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Well, I was caught by the banner ad, and some 20 pages later, I'm the proud owner of a toy accordion to annoy my neighbors, and I'm strongly eyeing a Q-chord to sort of chill and jam on. My question for you TTFA, is when you were talking about taping over the reeds to so only one reed is playing instead of two, where do you put the tape? Over the hole, or on the actual reed itself? I'm just itching to tear this thing open and make it even better.
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Jun 23, 2012 21:33
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:Tim Eriksen and Bajo sexto What a find. I love (t)his style of music and as soon as I'm good enough at guitar I'll move on to a bajo. amazing stuff
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Jun 24, 2012 09:47
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Kevindanger posted:Well, I was caught by the banner ad, and some 20 pages later, I'm the proud owner of a toy accordion to annoy my neighbors... I meant to do a YouTube tutorial on how to do this mod, but before I got around to it I gave my home-tweaked toy accordion to a guy who wanted a squeezebox to cover sea-shanties. I need to go to the neighborhood where the toystore is anyway, so I'll try to grab another and actually film it this time. In any case, it's really easy. Get a pliers or anything grippy, wrap some cheap cloth or something on the jaws so as not to scratch the metal or celluloid. Find the little nubby pins sticking out of the accordion close to the seam with the bellows, and pull each long pin straight out. Remember: always keep a baggie or similar on-hand to store the loose parts in, because losing such things is a bitch. With the pins withdrawn and the instrument sitting on its little feet, carefully life the keyboard end upwards off the bellows, and you'll be able to see the reed array. The reed array has two sides, since each note is doubled. Each individual reed plate will have one reed you can see (the pull reed), and a flap covering the reed that's on the inside (the push reed). If your pairs of reeds are more or less in unison, then just tape off one whole side with some masking tape (seems the least-damaging tape option). Just run a piece of tape all the way across the reed set perpindicular, or else make seven little strips and cover each plate with the push/pull reeds all down that one side. If you have any buttons where the two reeds are varying greatly in pitch, you'll have to experiment to see which of the two reeds is more in pitch, so try taping one, put the 'box back together, and see if that button gives you a better or worse note. It's really pretty easy, and so long as you don't damage the reed or flap, it's all reversible. If you have any issues with buttons not responding right or "ghost" notes squeaking through, you can unbolt the reed assembly and make sure all your pads are flush with the holes leading to the chamber. I had one accordion with a constantly-sounding chord on the left side, and it turns out the pad had unclipped from the lever arm. These things are really, really simple, so it's way easier than it sounds. Just be bold and open it up, and it'll be pretty clear to you how it works. Toy accordions are a bit shoddy, but that's because they're toys. Though they're probably not a lot worse than a lot of bottom-end squeezeboxes played by miners, farmers, and sailors back a century and some ago. The workshops in Germany produced a lot of lovely squeezeboxes back in the day, but the instrument still became wildly popular.  quote:and I'm strongly eyeing a Q-chord to sort of chill and jam on. Q-chord is a pretty trippy instrument, and I think the people marketing it aren't quite clear on what it can really be used for. I think their target market is the musically incompetent, "praise music" enthusiasts, music therapy, special-ed, etc. But there are a hadndful of indie musicians doing some great stuff with it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTKOm_jaCX4 It has plenty of potential for someone putting some thought into it. If you get one, definitely report back on your impressions, and YouTube does need more cool Q-chord clips. Plus you'll probably be one of the few folks in your scene playing one. quote:What a find. I love (t)his style of music and as soon as I'm good enough at guitar I'll move on to a bajo. amazing stuff Tim Eriksen is a goddamn national treasure. He uses a very unusual tuning on his bajo ("Top to bottom ist's g-g/c-c/g-g/Eb-eb/Bb-bb/C-c"), but if you like his overall sound you may enjoy trying out DADgad on your current guitar. Eriksen uses a lot of different alternative tunings, but he does use DADGAD a bit, and it's one of the easier alt-tunings to start on and sounds great. Plus it doesn' require changing any strings or adding tension. This is a reminder to me to finally get a post about alt-tunings for this thread. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 01:34 on Jun 25, 2012 |
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Jun 25, 2012 01:29
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I'm nearly done with my first-ever repair of a junked concertina, using Concertina.net's article Making a Bastari/Stagi Playable. The Stagi/Bastari, and most other Italian boxes I've seen, are reasonably similar inside, and all of them did the cost-cutting measure of making the buttons link to the internal levers via bits of rubber tubing instead of fancy hinges. It actually works decently well, but given many of these were made 1950-1970, the rubber dries up over time, and the buttons are no longer held in place and drop inside the fingerboard. You can ID these on sight on eBay often, because the buttons will either be crooked or a few missing. I'm up to about six beater Anglo 20-buttons I've paid $40-90 for, and finally sat down and got one fixed. Of the six, two play decently well as-is with just maybe some minor tweaks like getting some fluff out of a clogged reed, while four others need the rubber tunes replaced with silicone tubing. Not hard, but takes a few tries to get the knack. On the bright side, all of them I've messed with are still in-tune, since retuning is out of my comfort zone. Once I get some of these up and running I'll toss a few up on SA-Mart, in case any of you toy accordion owners want to go the next step up. Speaking of free reeds: desert diver, you made me buy a thing online. drat you. Should get here from Volgograd sometime in late July.
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Jun 26, 2012 05:41
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Hello, this is my bass viol: Not as crazy as some of the other instruments here, but a lot of people have no idea something like this existed and is still played a lot today. Some of the famous names in history like Bach, Handel and Purcell. It sounds like this. What a brilliant piece. Basically it's endless variations on a simple theme.
