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JoeCool posted:My bad! I didn't realize the amount of thought that should be taken when choosing an instrument. No worries, here's a few initial suggestions to mull over, and let us know if you want any of the angle changed on this. Your initial note of fife and mandolin are both pretty good options, so for a start I'd suggest picking one of those two and making a solid go of it. I wouldn't try to get too multi-instrumental at this early of a stage, so focus on picking one thing and really putting some consistent effort into it, though if you enjoy uke there's no reason not to keep playing uke casually on the side. Note the key of "consistent effort" isn't "spend weeks promising yourself you'll set an hour or two aside someday soon to practice", but rather "keep your instrument handy and pick it up at every opportunity even if you just have a few spare minutes. Ten minutes a day is way better than an hour once a week. In any case, between those two: fife has the advantage of being small, pretty good ones are still quite affordable, they fit well into a number of traditions, and the skillset almost totally crosses over with Irish/folk flute and with tinwhistle. You can't sing with a fife (which isn't your thing anyway), and you can't chord, but it's great for melody, harmonizing counter-melody, etc. Mandolin is cool because you can constantly mix it up between chording and melody, it fits into a very, very wide array of traditions/genres, and they're still pretty affordable and though not tiny are still smaller than most other popular instruments.  For mandolin, we have a megapost somewhere earlier in the thread, I think the table of contents in the OP lists where. As I recall, Rogue mandolins have a good rep on MandolinCafe for being a surprisingly decent dirt-cheap starter. Like $75, crazy cheap. Though you may want to shop around to spend a little more money to buy one from a seller who actually knows instruments and properly checks out, QCs, tweaks each mando before it ships. As opposed to just jimmying open the crate from China and chucking one into a box to ship to you. Alternately, you can buy one as cheap as you can, and take it to your local luthier for $50 or whatever of tweaking and settup there. If you want a nicer mando, we can check around here, or the NMD:ML subforum's mando thread, or MandolinCafe to get the current gouge on what the good buys are in the $300-600 range. For anyone owning/buying a mandolin, check out Pham Nuwen's custom avatar: Niles Hokkanen's mando chordbook is amazing and costs almost nothing, so every mandolin player should have a copy in their case.  For fife, I want to stress that you don't just want to go out and buy just whatever fife off the first Amazon page you see. There are a lot of "camp fife" pieces around which are pretty primitive (or tourist wallhangers), or marching fifes which are only meant to be played in the highest registers in a big marching band. But my guess would be you want something more like a small flute, that plays regular melodies and its low register equally well. It gets a bit confusing because "fife" often means the simpler wooden flutes played at high pitch for "fife and drum" marching bands, which isn't what you want for playing Irish jigs and reels. Such a creature, a wooden keyless tiny flute, the Irish call a "piccolo", but Americans use "piccolo" to mean the small metal or wooden flute with keys used for orchestra or highschool band. Supposedly the Brits and Irish call the small flutes "band flutes", but that's confusing since in Northern Ireland a "flute band" is just a sectarian version of a fife and drum corps used to antagonise Protestant vs. Catholic strife with parades. But whatever, what you want is a fife that's made for playing folktunes, not for marching. For such tuneful fifes: the main brands I'd recommend checking out that are made to have a functional low range, basically playing just like a tinwhistle but side-blown which gives you more nuance: - I don't know if he's still making them as of this moment since I haven't seen an update, but user jemtheflute at the Chiff & Fipple Forum is a Brit who makes "pvc piccolos" for just £18 shipped, that are supposed to be pretty good basic instruments. http://forums.chiffandfipple.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=82663&hilit=piccolo - Ralph Sweet makes a wide variety of flutes/fifes/whistles, and his "Professional" line is supposed to be made a lot like larger Irish flutes are, not just simple bored rods like more primitive fifes. He has a really nice looking synthetic model for $125, $150 for rosewood, $225 for blackwood. http://www.sweetheartflute.com/fifes.html You could also puzzle out whether you want to start with fife, or with full Irish flute, which behaves almost exactly the same but is larger and an octave lower in pitch. Note also that tinwhistles also finger identical to flute and fife, just the mouthpiece is different, so if you get a D fife (which I strongly suggest that key so you can use instructional materials produced for flute/tinwhistle), for just a few bucks you could buy a tinwhistle in a different key (like Bb or C) so you can switch it up a bit if you're jamming with friends and want to play in a different array of keys.  I'm not seeing it listed as an option on their site, so you may have to email them to request it, but at one point Sweet was offering his polymer "Professional" fife as a "trio" set, where you got one body, but both whistle and fife heads, so you could play the instrument with one mouthpiece of the other depending on what sound you wanted. Kind of a neat versatility if he still has that, but if he doesn't no huge deal since you could just buy a D tinwhistle by Feadog or whoever for $10 and have that be your backup. Here are a few fife-related clips: - a relative beginner (though iirc she already plays tinwhistle) playing a Ralph Sweet camp fife in C: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugbi6uBtOeM - Irish slow aire on a fife by KDJ Flutes, good use of the low register: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bJBUyYpSik - here's a wooden piccolo with keys, basically the fife's evolved relative, doing some Irish reels: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNXm0qVSrbM - The "Cup of Tea reel" played on a gorgeous and pricey handmade McGee piccolo out of Australia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQT4K5GCopE Another (not quite as pricey) high-end Irish piccolo maker is Skip Healey, and a Japanese piper playing Irish tunes on a Hammy Hamilton model: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMR12iXHVoo. If you're wanting to drool over high-end items in the $400-800 range. Granted, that's pricey, but fifes do have some great value for the price. For any fife in D, you can just use any of the vast amounts of online tutorials (video and written) for tinwhistle/pennywhistle and all the finger motion is pretty much identical. There's also a neat blog for folk fife (or "piccolo" for the Irish) that looks well-worth reading: http://irishpiccolo.blogspot.com/ TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 07:02 on Feb 8, 2014 |
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Feb 8, 2014 06:43
