chant. Exactly how the tradition evolved at first I'm not sure, though it's probably tied into Colonial-era English singing, secular and religious. But by the early 19th century it had become a trend for traveling salesman to cart around books of four-part harmony sheet music books. The idea was that a community would buy a few dozen of those, and then meet up for sings or "conventions" to harmonise as a group. To make the sheet music easier to use, the notes were given shapes to spell out their relationship to other notes in the scale. I won't get into the tech here, but I and a lot of other folks will attest that it is far faster to learn how to sigh read vocal music in shapes than it is on the usual staff, but it also doesn't slow down anyone who actually can read music.  Shape Note is sung by sitting with the four parts all facing each other in a "hollow square", and then all take turns choosing a song and standing in the middle to direct. It's not at all performance-based, it's experiential. A lot of the harmonies are in fourths and fifths (vice the thirds popular now) so have an almost medieval sound to them, and though there was secular Shape Note music, most of the stuff that survived is very dramatic Great Revival stuff with lyrics about "bones mouldering in the Grave", "Babylon is fallen to rise no more" and the like. I've been to sings in a variety of states, and the crowd varies from deeply religious folks in the South, to middle-aged folk music fans in Cali, to a bunch of pierced hipster music kids in Boston, all with different reasons they got into singing. But folks have always been friendly, so I just show up, borrow a book from the stack, and get to singing. Again, it's rough stuff, but the room just vibrates when the chords unite, so if you dig it you just dig it.  The go-to website for all info on Shape Note, and listings of local sings held throughout the US and parts of Europe is http://fasola.org/ . The name refers to the four names for notes in the scale: "Fa So La Mi". You'll notice to in some of the clips that groups tend to sing the names of the notes (for each part, so different people are saying different names) the first time through to get a feel for the tune. Go, give it a shot.
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 22:01 on Jun 2, 2012 |
|
#
?
May 30, 2012 01:26
|
|
|
Tim Eriksen is The Best.
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2012 02:45
|
|
|
withak posted:Tim Eriksen is The Best. You will get no argument from me. Dude was 1980s punk-rocker who got really big into listening to old Dock Boggs and Dwight Diller albums of traditional music.  - Singing "O Death" with only fiddle accompaniment. Note he plays fiddle off the hip so as not to interfere with singing. In the US it's an old Appalachian technique, but you see it in paintings going back to the Middle Ages: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Pje4Bqvwqw - On dulcimer playing "I Wish my Baby Was Born." A great job here making what could easily be a banal song into something hardcore: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFpU3zslpHw - Playing banjo and singing "Golden Harp" on the train to Warsaw to perform. Note using the Shape Note technique of singing the names of the notes prior to launching into the lyrics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qs76UhGz24Y 
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2012 13:25
|
|
|
I like bajo sexto in the airport: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrpikEOI45M
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2012 14:25
|
|
|
withak posted:I like bajo sexto in the airport: Can't post about the bajo and not show a photo. I need to do a post on bajo soon anyway.  See you the bajo in the airport and raise you playing fretless banjo on an island in Croatia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-RomdYUngE  This man is the whole reason I got interested in clawhammer banjo, and in fretless. Though in fairness it was Mike Seeger (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udSxPjk9EVw), brother of both Pete Seeger and Peggy Seeger, who got me interested in nylon/gut strung banjo.
|
|
#
?
Jun 1, 2012 02:30
|
|
|
I just made a major Craigslist find: a harp that goes for $2495 new, with case and full Camac levers, selling for $1000. I brought my harp teacher with me to check it out. One tuning peg is loose, which is fixable. It has 30 strings. It is four feet tall. It has a glorious bright tone. It is now mine, mine, mine. Harp:  Triplett Sierra 30-string lever harp, in maple.
|
|
#
?
Jun 2, 2012 01:35
|
|
|
Arsenic Lupin posted:Triplett Sierra 30-string lever harp, in maple. That is amazingly beautiful. Congratulations!
|
|
#
?
Jun 2, 2012 01:56
|
|
|
Thank you. It really is, in body and sound. I may have found myself kissing it on the cheekpiece once or twice.
|
|
#
?
Jun 2, 2012 02:26
|
|
|
That is fantastic, and it looks glorious!
|
|
#
?