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Jun 26, 2012 21:14
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It's not that weird but goddamn I want to buy and learn how to play a lap steel guitar, they're so drat cool and not that terribly expensive, a new one goes for as low as 79 euros on Thomann. Anyone here into lap steels?
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Jun 27, 2012 00:21
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:Speaking of free reeds: desert diver, you made me buy a thing online. drat you. Should get here from Volgograd sometime in late July.  What did you buy? And did you ever hear from that Russian Tula website?I am working abroad for the summer and had to leave all of my weird instruments at home. I am missing my garmoshka particularily much right now, I think I will go buy a toy accordion or something to ease the pain. edit: OhYeah, that is awesome. I love baroque instruments, one day I want to try a theorbo:  Also I like bluegrass and all, but baroque mandolin is where it's at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPIZbBH-FNY desert diver fucked around with this message at 02:57 on Jun 27, 2012 |
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Jun 27, 2012 01:30
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For Austin, TX goons, I'm trying to raise money for a new instrument and so I'm trying to sell one of my old sitars. I originally bought it from Buckingham music, and it was one of their AA Krishna models. The strings have recently been changed. The string action on the high frets is a little high 2nd to a slight angle in the neck, but it sounds fine. I live in the Austin, TX area. Feel free to PM me for more info, you'll probably want to see if you can sit with the instrument first, I tried renting it to another older guitar player who wanted to learn from my teacher, but he couldn't manage to play comfortably. I can point you to some teachers in the area.
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Jun 27, 2012 01:59
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desert diver posted:
I got a 13x8 shipping in; it'll be limited, but I like small boxes. I figure if it's functional I can Craigslist it for what I have into it if I tire of it. Stand by for pics and maybe video next month. Heard back from Tula; my Russian is bad and gTranslate isn't totally clear, but I think this is saying it's not worth the expense to ship: quote:Здравствуйте! I checked with Robertos Winds, and they just carry a few bayans, and aren't planning to order any garmons. I am a bit skeptical as to it being so totally impractical to ship a garmon. There are plenty of eBay sellers doing garmons from Russia for $100 shipping, and I imagine that's a lot of "handling" in the S&H. I can't imagine that Tula can't ship a $400 accordion for $100 or less, and while that's not massively efficient, it's not a terrible deal. Feel free to talk it out with them if your Russian is better than mine; I'd be curious to hear the results. Maybe if you're working somewhere closer to them this summer (or live somewhere other than the US) shipping is more reasonable? quote:It's not that weird but goddamn I want to buy and learn how to play a lap steel guitar, they're so drat cool and not that terribly expensive, a new one goes for as low as 79 euros on Thomann. Lap steel is awesome, certainly weird enough for the thread, and we have at least one goon in the thread who plays lap (and I think also pedal?) steel. The Thomann for that price is I think one of the pretty generic Chinese-made lap steels. That said, a lot of those are considered perfectly good start instruments; the only caveat I've seen on those is that some models (was it "Rogue" in the US?) are based on rather short-scale old lap steels, so not as easy to learn on as other models of cheapie basd on long scale. You can't go too wrong, though I would also check eBay in your country/region and see if there are some other competing import cheapie brands at similar price, just to get a feel for the market. You might also want to check in with Steel Guitar Forum; before you buy they might be able to help you choose amongst cheapie imports (and maybe cheap vintage) in Europe, and after you get one they're a great source of learning on steels. Steel is great, extremely expressive instrument, so if it suits a style of music you dig, give it a shot.  NOTE: for any goon who's been shopping on Cajun accordions, Jim Labs Music has a Hohner Ariette for $250: http://www.jimlaabsmusic.com/used-instruments/used-accordions/hohner-cajun-accordion/prod_6491.html
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Jun 27, 2012 11:24
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desert diver posted:
You should, because simply put, theorbe is the best sounding plucked string instrument there is. I simply adore that instrument. Look here. It's a viol piece, written by the most virtuous viol player of all times, Forqueray (or possibly his son), but here it's played with a theorbe. It's sounds loving perfect, completely out of this world. Also, in the court of Louis "The Sun King" XIV, there were times were Antoine Forqueray (the best viol player of all times), Francois Couperin (the best clavecin player) and Robert de Visee (the best theorbe player) came together to improvise for everyone's pleasure. Can you imagine what must've been like? I can't think of anything more awesome than that.
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Jun 27, 2012 12:34
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Thanks for the thoughts on lap steel, I might buy one when I have more cash, need to get a car first though but I'll just buy a cheapo beater to drive to work in so it won't be long.
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Jun 27, 2012 13:43
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OhYeah, you are as a god to me. I've loved viol music ever since Tous Les Matins du Monde turned me on to Jordi Savall. Do you have a consort to play with?
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Jun 27, 2012 19:13
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Arsenic Lupin posted:OhYeah, you are as a god to me. I've loved viol music ever since Tous Les Matins du Monde turned me on to Jordi Savall. Do you have a consort to play with? Yeah. We had a mixed group of professional strings players and amateur players and our most interesting project was with a Canadian singer doing her doctorate studies in Helsinki on renaissance song. Unfortunately due to some scheduling and availibility issues it didn't work out. I hope she doesn't mind if I point to her website. We are still planning on doing a couple of concerts here later in the year, and also maybe Finland. I also recently joined a punk-rock band and I play viol there as well. I hope I'm the only one in the world doing that  . We play music like this.EDIT: A recording from one of our concerts that is not good, but less terrible than the others: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxxcpEF9itM OhYeah fucked around with this message at 00:14 on Jun 28, 2012 |
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Jun 28, 2012 00:05
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Cached Money posted:Thanks for the thoughts on lap steel, I might buy one when I have more cash, need to get a car first though but I'll just buy a cheapo beater to drive to work in so it won't be long. Interested in lap steel but short on cash? Sounds like you need to make a diddly bow.  A cheap acoustic one string can be knocked out with just a board, two nails, and a bottle or can in probably a matter of minutes. Though you can always get slightly fancier, still using just scrap parts, and make a 2 or 3 stringer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGDeQInGwGY You can do a lot of learning on one of these while saving up for a lap-steel.