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JoeCool posted:Wow, awesome post man that helped me immensely in deciding. I really enjoy those Irish reels and warm, Renaissance-esque tones. I've also realized I am less drawn something more shrill like American Civil War fife playing. Those rogue mandolins look great as well. Could you tell me more about fifes because that was a good read. No worries, the above and also my first fife blurb on page 6 is pretty close to the limit of my knowledge. The blogspot is really worth leafing through as well. Do you still have any specific things about fife you wanted to know? We have a few goons in and out of the thread who play various early flutes. EDIT: here's the site-specific google hits link on Chiff&Fipple for coverage of the topic. EDIT2: As the C&F forum threads explain, the difference between the older "simple system" piccolos and the modern is the same as with the older wooden flutes vs. the "Boehm" design modern silver flutes. So that's one distinction. I'll also add just for reference that Peter Worrel was recommended on C&F for making simple-system but fully-keyed piccolos. Many ways to upgrade (and often suprisingly inexpensively) if you go this route, but many quite inexpensive ways to start out.  Fundamentally, a folk fife is kind of the midway between an Irish flute and a tinwhistle, and uses identical fingering to both of those, so pretty easy to find learning materials. My impression is that it's not so commonly thought of as an Irish instrument these days, seen just rarely at sessions, but that it was reasonably popular earlier in the 20th century, especially for playing for dancers. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 21:28 on Feb 8, 2014 |
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Feb 8, 2014 17:12
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No Gravitas posted:My ocarina has left Japan and is coming to my hot little paws sometime over the next few days. Joy! I'd have to go dig around since I'm not as familiar with sites of sheet music for that period. The main trick is you want to favor tunes which span just an ocatave or so, within the range of your ocarina. If you ever happen to order anything from Susato, they have a $7 tunebook of one-octave tunes that's supposed to be pretty good.. If your ocarina has a range of a 9th, Susato has a whole line of inexpensive books in their "Nine is Fine" series of tunes for instruments with a range of just an octave +1. quote:And any suggestions for an instrument which is cheap, isn't a recorder and plays renaissance music well? Are you thinking primarily wind instruments here? Most Renn string instruments tend to be a bit pricier (though not ridiculous) and would take some real focus to learn. There are some Renn wind instruments though that wouldn't be a particularly difficult segue from ocarina. So far as cheap, since you have an ocarina coming, I'd focus less on finding another cheap thing to buy right away, and instead put a little time in on ocarina while saving up so that when you know what other wind instrument you want to add, you'll be able to buy a solid one. So far as Renn wind instruments, there are a lot of really unusual and interesting ones, many of which are surprisingly available and affordable. Setting aside recorder, there were also a number of early side-blown flutes popular then. My impression is that they're somewhat different from the modern keyless Irish flute and fifes a post above, but I think in the short term you could get a pretty good feel by buying one of those affordably, and could always get a more authentic reproduction if you get big into serious ensemble playing or reenacting. Those aside though, here are a few of the key examples of really interesting, yet available, Renn wind instruments: Crumhorn  Pretty classic Renn instrument, popular in ensembles. Basically a kind of primitive oboe with a capped mouthpiece above the reed. Kind of a buzzy, resonant sound. Susato makes all sizes of them in ABS plastic in the $300s. They also sell a somewhat modernized/hybrid version that fits the long instrument in a more compact space by winding the bore through the body, calling in the "kelhorn" after the company's owner.  Consort: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8w7KJznei7I Solo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UI30-9TsafQ "Crummhorn Homepage": http://www.recorderhomepage.net/crumhorn.html Cornetto and serpent   Though it looks like the other reed instruments, this is actually a brass instrument, with a small trumpet-like mouthpiece. These are very foreign to us because the modern era really doesn't have brass instruments with open finger holes. It's kind of in the same family as the awesome serpent; we have some extensive discussion of serpent earlier in the thread; for a while it appeared the main guys making affordable synthetic ones for $800 weren't taking orders, but they updated their site back in August, so I emailed them to ask if they're up and running. Cornettos/cornetti can be bought in ABS plastic cheaper still, The cornet/cornetto/zink was a rather prestigious instrument in the Renn period, lots of music written for it, but only seen in rare niches nowadays. There are a handful of virtuoso players, mainly in Europe, that seem to do pretty well for themselves. It is a really beautiful instrument, kind of sounds between a trumpet and a flute. There are a number of makers making resin ones quite affordably; Chris Monks makes them in £200 range. - Quick podcast intro to cornetto: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VmXoJL84J0 - Cornetto lead backed up by piano: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8LqhUgbuzQ - Cornetto lead in a larger ensemble: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U3jGWLFmsQ Rackett and dulcian   The dulcian (also called fagotto, curtal, etc) and the rackett (or rankett) are ancestors of the bassoon. The dulcians tend to be a little pricey, like $1000+ (though Lazar's Early Music occasionally has really affordable used ones), although racketts can be had a fair bit cheaper. Rackett is kind of like an extreme version of the kelhorn listed above, where that tiny body holds a hugely long bore because it doubles back on itself nine times inside there. Also kind of resembles a bong. Keith Loraine makes racketts in the $700s, Paul Beekhuizen has sopranos through tenors around €400, RenWorks starting around $1000. - Quick intro to rackett: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql25jqpsNZ4 - Rackett ensemble: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFfXS59UQs4 - Intro to dulcian: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovSpmpePMno Those are a few big-picture suggestions, but in the meantime take your time and really get a feel for ocarina. Read up online about Renaissance music, see if you have any friends that want to play duets with whatever instrument they play. While it's not impossible to get involved in the above Renn pieces on a purely individual basis, a lot of folks come into them through interacting with other people in the Early Music scene, so you might want to see if your area has any Early ensembles you can visit, watch some of their gigs. This has been a fun one to research, I hadn't read up on Renn stuff for a while. I noticed that Official Piffaro has a number of good intro clips explaining Renn instruments, so their series is worth watching. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 06:46 on Feb 10, 2014 |
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Feb 9, 2014 21:05
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No Gravitas posted:Thanks! That was a nice blast to have. No worries, and not at all discouraging you from further exploration in the big picture, just saying you'll have a much better idea of what you want once you get some months of Renn ocarina playing under your belt. Start tossing your spare change and loose singles into a jar, and by the time you figure out what you want you may well have enough to buy a next instrument. Anything jump out at you as a possible aspiration out of the above-posted Early Music instruments?