Jun 2, 2012 15:28
|
|
|
FelicityGS posted:That is fantastic, and it looks glorious! Dammit, came here to post "countdown to Felicity". In any case, great to see you found a good deal, and on a harp that's you're not going to outgrow anytime soon, if ever. As the phrase goes "the greatest economy comes from buying the best you can afford." The only downside is that if you sound crappy, now you can't blame the instrument... So you're still taking lessons; how are they coming? Are you developing an idea yet of what styles/regions of harping appeal to you, are you going in with a clean slate to learn basic skills and will just see what starts speaking to you? For me, still back playing a lot of Anglo-Saxon lyre; looking forward to seeing when I Greyhound's kantele comes in, since that's the closest-related instrument a goon has picked up and posted about. It really is amazing what you can do with only six (or on the kantele, five) notes. Here's a clip of a musician playing the 10th-century Old English chart-topper Deor with lyre backing. He sticks to the plucking style, vice the strumming style, but his arrangement is great and singing cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3ZvjTHpb1A  On another front, I looked into the new album by Sharde Thomas, who is one of the few remaining direct inheritors of the "Fife and Drum Blues" tradition of the Deep South. Not that literal genetics matter, but she is one of the few musicians who grew up around and playing the music, and learned directly from Othar Turner, the last recognised master. I was meaning to get the album, and mentioned the style to an Irish friend, and it turns out just that week she'd read a New York Times article about the style: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/18/t-magazine/mississippi-blues-travelers.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all Unfortunately, the article quotes Sharde as saying that she's more interested in aimming for a hip-hop/R&B career than maintaining the F&DB tradition. Free country, and nothing against those styles, but it seems a bit short-sighted. There are tens of thousands of people around her level already in those genres or trying to break in, but she's literally uniquely poised to be a blues guru, albeit in a very niche genre, for the rest of her life. She'd just need to keep the pot at a low boil, playing at festivals, doing some interviews or talking to ethnomusicologists now and then, playing for some film soundtracks (Scorcese and some others are nuts about the style), and maybe even get some arts funding. Not that she's likely to be a millionaire playing F&DB, but her odds of at least making a decent living playing music, and being famous within a small field, seem much higher sticking with the tradition.  If anyone is interested in her new album but wants to stick with the old-school F&DB tracks, you can buy them individually off iTunes (which I did, skipping her R&B tracks): Island Breeze, Sally Walker, Bounce Ball, and Shimmie are the trad ones. Technically "Shimmy She Wobble" was the tune used in Gangs of New York (scene clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OE4_FpZvGFA), but her version of Island Breeze sounds close to it.
|
|
#
?
Jun 2, 2012 19:06
|
|
|
TapTheForwardAssist posted:The only downside is that if you sound crappy, now you can't blame the instrument... quote:So you're still taking lessons; how are they coming? Are you developing an idea yet of what styles/regions of harping appeal to you, are you going in with a clean slate to learn basic skills and will just see what starts speaking to you? I'm expecting to dive into early music*. I really love listening to it; the alien (to me) intonations really appeal. Until I'm ready to do my own arrangements, I'll be buying books. Robin Fickle's Renaissance Gems is on my shortlist. On an unrelated note, I definitely want to get into O'Carolan. The first harp music I bought apart from exercise books was a download from http://www.harpymusic.com/digital.htm, a simple arrangement of Bach's Prelude in C. I can pick out bits now, but I hope to be playing it for real within a few weeks. My teacher's taking July off, so I can spend the month messing around with whatever I can get my hands (and ears) on. I learn best by eye, not by ear, so for me sheet music is a Godsend. * By which I mean "Baroque and earlier", give or take.
|
|
#
?
Jun 3, 2012 01:05
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 11, 2024 11:45 |
|
|
I've been intending to post on a few cross-cultural fusions, so here's the Vietnamese guitar, also known as luc huyen cam, vong co guitar, or ghita. I've read a few contradictory stories about its origin. Either it's the result of guitars introduced to rural Vietnam by Westerners, or the result of Vietnamese refugees in the US adapting the guitar to play Vietnamese music since they couldn't acquire trad instruments in their new country. In any case, it's basically a standard steel-string guitar, but with very light gauge strings in alternate tunings, and most importantly with the fretboard deeply scalloped between frets. This gives you a bunch of space in which to wiggle and press the string beyond what a usual fretboard would allow, permitting variations in pitch and tone not normal to Western guitar.  Interestingly enough, a similar technique has been done to fretboards by some Western guitarists, I think especially metal soloists like Yngwie Malsteem. There are a variety of good YouTube clips up by metalheads describing the mod and its benefits. I had a hard time finding decent clips of Vietnamese scalloped guitar playing, but here are a few decent ones: - Acoustic player in a cafe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TI3sqG5RJOY - Street musician on a cheap electric: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DieH98kG80E TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 04:51 on Jun 4, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jun 4, 2012 04:30
|
|