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Jun 28, 2012 13:50
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Awesome thread. I had a weird/awesome instruments folder before finding this and it has now tripled in size. Especially impressed with the nyckelharpa. As far as musical ability myself, the second sentence of the OP pretty much describes me perfectly. That said, I am looking for a recommendation. Mostly for playing by myself and "zoning out" but the ability to jam with people would be a nice bonus as almost all of my friends play an instrument. Really love the sound of bow&string though bagpipes and squeezeboxes are also very cool. I am very interested in a kantele and maybe a tinwhistle because if I remember right it was said earlier that playing the tinwhistle translates to some bagpipes well, but I figured I would ask to see if the wise and terrible TTFA has anything in mind that would better fit what I'm looking for.
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Jun 28, 2012 22:51
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What do your friends play? Having people to play with is the best way to learn an instrument as it will keep you motivated and playing together makes it both easier and more fun to learn. What kind of music do they play? What would you like to play? If you go down the route of tinwhistle/bagpipe/bowed/squeezebox you will certainly end up playing some kind of folk music. Doesn't mean the instruments are tied to that genre, it's just that usually that's where you'll find the most tunes and the greatest players. Where you live can also be important, especially if you're interested in something more unusual like bagpipes or a nyckelharpa. Some instruments require more guidance than others and finding people who play what you play depends quite a bit on where you live. If you even have the slightest interest in the tinwhistle you should go and buy one, right now. A Feadog or Generation (traditionally in D) for a fiver is an excellent introduction. Tinwhistles are really easy to pick up, even on your own, and they're just so drat cheap for what you get.
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Jun 28, 2012 23:36
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Mostly they play harder style punk rock (The Vandals comes to mind) in a sort of friend-band-group thing we have had going since highschool. They consider me part of it even though I mostly just get on stage every once in a while to make absurd noises with a broken set of paki pipes I moderately understand or a shoddy clarinet I found at goodwill I don't understand at all. Most of the songs are made to be humorous in one way or another so it kind of fits. Here is a video if anyone decides they hate their ears and/or wants to see the singer hit himself in the mouth with a mic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzKt1QxTy98. It's about Charlie Brown. But while I like that style of music I mostly just want an instrument to play to myself and sort of zone out and relax. Ability to jam would be a bonus because they grab acoustics, a doublebass, a couple mandolins nobody knows how to play and similar every once in a while so something more folksy could work there, but it's by no means a requirement.
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Jun 29, 2012 01:50
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I figured out the bones pretty fast. I have a bodhran in the mail, I can't wait to learn it. Thanks, the all of you
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Jun 29, 2012 03:38
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Bowrrl posted:Awesome thread. I had a weird/awesome instruments folder before finding this and it has now tripled in size. Especially impressed with the nyckelharpa. As far as musical ability myself, the second sentence of the OP pretty much describes me perfectly. First off, I want to echo PlaceHolder's comment: "If you even have the slightest interest in the tinwhistle you should go and buy one, right now." Not just you, but anyone in this thread. If you have the vaguest intention of playing a wind instrument, or messing with instruments in general, $5-10 for a tinwhistle is a no-brainer. They're quite easy to play (the only initial slight hurdle is modulating breath pressure) and the internet is awash in free instructional materials for them. That skill applies slightly more directly to uilleann than to other bagpipes, but by only a slightly lesser margin having basic tinwhistle skills will make you considerably more prepared to play any kind of bagpipe, or just about any wind instrument for that matter. So for winds, get a tinwhistle and mess with it. Down the road, check out bagpipes, and for your interests probably Swedish (easier, cheaper, but slightly less versatile) or uilleann (vice-versa) would probably be the best bet. So far as strings, kantele is conceptually similar to Native American flute: both are extremely easy to just kick back and improvise on, but on both jamming skills are a bit limited by available keys and range. On either it's not hard to duet with a buddy playing fiddle or guitar, provided you pre-arrange "let's do a few songs in D, and then a few in C minor", but volume/tone-wise would get lost in a larger group, and aren't suited to suddenly moving to a different key. If you want something string more meditative/solo, kantele is great, and I know a guy making solid-body kanteles for really cheap, like $50; too quiet for any kind of audience but just loud enough to set on your belly and play while relaxing on the couch. For your broader description of what you want in strings, and your mention of jamming with friends, punk music, etc., let me lay this on you: electric dulcimer.  Provided much of your jamming with friends is electric, an electric dulcimer would let you keep up with amped instruments, and can do two particular styles that would fit with punk and hard rock. First, traditional drone style; you're a little limited in key there, so you'd have to tune or capo for each song, but not hard if there's some set list, or someone will call out the song key before starting. Now barre chords (or "power chords"), now that's where dulcimer get's really, really easy and versatile. I'm having a really hard time finding proper video footage of this on YouTube, so I might need to post a tutorial this weekend. Way easier than it sounds, but basically any dulcimer in open-tuning (like CGC, etc) you can just lay the flat of your hand across the whole fingerboard, and each fret is just a X5 chord, neither minor nor major so fitting both. So if you're about to play some punk song, and your buddy says "this one is just D-F-G progression", you just mash your fat paw across all the strings at the 1 fret, then the three fret, then the 4, and those are your three chords. This is really, really drat simple and I'm baffled it's not shown on YouTube. While you're waiting, here are a few basic clips of more drone-like rock music (and a tiny bit of barre-ing) on dulcimer. I'll notice these clips aren't musically skilled, but it's the principle of the style that matters. - Black Sabbath "Sweet Leaf" on dulcimer played