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Feb 13, 2014 01:43
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I still find it very odd that two goons ordered bowed lyres at the same time; I think we also have a third one who was working on building one in her garage a few months back. I've been culling all the instruments I don't use often so I can focus on the ones I play all the time. Aside from playing mileage, I do also factor in cost, size, and durability. So when I have an extra ABS Native American flute, I'm not too concerned because it wouldn't sell for much, and I can chuck it in a drawer and forget about it for years with no harm done. As opposed to say a huge bajo sexto that's even bigger than a normal guitar case and sucks to haul during moves. The practical upshot of this is I ordered a Sweet professional fife (the resin one) this week because I figure it's a generally useful item, easy to loan to flautist friends, and near indestructible. following not mine, just an example of an array.  I now have one of those $5 Yamaha fifes that I won't need, also because it uses recorder-like fingering rather than tinwhistle fingering. To that end, if you're an absolutely dirt poor young goon at the moment but want to mess with wind instruments, email me at my username at Yahoo and I'll send you out the fife, and also a few tinwhistles that are new with the mouthpieces still shrinkwrapped so you can share them with friends who also want to play music.
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Feb 15, 2014 00:04
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Aphra Bane posted:I stumbled across a pentatonic kalimba the other day, and thanks to that awesome kalimba post a couple of pages back, I decided to buy it. The shop I bought it from had sat it next to pastel didgeridoos and was trying to pass it off as an aboriginal instrument, so I was a bit wary of its quality, but it was $15 so I figured why not. It only has a range of 5 notes (7 keys), but the sound is very resonant and mellow. Almost melancholic, actually. And you weren't kidding, TTFA, when you said it was hard to sound bad on these things! I kinda underestimated that plus-point, and it really is satisfying being able to pick it up and start playing without having to fuss over it. Glad it made you a believer; pentatonic instruments are incredibly to "make music" on without having to do all the book-learning and all. Just naturally harmonizing instruments. - For wind instruments, the main pentatonics (at least commonly available in the West) are Native American flutes (available in the <$50 range for student pieces) and Susato makes a kind of pentatonic tinwhistle called the "Pentacorder" for $30. - For percussion, there are a decent smattering of pentatonic marimbas and xylophones, and some of the "Hang drum style" metal hand-pan drums are available in various set pentatonic tunings. Kalimbas are, of course, the most affordable and compact of these percussion instrument (well, technically a lamellaphone, but similar idea). I'll put in a particular shout-out for Goshen Kalimbas. A little hard to find online, and Kalimba Magic only carries a few of their higher-end items. However, House of Musical Traditions gets their stuff on and off, and tends to have their neat small solid-body pentatonics for just $25 or so, which are a great deal. - For string instruments, the easiest pentatonics are the various smallest harps/lyres/zithers. Some, like the kantele, are not traditionally pentatonic tuned, but the beauty of strings is that just a few twists of a key makes the instrument pentatonic. I do keep meaning to hit up that guy on Etsy who makes really neat mini hammered dulcimers to see if he can do a pentatonic version... No Gravitas posted:EDIT 2: The reputation that Night by Noble Alto C gets is an understatement. It is better than people say. Way better. I cannot imagine an ocarina that sounds better. My thoughts of getting a clay Standard Night AC in lavender are now over. I don't need anything else. This is it. Really glad to hear getting a good ocarina has really turned your experience around! I'm not pressuring folks to go out and spend themselves into pain, but the price difference between poo poo and great ocarinas is quite low (especially in the US where great ocarinas are $20), so getting a dubious one is of false economy. We're fortunate with tinwhistles in that all the most common ones are pretty solid, so the many goons getting tinwhistles are sitting pretty. You almost have to go out of your way to buy crappy tinwhistles, which I have done about three times: a solid plastic "Dixie" model that was a weird design (raised fingerholes?) but played okayish, then a souvenir-stand one at Mt Vernon labeled "Cooper" where the woodblock fipple was misplaced and is almost impossible to get tone out of, and a "Schylling" brand from an educational toy store, that was apparently made of steel and weighed a ton and sucked. I gave away the Schylling, but I'll include the other two in my gift-box of tinwhistles (the rest I'm sending are better) for whatever poor young goon rogers up for those and the Yamaha fife. By the way, I finally got all my tinwhistles into one spot, and here's what I have: 
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Feb 18, 2014 03:31
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Just got my used flanger in the mail today: this combo is gonna be tits:
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Feb 23, 2014 15:42
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There are a couple ways to go about this, here are my three key ideas: - What you're doing so far, look at small piano accordions in your area. What you really want to do though is read up on "how to buy an accordion" articles, and/or YouTube tutorials. There are a ton of piano accordions floating around the US market, of varying degrees of quality and condition. Repairing an inexpensive piano accordion is not very cost-effective, so you really want to prioritize getting one that's in good playing condition from the start. Here's one such guide for a start: http://1accordion.net/buy.htm . Just showing you know what to check for also gives you credibility in arguing the price down, since you can point out small defects. --Upsides: available locally, reasonably familiar for a keyboard player / Downsides: Even the small ones are a good 10lb+, and a 25-key only has two octaves of range. - You're not likely to find a decent concertina in your price-range, unless you're willing to go to $275 or so used, but you could rent a concertina for several months for $50 or so, which would give her time to try out an instrument. And some of the shops that rent concertinas will apply your rental fees towards the cost of the instrument if you end up buying. From what you describe, English concertina might be a good option, since it's small (just a few pounds), three octaves of range, fully chromatic, etc. The main place to look for used concertinas would be Concertina.net/forums , and we have a few other goons who've gotten good deals there, and other players are really helpful. - So far as button accordions, buying off eBay is inadvisable since most sellers have no idea how to judge accordions. That said, Melodeon.net has a wide following, and if you ask on their Classified forum, you could quite possibly find a good deal on a 2-row accordion in your price range. Posting a "WTB" ad could work, or there are a few key members (especially hickory-wind) who routinely buy beater button accordions in the US and refurbish them, and can probably find you a good deal on a serviceable 'box in the $100-200 range if you PM them. By buying from other musicians, you (generally) get a much more accurate feel for what you're buying. In particular, the "Club" model accordions, which are 2.5 rows, are good Hohner instruments but have a limited following in the US, so can be had at great prices from casual players and refurbishers. A good Hohner Club can be 8-9 pounds, and since it's bisonoric (different notes on push/pull) its 8 bass actually are equivalent to 16 bass on a piano, and a Club is largely chromatic. It doesn't have the familiarity of a piano, but it has its own intuitiveness to playing, and would certainly be a more unusual accordion, plus most Clubs are from well-recognized manufacturers (mainly Hohner) so you don't have to navigate an environment of dozens of no-name instruments.  Those are my takes on the issue, though clearly your girlfriend's preference should be key. I wouldn't try to just surprise someone with an instrument type they weren't expecting, since choice of type of instrument, and even of individual axe, has a lot of the personal to it. Sit down and watch some YouTube together, take a look at piano accordions, English concertinas, button accordions, see what sound and feel speaks to her. EDIT: the free giveaway package of cheap tinwhistles and fife higher up on this page is still available; see earlier post TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 14:55 on Feb 26, 2014 |
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Feb 26, 2014 03:47
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HenryJLittlefinger posted:Man, you do some straight up effort posts. I really appreciate it. HenryJLittlefinger posted:So in true goon fashion, and against my better judgement, I broke some of the "How to Buy Used" rules. I also didn't wait around long enough for an answer here and rushed. I really wanted to have an instrument in hand today, as it's her birthday, and I needed to do something big and surprising (I don't think she was actually expecting it). I do really appreciate your post, though, and can see myself using it in the future. After spending some time on concertina.net, I think I want one for myself, and have some surplus stringed instruments not being played. No worries, glad that you ended up finding a good piano accordion; PA is probably your best/cheapest bet for your immediate situation, because there are just so many of them in the US, and the piano keyboard is reasonably familiar for a lot of folks. If your girl is mostly playing casually, a 25/12 might hold her for the foreseeable future, and it’s a handy-sized package. Down the road, if she gets to playing more and finds the small one limiting, I’d encourage you to also read up on CBA as well as looking at larger PAs. There are some good pro/con write-ups online about PA vs. CBA: for an American PAs and teachers/materials are easier to find, somewhat the opposite in Continental Europe. PAs as noted have the advantage of a “familiar” keyboard, while the CBA keyboard has a lot of neat advantages one you get used to it, particularly in that it’s “isomorphic”. That is, no matter where you are on a CBA keyboard, the same stretch gets the same interval: eg choose a button, go two over and one up and that note will always be a fifth higher. So CBA, like Duet concertina, ties music less to specific pitches, and is more about relative note relations. Makes reading music a little harder, but transposing/improvising way easier. PAs tend to have fancier register switches and doodads, while CBAs tend to be smaller (though equal in weight) for the same amount of range since their layout is more compact. So far as concertinas, feel free to poke back in when you’re moving to ponder those. Are you looking for a folky/nautical singalong instrument and/or Irish trad piece like an Anglo, or looking for something more melodic/jazzy/classical/chromatic like an English concertina? quote:That's a really neat looking lap steel. But I've always found that calico tone cats give a warmer sound. The Siamese models are just really nasally, too feedback-prone. Anyway, if you’re wanting a lap-steel but short on cash, get you a 2x4, some nails, tin can, and one guitar string (or piece of wire) and get cracking. There is not a single person on this forum as poor as a 1930s sharecropper, so nobody has an excuse not to be playing diddley-bow. And those skills cross over most directly to lap-steel.  As others have pointed out, even factory 6-string lap-steels are also really dang cheap, like often under $100. Don’t blow the rent money or the baby formula budget, but if you’re hankering one it won’t take too long to save up enough loose change. Just do your basic due-diligence to get one of the more reputable cheapies, since some makes are better-received than others. EDIT: this cover of "Personal Jesus" is still my absolute favorite diddley-bow track. It's amazing that this is just a one string, a board, and some scrap parts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0YWVm6OQEk
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Feb 28, 2014 03:17
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I'm getting together some Irish tunes on 1-row melodeon for my office's St Patrick's Day party. Just need to figure out which work buddy can play guitar and doesn't mind playing nothing but Em and Dmaj for a half-hour straight. Meanwhile, I'm setting up a missionary effort to educated GBS1.4 goons about bagpipes, so if anyone else is a piping enthusiast (for whichever nationality of pipes), your contributions are appreciated: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3613560 