drone-style: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGSYZqn8ksQ - Nirvana's "All Apologies"; mostly drone, but watch around 0:52 and similar parts of the song, where he lays his fat paw down for a barre chord. That's how easy barres are, and you can back entire songs with just barres: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FG8L_LbhKmE - Here's an example of basic electric dulcimer with effects pedals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Euz8X1z1g3s I'm having a hard time illustrating dulcimer in a hardcore application; in all honesty I have trouble finding YT clips of dulcimer that aren't overly wussy. Not the instrument's fault, just the people who tend to play and post clips. Even setting rock aside, it's hard to find clips of down-n-gritty Appalachian murder ballads and the like. There are several instruments where I have similar problems; the instrument may be cool, but too many chumps post YouTube. In any case, you can buy solid-body electric dulcimers as low as $140 new, or for maybe $50 in parts can build one. It's only even that high because I recommend you buy the fretboard pre-made because it's a pain having to measure out and sink frets if you're not used to it, but all the rest is just really, really crude carpentry. If you're interested in electric dulcimer, I can point you towards some forum threads on EverythingDulcimer about it, and whether home-build or pre-made it's not going to cost you much money.   Seriously, aside from the fretboard it's an afternoon of work with a handsaw, drill, and screwdriver. Just don't buy the kits made for a piezo (vibration-based) pickup, but build/buy one with a guitar-style magnetic pickup to avoid feedback issues. Happy to talk it out if you need more info, but an e-dulcimer really jumps out as a strong candidate for what you describe. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 13:40 on Jun 29, 2012 |
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Jun 29, 2012 06:23
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Small progress report! Two DIY PVC flutes, a basic "western" flute from this link: http://www.markshep.com/flute/Pipe.html and a shakuhachi from here: http://www.fides.dti.ne.jp/~sogawa/englishpagepvc.html From his site the latter is apparently a professional maker of traditional Japanese instruments who also shares instructions for PVC flutes. Several of the shakuhashi pages I found give me the impression that PVC instruments, as simple as they are, as fairly legit as a cheap, robust, basic alternative even among guys who deal with traditional bamboo instruments worth thousands of dollars. I made both from 3/4" schedule 40 PVC which is fairly thick-walled and seems to work well for these. Another one of TTFA's suggestions calls for thinner material, pipe normally used for sprinkler systems rather than this stuff, so I'll have to try to grab a piece of that some time (this stuff is so cheap and easy I'm tempting to make a huge assortment). The "plumber's" flute was pretty easy to play. I think I'd like to make a somewhat larger, lower-tuned one as well as this first one's a bit shrill for my taste (my extremely rusty skills don't help of course). On the other hand, it took a lot of experimenting (over multiple days) to get the shakuhachi to sound. The top-blown flute made from 3/4" pipe has a pretty wide mouth, and I find I need to cover most of the top of the flute with my lower lip to get it to sound properly, but I think I am starting to get the hang of it. My prior flute experience is with orchestra-style flutes with mechanical valves, and I initially expected to find these flutes to be limited because of their tuning, but in fact you can do a lot of pitch bending with partial fingering. I haven't experimented a lot (because I've mostly been trying to get that shakuhachi to sound).
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Jun 29, 2012 08:06
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Base Emitter posted:I initially expected to find these flutes to be limited because of their tuning, but in fact you can do a lot of pitch bending with partial fingering. I haven't experimented a lot (because I've mostly been trying to get that shakuhachi to sound). In regard to pitch bending the open keyed flutes are indeed superior to the keyed flutes, you can do all sorts of impressive slides and glides if you get your control down on curving on and off the open holes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QuDEx3_Ygo
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Jun 29, 2012 14:20
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Thanks for the information. That electric dulcimer is goddamned awesome. Links to those threads you mentioned would be greatly appreciated.
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Jun 29, 2012 14:54
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Bowrrl posted:Thanks for the information. That electric dulcimer is goddamned awesome. Mainly I'd just suggest you sign up at EverythingDulcimer.com and do an Advanced Search for "electric", but here's one of the better threads about building solid-body electrics: http://everythingdulcimer.com/discuss/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=26229&hilit=electric The thread does fairly note that building an e-dulcimer isn't necessarily cheaper/better unless you're actually into the project and have some basic tools. If you just want to play and don't want to dick around too much, good e-dulcimers can be had brand-new, US handmade, for $140-250, which is cheaper than all but the nastiest China import electric guitars. Tom Yocky does an electric for $250, and he's one of the more famous and popular current dulcimer makers. I don't know this guy's work first-hand, but Wautuga Lake dulcimers does a solid for $140, with various available options.  If you like tinkering, and you or a friend have some basic tools like a decent table saw and router, and you can look at some basic pickup wiring diagrams online and see how it's done, sure building one could be fun and creative. I would definitely buy a pre-made fretboard though, since fretting is tricky. And I'd get in contact with the Making Dulcimers sub-forum at ED. If making is only appealing to save $75 or so, just save up and buy one, since making one when you're really not enthused about it is going to end up being false economy. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 03:20 on Jun 30, 2012 |
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Jun 30, 2012 01:45
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I think I will make one. I have lots of tools at my house, though admittedly not many of them are carpentry related, and my friends have lots of experience with fixing and doing custom stuff to electric guitars which the electric dulcimer doesn't seem too far off from so they can help me out. The bassist for the aforementioned band actually just put a new neck in his bass because he wanted it to be fretless for whatever reason. And I like tinkering. Really it's been way too long since I have tinkered with something. I got excited at work today because I found a way to fix a couch by cannibalizing a broken desk. Building a dulcimer would be good for me.