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Mar 6, 2014 05:45
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slap me silly posted:Nice! Which tunes?? Probably just a few of the classics: Man of the House, Road to Lisdoonvarna, O'Keefe's Slide, etc. There are several cool tunes that I like playing on other instruments that I can't play on melodeon though, the tunes that have both an F and F# in the same D-based tune. So like Banish Misfortune, Rights of Man, etc. I'm not sure, but I'd be curious as to whether those tunes alternate between F/F# because in the past the tune had a "neutral third" that was somewhere between those two notes. If anyone wants to watch a clip of the music theory thereof, here you go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kY5wftQlz3g quote:Speaking of whistles. My wife's tin whistle sounds like poo poo. ... Any ideas what may be going wrong? Some permanent damage, maybe? It used to play well... Key question: what kind of whistle is it? What sort of head? It if has a plastic head (Generation-style), about all that can actually "break" is either the fipple cracks somewhere, or the blade is damaged somehow. If it's a conical (Clarke, Shaw) where the mouthpiece is formed by mushing the cone square, those are more at risk for misshaping the mouthpiece if you step on them or something. Alternately, those ones you can greatly improve if you know how to much around with carefully bending the metal just right to improve the mouthpiece. I don't know how, so I gave Jerry Freeman $20 to tweak my Eb Shaw, and it plays twice as good. That man is just amazing; his actual (presumably retired) profession is tweaking stock tin-whistles to make them play better; doesn't bother trying to build his own, just shapes existing ones. If you have Generation-style (metal tube, plastic head), and there's no head damage at all, try cleaning out the fipple in case it's like grit, dried spit, etc. Also if you google "tweak generaation whistle" or whatnot there are things to check for like loose plastic burrs, etc. This is way easier to check if you remove the head, which you should do anyway for tuning/cleaning purposes. On any of the cheap Gen-style whistles, you just want to heat up the metal while not heating the plastic, often by just holding the metal part (below the head!) under a very hot fauct, let the water heat the metal, that'll weaker the glue, and you can firmly twist the head to break the glue loose. Now the head can be removed for cleaning, can be slid up and down slightly to fine-tune, etc. quote:Also, what's the patch? Bought it out of the spare-parts bin at a milsurp shop if furthest Cannuckistan. About 15km from the easternmost extent of North America. Will get back to you on instructional materials shortly. Interesting experience today, and again testament to getting out there and meeting other musicians. I've been bad about that, aside from a few existing buddies, since I returned to being a working stiff. I was way more musical when I was unemployed. So weather was fine in DC, went to the park to play concertina. As usual, every few minutes someone swings by to say something nice, ask what the instrument is, etc. Then this dude drops by with a big circular case, asks if he can join in. I figure it must be a bodhran or something, but then he pulls out one of these.  Yep, a Hang drum. And not one of the several derivative makes, but an actual original Hang from Switzerland, and from before the owners abandoned concert-pitch tunings. Gotta be worth a few grand. So he played Hang, I played concertina, and we just did a bunch of small jams around the limited scale his Hang had. Neat instrument; sounds somewhat like tinpan drum, clearly, but also a rather harp-like tone; it went surprisingly well with concertina. We had a pretty good rotating audience of 5-10 people the rest of the time after that, who of course had a lot more questions about the Hang than my squeezebox, but I can't fault them. We exchanged contact info, so we'll see if we can make something interesting of this, since my other mini-projects on the side are all progressing awfully slowly. A few friends that I just play at parties with for chill-out music, and I'm finally learning just the absolute basics of multi-track recording/mixing on Garage Band so that I can make tracks of me playing different instruments/parts and singing. It's been a good music weekend.
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Mar 10, 2014 03:45
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No Gravitas posted:Mountain ocarinas can be had for much cheaper non-US if you go through Susato. The instrument costs 1$ more, but shipping seems much less. I haven't tried it yet, but probably will in the next few days. Good catch there; if any foreign buyers have success with this, post back here to confirm. By the way, when ordering ocarinas from Susato, spend the extra $5 for their book of one-octave tunes, to fit the ocarina range. Note also for $7 you can get one of Susato's mini plastic ocarinas, small enough to hang as a neck pendant; come to think of it I think I have one buried somewhere in my cabinet.  quote:Do you have that Johhny Connolly record? http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/johnnyconnolly I do indeed own An Mileoidean Scaoilte; it's one of my top favorite 1-row melodeon albums, up there with Tom Doherty's Dance Sean Nós. Doherty's album uses an E♭, so to play along I have to use a music editing tool to get it to play in D with the standard melodeon. Connolly's album has what's my favorite slow air, an instrumental version of the early 20th C. sean-nos song Amhrán Na Trá Báine (sometimes called "the drowning song"). Supposedly a woman in South Boston wrote in (in Gaelic) about her brothers who were drowned when a wave overcame their small boat by the town of Tra Baine in western Ireland. Full story here: http://www.joeheaney.org/default.asp?contentID=781 . Here's a vocal version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABCS5ldVqyw and here's a woman covering it on Anglo concertina: https://soundcloud.com/anabel-3/amhr-n-na-tr-b-ine-anglo In any case, it's my favorite track on the Connolly album; he plays it on a G melodeon (the lowest-pitched tuning normally found), so it's got this deep rumbly growl to it, and the plaintive bits played up high. 
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Mar 15, 2014 14:40
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Paladin posted:
Have you checked out the e-tenors from Soares'y Guitars of Portugal? They sell a lot of their gear direct on eBay, and looking at "Completed Auctions" some of their simpler models sell under $300. Just from casual glancing, they appear to have good reviews on Mandolin Cafe and Ukulele Underground, and they have a pretty good writeup on the steps they take to make their 4-string conversions, as well as 8-string conversions, in a variety of tunings. May be worth reading up on, and watching eBay for one of their less-expensive models to come in with low bids. EDIT: Remind me, are you looking at tenor guitar because of ukulele familiarity? It is a pretty/really easy way for uke players to cross over to steel string. EDIT2: Here's an ultra-cheap franken-tenor if you want to roll the dice a little on a cheapie: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Clone-Strat-Style-Electric-Tenor-Guitar-with-Gig-Bag-/251478301508?pt=Guitar&hash=item3a8d465b44 
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 04:17 on Mar 18, 2014 |
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Mar 18, 2014 04:13
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I LIKE COOKIE posted:Can someone post a link to a site selling a good/cheap tinwhistle? The only well reviewed one on Amazon is a Clarke conical style whistle. I'm willing to spend ~$15 Are you preferring to stick with Amazon? If so, their vendors have Walton (same company as Soodlum), Oak, Feadog, etc. Those are three go-to standards. IIRC, Oak and Feadog are you basic Generation-style brass whistle (or nickel-plated brass), just with a slightly different fipple design and arguably better QC. A lot (all?) of the Walton models are aluminum, so they're lighter weight than the brass, maybe not as rock-durable, but they're also inexpensive and play well. Most all those models even on Amazon you can find well under $15 shipped. Some sellers have Waltons for like $5+$4ship, at which point you might as well buy two at once. With Clarke, important to note that there are more modern Clarkes like the Meg/Sweetone which have a cast plastic fipple, so the mouthpiece behaves generally like a Generation-style whistle, just body is different. But the old-school Clarkes have a wooden block slanted into the cone itself, so those feel a bit differently. Also, whether it's a design issue or a QC thing, you're not going to get the best performance out of a Clarke (or the similar Shaw design) until you tweak it a little bit, and that takes a little skill. I had a Shaw that played okay, ran across Jerry Freeman (famous whistle fettler) at a festival, and for $20 he did bunch of microadjustments to the Shaw fipple with files and pliers, and it plays way, way better now. So my point is if you get a Clarke as a noob, get the plastic-cast mouthpiece vice old-school wood. Whatever you get, if you're going to play Irish music get one in Key of D, since the vast majority of instruction on tinwhistle is Irish stuff on a D. I wouldn't necessarily buy one of the "packs" where it comes with a book and CD, unless you really like having a physical book, because there's so many tutorials for tinwhistle free online.
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Mar 21, 2014 14:46
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Got a warm-fuzzy today as I divested myself of extra music gear. I've been selling or donating a number of instruments that I just don't play enough, so I can focus on the handful that I really want to get good at. And keeping a small bundle of cheap/durable things like tinwhistles and all that I don't feel bad about and they won't spoil if I keep them in a drawer for years. I've got almost all the surplus gear gone, but sometime last year on impulse I'd bought one of those pBone plastic alto trombones for $100 or so, only to later decide that I really don't need to get into a whole new family (brass) of instruments. For months I vaguely was intending to donate it to a school or church or something for them to give it to some poor young kid, but never got around to it. Eventually I just figured my neighborhood, being semi-scruffy, already has a bunch of poor young kids. Today when I was coming home, there were a few kids in their late teens busking with a trumpet, baritone, and a drummer playing plastic buckets. I dropped in back home, grabbed the pBone, and just gave it to them as a gift. They seems surprised and confused, but really appreciative, and by the time I got down the block and glanced over my shoulder the drummer already had it out and assembled and was playing it.  This way at least it's getting played, and hopefully the kids will get some pay-it-forward spirit out of just getting handed a trombone on the street corner. 
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 01:21 on Mar 24, 2014 |
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Mar 24, 2014 01:13
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quote:Well, a bit of craigslist luck and I found myself with a decent tenor banjo for 100 bucks. Now to learn ragtime! Outstanding! Once you get a few weeks on it, gonna drop back in here with some photos and update us on how your learning is going? If this goes well, will you be back looking for an electric tenor guitar later in the year? Pham Nuwen posted:By the way TTFA, this is a prod to link me some Spilåpipa music/learning resources if you know of any, I haven't had a lot of luck with google. Right, right. I'm intending to take a month of unpaid leave off work just to get my head straight, starting around mid-April or so, so ping me again in the latter half of the month when hopefully I'll be far more idle. After that sabbatical, it's quite possible I'm come back and give 2wks notice and leave to go work at startup run by a buddy back from my old days in the Marine Corps.