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Jun 30, 2012 04:33
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Bowrrl posted:I think I will make one. I have lots of tools at my house, though admittedly not many of them are carpentry related, and my friends have lots of experience with fixing and doing custom stuff to electric guitars which the electric dulcimer doesn't seem too far off from so they can help me out. The bassist for the aforementioned band actually just put a new neck in his bass because he wanted it to be fretless for whatever reason. If there's hardwood in the desk, save some of that poo poo. At some point you'll want to salvage something sturdy at least 1" thick and about 6" wide by at least a yard long for a body. You can buy scrap pickups at a lot of guitar shops, or used on eBay; ideally get one that instead of having the "dots" on the top is a smooth tube of magnets, called a "lipstick" pickup. That way you don't need to worry about the strings aligning with the magnetic poles. You can buy tuners as scrap as well if there's any guitar repair-shop in your area, ditto for the micro-adjustable bridge pieces where each piece of bridge is on it's own little bolt and can be slightly slid back and forth. I think some folks buy a six-string scrap adjustable bridge and hacksaw off half of it. I would still definitely buy a pre-made fretboard though, they're like $20 for an totally finished fretted overlay 1/4" thick that you can glue to a piece of 1" scrap to make a fingerboard. The fret placement is vital, and your bridge (I'd make it a floating bridge, and/or scrap adjustables) needs to be fixed at a specific ratio from your octave fret, so make sure either someone online or a savvy friend helps you understand where the bridge needs to be set relative to the fretboard. That aside, it's mostly wood-butchery with little finesse. If you make one, you definitely must post a pic here. And I'll aim to try and record a quick demo of power-chording on dulcimer just to show you what an easy punk-tool it can be. quote:Small progress report! Groovy, sounds like you're learning a lot! At, what, 50c or so of material per flute I reckon you can do a lot of learning. And whatever prototypes you have that you don't 100% love, maybe you can gather up an armful and dump them on some street-punk kids in your city of something. You raise an interesting point about shakuhachi: though the purists insist you really want a $1000+ vintage bamboo one, if you're getting anything less they just tell you to make one from PVC. In all fairness, a PVC shauhachi seems almost traditional, since the original ones were pretty much "poo poo poor monk finds a piece of bamboo and spends some time on it", so it seems a rather faithful modern equivalent. If you're searching for interesting things to try, why not make a PVC kaval/ney? Clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PkWYNJAZqY Plans: http://www.phantomranch.net/folkdanc/articles/kaval-slama.htm  Another of the family of end-blown flutes, but with a bladed end vice a notch like the shakuhachi. Honestly, you can pretty much just take your pick of most flute instruments and there are online plans to make them from PVC. Even the reconstructed, long-dead Anasazi flute o the US Southwest: http://www.ehow.com/how_7673127_make-anasazi-flute-pvc.html TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 06:41 on Jun 30, 2012 |
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Jun 30, 2012 06:12
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The desk probably did not have hardwood in it, but my job is a part time at Goodwill so we get stuff in all the time. I can probably find something salvageable there eventually. Semi-related question, for an electric instrument does it matter if the wood it is made from is a "tonewood"? Also, a friend of mine says that I should wind my own pickups. More because we share the mindset of when doing something weird you might as well push it as far as it can go than any respectable reason, but he also says that (at least in guitars) it gives the instrument a unique sound. Do you have any insight on this? I mostly want to know what he means by "unique" and if it would fit with the dulcimer style.
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Jun 30, 2012 06:51
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quote:I figured out the bones pretty fast. Great, thanks for the update! What kind of bodhran did you get? It'll be a bit tricky to get bodhran skills down, but it's an amazing drum once you get a feel for it. Do you play Irish, or are you using these in other genres? Bowrrl posted:The desk probably did not have hardwood in it, but my job is a part time at Goodwill so we get stuff in all the time. I can probably find something salvageable there eventually. Semi-related question, for an electric instrument does it matter if the wood it is made from is a "tonewood"? Not really. I mostly said "hardwood" more in the sense of "don't use something flimsy" rather than "be on the lookout for the finest walnut". Just pick something that's not likely to warp or crumble, so not like pressboard. But a chunk of formica countertop would probably work fine (though not sure about tooling i). There a different arguments as to how much wood choice matters in electric instruments, but my vague impression figure is that the "it doesn't matter" folks cite physics, and the "matters a a lot" folks cite magic. quote:Also, a friend of mine says that I should wind my own pickups. More because we share the mindset of when doing something weird you might as well push it as far as it can go than any respectable reason, but he also says that (at least in guitars) it gives the instrument a unique sound. Do you have any insight on this? I mostly want to know what he means by "unique" and if it would fit with the dulcimer style. Kind of like the build vs. buy above: if the idea of winding a pickup gets you all excited, sure, have fun. But if you're doing it to "save money" or "be more authentic" and you don't actually enjoy it, just buy a scrap one for $5 and be done with it. I'd just suggest looking at some articles online about it and see how appealing it looks. I don't have any of the kind of tools one uses in pickup winding, and no clue how you go about measuring the "ohms" in a bundle of wire. If said buddy of yours has the tools and know-how to wind a pickup, sure, give it a shot. My overall caveats in building this particular instrument: - Mind your string angles going up from the tuners to the nut, and down from the bridge to the tailpiece. Just don't try insane string angles, try to imitate what you'd see on a normal dulcimer or e-guitar. - Fretboard is the hardest part to get right, buy pre-made - I'd go for one of the designs where the bridge sits on a separate block from the fingerboard (like the pale one in my pics above), and with the bridge adjustable either through an e-guitar tailpiece, or just a floating bridge sitting on a large enough block so you can adjust it back and forth a bit to make sure your octave harmonic sits properly above your octave fret. Let me know if you need more clarity on that; it's just a basic aspect of string instrument physics. I'm getting some stuff down around the house today, so again will endeavor to get you a short clip of power-chording on dulcimer.