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Mar 29, 2014 18:24
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The Clarineo is a pretty interesting creation: The same company also makes keyed flutes (retail $170). The one with the curved mouthpiece is for small kids, so they can still reach everything (a similar bend is used to make huge bass flutes playable for adults):  The company that made the pBone plastic trombone (which apparently has been really well-received) are about to come out with a trumpet, though I did notice at least two other companies coming out with competing plastic trumpets. I haven't seen a mentioned price, but since a trumpet has moving parts it's got to be more than their $100 trombones. Here's the prototype pTrumpet:  I remember there was some unsuccessful attempt at a plastic saxophone a few years back, though I'm finding this "Vibrato Sax", which is however not an ultra-cheapie like the above, but more like $700: 
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Apr 7, 2014 03:48
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slap me silly posted:Finally got this! Great stuff. Some jigs played really slow for the fancydancers, which I never heard on records usually. Also great lift on the reels. Honestly kind of hard to believe it's all on the one row. The man is a wonder; the Rambling House article on melodeon says he took All-Ireland at some point (presumably for melodeon), though I'm not seeing him on the Wikipedia list, though it may not be fully current and/or synched-up. There are some good clips of players from the All-Ireland competition here: http://comhaltas.ie/music/tag/Melodeon . At some point in my life I'd like to attend the main event, or at least check out one of the regional competitions. I've debated entering one of the first-tier competitions just for the experience, since Duet-system concertina is by no means an Irish mainstay. That or try to work up some more traditionally-rigid skills on the 1-row. So far as cool plastic instruments, ran across a fascinating one online:  Carbon-fiber alpenhorn: http://swisscarbonalphorn.net Apparently someone took one up Everest to set the alpenhorn altitude record with 8850 meters. It weighs 3.4 pounds, and when disassembled is as little as 2ft long in its case. So yeah, for a massive instrument it becomes awfully handy. The downside is that the Swiss ain't cheap: CHF3700 (about $4k). In fairness, huge wooden alpenhorn are pretty expensive as well, and the carbon fiber ones are presumably way more durable and certainly more portable. There are some ways to build an apparently okayish beginner alpenhorn from PVC, or one guy online built one from papier mache. The clips of homemade alpenhorns I've seen aren't great, but honestly it's impossible to suss out whether they suck because the person who made them has no idea how to play one (or maybe doesn't play brass in general) vs. the actual instrument being bad. Given that I've seen clips of pro brass players sounding good playing a trumpet mouthpiece tucked into a roll of garden hose with a funnel at the end, I'm guessing more the former. Here's a somewhat involved construction tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_kpwIeagP8 - Das 5€ Dachlatten-Alphorn / The 5€ Roof Battens-Alphorn. It appears to take more effort than PVC, but sounds pretty good. - Here's one where despite the player the PVC horn may be decent: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRrL6ko8Uyo - And some serious trad playing:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0lqZZTU-3E - World record for massed alphorns (508 players): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynP5bsDOLlg 
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 05:03 on Apr 9, 2014 |
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Apr 9, 2014 04:49
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I passed the Clarineo info over to a guy in my band, and he may end up getting one now, so thanks for passing the word. I particularly like how the keywork on these is home-repairable, which has got to be awesome for parents of small children. As cool as the Clarineo is, the innovation is more in the modularity than the plastic itself, but I'm really curious to see how the pTrumpet comes out, and if it does as well as the pBone what their next instrument will be. My impression is that French horn has some weird complications to it, but maybe a pBaritone wouldn't be any harder than a pTrumpet? In other plastic fields, I spent a few days traveling around this last week, and carried a small all-plastic ukulele with me everywhere I went. Not an absolutely amazing player, but decent enough, so I always had something to do when waiting around, got into some fun conversations with people, and also I had no trouble hanging the uke off of a chair by its pegs, resting it on top my pint glass at a bar, letting my buddy's kid muck with it while we were having a beer, etc. A lot of musical instruments are relatively fragile, so it can be liberating to have an instrument that doesn't need a case because the case would be more easily damaged than the instrument. The brand I have is Outdoor Ukulele; their sopranos are a little clunky, but supposedly they made some major design improvements for their tenors that they just crowd-funded. I've got a pre-order, so should have a clear tenor soon:  As much as I love concertina, I'm annoyed that there aren't cheap plastic Duet concertinas I can carry around and bang up. The only real equivalents are the toy accordions (for one row players) which I do indeed occasionally carry around and bang up, though not as severely as the uke since a squeezebox has more moving parts. For Anglo concertina players Brunner/Stagi make an all-plastic (exterior) 20-button, though I'm sure some of the parts inside have wood and all that, so not totally weatherproof, but certainly more durable than wood. 
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Apr 17, 2014 18:15
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quote:This thread has been bubbling around in my brain for the last couple months and it finally prompted me to buy and begin learning the mandolin. Just ordered one. Thank you thread. Groovy, what make did you get, and what kind of music are you intending to play? While you're waiting for it to arrive, make sure to order the cheap little chord book referenced in Pham Nuwen's avatar. It's the best bang-for-buck available in mando instruction. Math Debater posted:I think Phil Shiva Jones is a fabulously fantastic guy and that video I linked totally makes me want to learn to play the didgeridoo! If I ever do try to learn to play the didgeridoo, I hope I don't give up on it right away like I did when I wanted to learn how to play the singing saw. Maybe the didgeridoo would be easier for me to play...   Huh, I did not know that's how things turned out for him. Glad to see he's still doing music, albeit different aesthetic. So far as learning to play one, a lot of instrument learning is a) committing to play even just a tiny bit as often as possible (5m a day is better than 1hr a week) and b) having a reason to be playing. Singing saw is fun, but if you're not already music-familiar and don't have a vision of what it is you want to do with saw, I could see it being hard to grasp. If you're learning saw because you really want to work it into your storytelling act, or because the band you're in wants you to switch it up with your guitar a little with some interesting novelty, that's probably easier to motivate on. With didg, as you probably know it's not really a "play this melody" instrument, so much as a drone that you can vary in character, so if you've watched videos and read up on the instrument, you should have a pretty good idea as to whether you'd have a role for that in your life. While you're deciding, you may also want to read up on "circular breathing" since that's a fundamental technique, and some of the exercises you can do even without an instrument. Years and years ago I heard something about how for, iirc woodwind players in India, the way they taught circular breathing is they'd give the kid a bowl of a water and a reed straw, have them