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Jun 30, 2012 17:30
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How legit is the fretboard on the cardboard dulcimers? If they're good what I think I might do is order one and get a feel for playing that while I look for things to salvage for the electric. Then when I have all the required parts for the electric I will cannibalize the cardboard for the fretboard. That way I get a fretboard and some first hand dulcimer knowledge which will probably help make the creation of the electric go smoother. Just checking to see if this idea is flawed in some way that isn't coming to my mind or if you think it is kind of pointless.
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Jul 1, 2012 02:20
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I remember reading a quote from Les Paul that said something like the ideal electric guitar is basically a railroad tie with strings and and pickups.
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Jul 1, 2012 03:26
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OhYeah, your gamba posts are awesome! Any chance you could put together a longer post with a little info about the gamba family, why a goon should consider taking up the viol, and maybe some suggestions on where to start (forums, associations?) and maybe where to buy them? Years ago I used to window-shop at http://www.violadagamba.com/ . These days they mainly appear to carry the "Charles Ogle" brand contracted to China, starting around $1500 for a treble. Then there's Early Music Shop in the UK, which carries the Lu Mi make starting around £1,000 for a treble. Are any of these even slightly reasonable starters? There's an outfit on eBay called Song Tie Ling, of whom I know nothing, but they have gambas starting at US$299. I am, of course, skeptical, but curious to know more. For context, this is the treble viola da gamba mentioned, much smaller than the bass OY plays.  Bowrrl posted:How legit is the fretboard on the cardboard dulcimers? If they're good what I think I might do is order one and get a feel for playing that while I look for things to salvage for the electric. Then when I have all the required parts for the electric I will cannibalize the cardboard for the fretboard. Those fretboards are generally quite decent, and they have an adjustable bridge, which is useful for getting a feel for proper bridge placement. Your idea seems a pretty solid one, and you could indeed cannibalise the fretboard later. If you cannibalise the fingerboard and have the body left over, you could just glue a basic slip diddly-bow onto the body to get some new use out of it. If you do cannibalise the fretboard, bear in mind you don't necessarily have to use the same tuners, so you could chop the head off so long as you keep the nut and frets together. If you want to avoid having to mess with routing the pickup through the strum-hollow during the conversion, you could also chop off everything from the strum-hollow forward; just make sure that you place the tailpiece with bridge at the same height and distance from the frets as it was when there were all one solid piece. A cardboard kit would give you something to mess with in the meantime, and whenever you're ready to do a conversion the Everything Dulcimer folks should be able to pass you good info. 
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Jul 2, 2012 02:58
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The Bodhran came in the mail! but I'm out of town, so my girlfriend is tending to the unopened boxes until tomorrow  I bought the Meinl that's on most websites. I bought it kind of on a whim, but most of what I read about it made it seem like a decent starter. For what I generally play, well, it's nothing right now. I'm really interested in Irish music now, as a pub I go to regularly has a really nice Irish dude who plays there every Saturday - unlike most Irish pubs, this place seems to be pretty authentic. (It has a thatched roof, too!) I got to play the bones with him up on the little stage once, and I was sold. I got my flute-playing girlfriend some tin whistles that she has picked up pretty quickly, and we both have been listening to The Chieftains on repeat over the past few weeks. I can't wait to attempt to play it tomorrow. The Irish fellow who plays at the pub told me he'd give me some lessons, too.
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Jul 3, 2012 01:15
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thomawesome posted:The Bodhran came in the mail! Meinl makes pretty solid gear overall, so I'm sure you'll be fine. Did you get the narrow-frame type with the crosspiece in the back, or the kind with just a really deep (6") shell and a slightly tapered-down head? As said before, when I was a kid absolutely everyone I saw in the US that played had the former, but it seems the latter style has really taken off in recent years.   No problem with one over the other, just different styles of play going in and out of style, and/or some recent hotshot lures people over to his kind of playing. If you want to see impressive playing, just search "bodhran solo" on YouTube; there are folks doing 10m solos and yet keeping it interesting. quote:I got my flute-playing girlfriend some tin whistles that she has picked up pretty quickly, and we both have been listening to The Chieftains on repeat over the past few weeks. I can't wait to attempt to play it tomorrow. The Irish fellow who plays at the pub told me he'd give me some lessons, too. drat, you've really taken off running with this. Motivational to see. Solo melodic instrument and bodhran can be a great combo; really minimalist and driven. I'm also fond of bodhran just backing up voice. This isn't the best example (kind of goofy singing) but ballads like "Lannigan's Ball" sound really stark with just bodhran: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPU6vqauk-o
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Jul 3, 2012 06:14
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:OhYeah, your gamba posts are awesome! Any chance you could put together a longer post with a little info about the gamba family, why a goon should consider taking up the viol, and maybe some suggestions on where to start (forums, associations?) and maybe where to buy them? I haven't tried the Chinese viols that Charlie Ogle sells so I cannot comment on them. My own instrument, however, is the 700mm 7-string Bertrand model offered by Lu-Mi Strings. I have also tried other Lu-Mi basses, altos and now also my daughter's cello teacher, who also plays the viol, bought a brand new treble from them. All the Lu-Mi instruments I've tried were "full" instruments, not the "students" ones. The main difference is the wood used, student instruments also lack decorations and nice touches like an ebony tailpiece and fingerboard in my case. All the Lu-Mi instruments sound rather different, too (it's very hard to find 2 viols which sound the same). Are they good instruments? Definitely. Markku, the Finnish viol player who represents Lu-Mi strings has used the 6-string bass on a concert tour and the ensemble he plays in, Phantasm, has used a Lu-Mi alto in one of their albums. The music school where my daughter goes to, owns a Lu-Mi alto as well and I have to say it is a very good instrument. The treble I had a chance to try sounded absolutely fantastic and the owner was extatic as well. And to top it off, it looked visually stunning, very nice dark brown finish. Are they better than instruments made by an European master? Or as good as? It's hard to say, I haven't had a chance to try many expensive viols, but I would say probably not. There is a reason why some masters have a waiting list longer than one for a rare and expensive Ferrari. But then again, you can consider the prices. My viol cost around 2300 USD (without strings, transport, taxes, case or set-up). A top-tier master's instrument can easily cost 4-5x as much. Do I have any criticism of my own instrument? I probably chose the wrong strings, that doesn't really help. Tip: do not buy "light" gauge strings. If you want to make sure you get a good set, get Pirastro's "medium" or any other maker's "heavy". The ebony finish on my instrument is not as nice as I expected. The same model, but a few years older one that I played had a supreme ebony finish and I was very disappointed to find mine was of a lower quality. Does it effect the sound or is it a deal-breaker? No. Overall, it's very good and I'm happy. It's not perfect of course, but I'm sure I could not have gotten anything better for the same price. Conclusion: Lu-Mi is a sound choice when money is an issue. The shop has made over 1000 instruments and I think they consistently produce quality instruments. With Markku you can even return the instrument within 2 weeks, if you don't like it, for ANY reason. If you have 10 grand lying around which you planned to spend on a viol then you are really spoiled for choice. If you have any further questions I would be happy to answer them.
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Jul 3, 2012 23:15
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My bodhran is great. It's the slimmer one with the crossbar. The irish fellow that inspired me and my girlfriend plays the crossbar kind. I got to play it today for a few hours, and through youtube learned a few things. The best thing about this drum is that both hands can do something. I can't control it, but the pitch bending with my left hand could be insane. I love the drum paired only with vocals and I am searching for more videos or songs that involve that. If that Irish guy gives me lessons, I will upload few videos of my progress with the bodhran. I love it, it's like an european tabla.
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Jul 4, 2012 05:59
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OhYeah posted:If you have any further questions I would be happy to answer them. Thanks for the great info! The main thing it'd be cool to see is just some info on why you think goons should consider taking up the viol. What's great about it as an instrument? Personally, if I were to take up any classical string instrument it'd be the viol or clavichord, but I don't have any serious experience with either beyond just mucking around. Did you get into it to play a certain genre of classical music, or what drew you (and apparently your daughter) in? I was glancing around YouTube to see if I could run across some interesting examples of non-traditional viol playing, and ran across this interesting variant of the instrument:  Ruby Gamba of Arnhem, Netherlands, produces a line of electric viols. Not cheap, about $4600 for non-VAT countries, but they look lovely. A clip from the band ANSKA with a Ruby: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rD8hcQzU_W4 There's also a US outfit ErgoInstruments who makes a very stripped-down electric gamba for $750. For whatever reason, they take the trouble to sink metal frets into the curved fingerboard, which seems a fair hassle. Not sure why they don't just leave the fingerboard blank and tie on (or let the customer tie on) gut frets as is traditional. There are a couple of simple Ergo clips on YouTube, like this one of Gata Negra: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5feqcavRw0. Here's a longer writeup on TalkBass if you're interested in reading up on. 
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Jul 5, 2012 06:34
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I really want to learn how to play a drum of some kind, and the bodhran has come up a bunch. It looks really neat and awesome but I haven't seen many mentions of other drums in this thread, what else do you suggest?
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Jul 5, 2012 07:05
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This thread is fantastic how did I never notice this before. Not nearly as interesting as most of the stuff in this thread but for the past year or so I've been teaching myself to drum properly on an MPD. Originally I didn't think it would be possible as the sensitivity isn't good enough for any complicated techniques but I worked out quite a good modification to improve the sensitivity, now it triggers a hit if you so much as brush against the pads, so I have proper velocity control. I really want to get a Cimbalom https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFaXcvHpJwU But unsurprisingly they are mentally expensive to buy in the UK, the only place I can find that makes them costs £1300. I guess I'll have to make do with a Hammered Dulcimer instead, although even they are bloody pricey here too, £400-700 for a 12/11.
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Jul 5, 2012 07:14
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:Thanks for the great info! The main thing it'd be cool to see is just some info on why you think goons should consider taking up the viol. What's great about it as an instrument? First of all, you can easily turn any viol into an electric viol, you just need a quality piezo pickup (requires a bit of work, and one of high quality costs around 100-200 EUR). The advantage of a true electic viol is of course the size, if you have to travel alot and you are constantly cramped, then having an electic viol will be very convenient. Why should you learn the viol? I will try to make a short list of all the relevant reasons. You don't have to have any previous stringed instument experience. I hadn't learned anything like the cello or violin before and I started when I was 15. All you need is a teacher that is willing to show you the basics and an instrument to practice on. The reason for this is simply the frets, they help new players immensily. Of course in solo pieces you have to go way up after the frets have ended, but in the beginning you can play simple renaissance dances with only little practice: example 1 You don't have to have a full consort of viols to play this kind of music. "Broken consort" is fine, which means a mixture of different instruments like viol, guitar, recorders, violin, lauto or clavecin for numbered bass. If you do, however, have a group of people who are playing viol you can go one step further and try the English consort music of the 16-17 centuries. Behold example 2. Also, if you search hard enough there is solo music written for the viol in the renaissance period, which is tehcnically easier to play, like this: example 3 There is incredible number of highly virtuous solo music for the viol in 17-18 centuries, most of it coming from France, but bits from Germany and Italy and other countries as well. example 4 So my advice: start with the basics. Let someone who knows tell teach you the basic stuff and don't jump to the more complicated music from the start. You won't be ready. Renaissance ensemble music is the best. You can play it with other people and the music sounds fantastic, always very positive and very easy on the ears. Most of it is quite energetic and paced as well so it's a treat for the listeners as well. OhYeah fucked around with this message at 13:04 on Jul 5, 2012 |
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Jul 5, 2012 13:01
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quote:My bodhran is great. It's the slimmer one with the crossbar. The irish fellow that inspired me and my girlfriend plays the crossbar kind. I got to play it today for a few hours, and through youtube learned a few things. The bodhran is pretty unique among European drums, and drumming is really pretty subdued in most of Europe, other than the very far eastern bits that took up drumming under Ottoman occupation (Balkans, etc). I'm not totally sure on the reasons, but I think there's some arguments that drums were suppressed in Europe over time due to both rules reserving drums for military purposes (and/or keeping them out of the hands of rebellious militias), and there might have been some attempt to break drum traditions due to non-Christian roots. I do believe both of those are also reasons drumming was discouraged amongst slaves in America. In whatever case, the bodhran is probably not some ancient Celtic custom, but a relatively (century or two) tradition, and probably was nowhere near as virtuosic as it is now until the 1960s when it got pulled into the Folk Revival. So it is somewhat of a "new tradition" and rather anomalous among European drums. On the very bright side, that made the bodhran a "blank slate" for people to try out new things on rather than be stuck in "that's not how it's done", and people have found some really remarkable ways to get sounds out of these. If you find some good voice-bodhran clips, chuck them up here to share; it really is a great drum for the solo singer. Mister Snips posted:I really want to learn how to play a drum of some kind, and the bodhran has come up a bunch. It looks really neat and awesome but I haven't seen many mentions of other drums in this thread, what else do you suggest? We've covered a few other drums, though not as frequently: djembe, dumbek, bongo, the Hang and HAPI drums, cajon, and some assorted frame drums. The main question, as is frequent: what kind of music do you want to do, and in what setting? Outside of the popular rock/jazz trap set, the bodhran, and some rather specific traditions (Balkan tupan, Indian dhol, etc) a lot of the hobbyist musician drums are hand-drums. If you have a specific musical style in mind, that makes it a bit easier to choose something, but barring that there are some drums that are quite available/affordable and relatively versatile. - If you want something you can play outside for drum circles or jams, you want something relatively large and loud, and probably one of the instruments out of the African or Latin tradition. Djembe is a perennial favourite for this role in the modern day, dumbek is a little more compact and with a sharper-brighter sound. Bongo doesn't get the love it used to (other than in the actual Cuban tradition) but is a great instrument with potential for serious study.  If you like djembe but want to branch out slightly, ashiko has some similar stylings, and some people use the long Thai Klong Yaw as a cool alternative. One slick rarity that's both hand and stick is the Dominican tambora. If you want something less Latin, and a little more Middle East, maybe a bit medieval, maybe a bit of a darker/edgier sound, there are a lot of good frame drums out on the market. Less of a hand motion, more subtle finger motion.  Lots of good variants on frame drum, quite affordable, reasonably easy to carry and store, can be muffled decently for indoor practice. Lots of good instructional materials online and/or on DVD, and the frame-drum scene (as a huge generalisation) is a bit more of an artsier and serious crowd. - Gene Velez rocking a big tar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fB0hE-YlfzQ - Long Persian daf solo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KboogWwmzrc - John Cage - Composed Improvisation for One-Sided Drums with or without Jangles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-NJ4bzguPFs As a last rough "category" that I'm kind of making up, you get some quieter and subtler drums, mainly ones that don't have a membrane head. The nice thing about these is some of these can be very affordably home-made, can be played in a small jam but quiet enough to not bug neighbors. One great instrument is cajon (Spanish for "box"). People have some drat amazing artistry just hammering away on wooden boxes. Note there are sellers of small "cajoncitos" the size of a toaster oven, and honestly if you don't want to spend much money but want to try out some cajon licks, I'd grab a wooden cigar box or similar (a lot of cigar shops sell them for a few bucks) and go to town. Here's a big cajon https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvE1miO4ZyY a cajoncito https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPVr8FCgCN0 and drumming on a cigar box bongo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PQRT5BEsNU. Similar subtle idea, with a wide variety of sound textures, is the udu or Ibo drum. I have a Meinl one I'm pretty stoked with: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDEMFwJlsqM. An udu is just a ceramic (Meinls are fibreglass) pot with some holes you can strike, cover and uncover to change the tune, etc.  So those are a few ideas that jump out at me. Any of those grab you, or is there some other specific tradition you're keen on? You might want to also check for drum crews in your town; there might be hobby groups were you can get together with folks, learn a specific style, and play in an ensemble. In my neighborhood I've seen public performances by the all-woman Washington DC Batala group, playing samba rhythms. @ Oh Yeah: the upside you didn't mention for solid-body electrics is that they can use a range of effects pedals without the feedback issue of having a resonating body, so there's that. I will ponder BSE's cimbalom issue; UK prices for a lot of instruments suck, but I don't know an easy way to get an affordable 14/15 from the US to the UK...
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Jul 6, 2012 01:00
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Oh wow, I wasn't expecting that big of a response! I really don't know what type of music i want to play, I just know that lots of times I tap out beats to music and I want to do something cool and musical. I can also keep a beat better than my friends, which doesn't say much because none of them play instruments but hey why not The cajon looks really cool to me though, it's versatile and from what I can see seems to fit in well with lots of different styles of music. I really like how it has a snare built into it, it has more than one sound. Plus you can attach other percussive bits to the side of the box, which is pretty cool
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Jul 6, 2012 06:47
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