blow bubbles into the water, and every time the bubbles stopped the instructor would smack the kid upside the head. But there are probably more chill ways to learn that. We have a little advice back earlier in the thread about buying didges, but overall there are just so many "how to choose a didgeridoo" articles online it's probably best to read just a few of those and congolmerate them into an opinion. From looking at a few myself, a few broad trends: - If you're short on cash, building a PVC didg is pretty workable, something most sites consider pretty decent. - If you're looking for a cheapie, look for a reputable cheapie from a serious didg seller as opposed to just whatever is on eBay. Like with Native American flutes and other such instruments, there are shops in India, Pakistan, Indonesia, etc churning out cheap copies in indifferently-sourced wood. For little more (or even the same price) if you poke around the focused didg sellers have decent cheapiers, in either natural woods or synthetics. - For your first one, get a "standard" size, not a tiny one or a massive one, since the medium sizes apparently are easiest to blow. - Me personally, I'd tend to at least start with a synthetic since that way you can take it everywhere without fretting it getting damaged, and that might make you more comfortable keeping it handy next to the couch, hauling it out to the park, etc. But if for whatever personal reasons you want natural materials, those aren't hard to find even in cheap.  I used to live in the High Desert, so I always found the idea of agave didges cool Not sure if your particular purposes (meditational?) have any spiritual requirements, but in the more abstract sense one thing that comes up in didge buying is the whole Aboriginal cooption thing and whatnot. So there's at least part of the community that's big on not buying "aboriginial artwork" not made by actual indigenous Australians. The US has the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1990_Indian_Arts_And_Crafts_Act]1990 Indian Arts and Crafts Act[/url] which makes it a crime to claim/imply an American Indian origin for an item not made by indigenous craftsmen; I'm not sure what Australia's protections are to ensure the genuine article. So there's some argument that if you want a traditional "eucalyptus hollowed out by termites, painted in Aboriginal patterns" you should buy from someone who carries just the genuine article, and otherwise just get an item (wood, bamboo, yucca/agave stalk) that's generically geometrically painted or unornamented and you can paint it yourself. Basically the usual "if you're going to tie in to traditional artwork, recognize ownership by the originating culture." As a sidenote to that, there are some good serious writeups on the "women can't play didgeridoo" taboo myth. Long/short, apparently the areas where didg is most traditional didn't have women playing it in ceremonies, but women played it recreationally and in informal settings. The areas of Australia biggest on the "women can't even touch a didg" are the Aboriginal groups in areas that didn't receive the instrument until the modern era, where they were soaking up as much Western perception, New Age marketing, etc as assimilating culture from Aboriginal groups of other regions. There seems to be an expansion in the last few years in "box" didges, which I've always thought were awesome. I see some divided opinion as to whether they're good for beginners or no, but if anyone has a need for a compact instrument and has a less-traditional focus, these are pretty awesome. Akin to bassoon, the instrument is "longer than it looks" since the bore winds back and forth through the instrument, so you can fit an five foot didg into a 9 inch box; I see them around for like $40-60.  EDIT: I also picked up another beater Italian-made 20-button Anglo concertina. It's a little wonky so though it plays and is in decent tune, probably should still go to someone who isn't shy about taking a look inside, making new leather hand-straps for it, basic unskilled but handy stuff. I'm going to put it up for $39 in SA-Mart later. EDIT2: quote:The clarineo price has just fallen by another 2.50$. It was 74$ just a day ago. Now at 66.31$, shipped in the USA. Two weeks later, it's back up to $77 shipped, so it looks like the fall wasn't non-stop. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 18:11 on Apr 21, 2014 |
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Apr 21, 2014 18:06
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quote:Try the local library? Look for fakebooks, maybe? Note also that aside from just .jpg/.png/.pdf of sheet music online, a lot of older/public-domain stuff is available in "abc" notation. There are a number of free "translator" java apps and whatnot online that'll turn "abc" coding into standard sheet-music. quote:But yeah, getting a didgeridoo does seem appealing to me because I would like to see for myself if the experience of playing the didgeridoo is as mindblowingly consciousness-altering as Phil Shiva Jones seems to suggest that it is in that video.  No worries, glad you enjoy. If you want a basic plastic colorful dig, there are many makers indeed that are quite inexpensive, though I'd still suggest buying from a didg-specific dealer so you get good customer support, and some level of quality-control. I'd also suggest you consider ornamenting the instrument yourself as your beliefs/tastes indicate, whether by painting it or just putting stickers/etc on it. You really can't go too wrong trying this; synthetic didges are inexpensive and at worst probably not hard to sell to whatever local hippie kid if it doesn't work out for you. Plus just the experience of learning to circular breather, work with drone, etc can't help but be a constructive experience. Not to distract you from your didg course, but if you end up liking droning but find you miss having melody options (either as supplement or alternative), take a squint at the drone-flutes roughly based on Native American flutes (which themselves were influenced by European instruments, not purely indigenous): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqxQ0XqZxG4 Big Beef City posted:I went with this guy, a hard case, some flat picks (e: a tuner) and a strap for about a $240 total investment. Good deal, a basic mando is nice and inexpensive, compact, and as you note quite versatile. From the pic of your model, it appears it has adjustable bridge height. Don't fret it immediately, but if you start getting past the utter basics, you may want to read up online as to making basic adjustments to bridge/action height for smoother playing, since your bridge has those little metal thumbscrews that adjust height. Or if you have a friend who's serious into guitar tech (not just a decent player, someone who does actual mechanical adjustments), have them google a bit on action measurements and take a look at it for best results. Here's a good MandolinCafe post about using coins as makeshift feeler gauges to check out action height: http://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/showthread.php?100752-set-up-without-feeler-guage-using-coins As you've noted from the thread, mandolin is one of the most versatile of the "weird" instruments, probably about as cross-culturally applicable as guitar, or even more so. Just about wherever you go in the world, there's at least some mandolin tradition, or similar instruments you can base your riffs on. Bluegrass is also a great mando genre to start on, since the instrument has a very established role in that genre, both as a rhythm instrument (playing the snare-like upbeat while the bass plays the downbeat) as well as fiddle-like melody breaks. I don't play mandolin much these days (used to play a ton), but I still think of it as a great instrument with a very wide applicability.  - brief documentary on South Indian mando expert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJRNX4fM6jI - amateur North African octave mandolin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s--CHQnjQO8 - Argentine tango on mandolin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k48vJW27rrE - Led Zeppelin "Battle of Evermore", one of the most famous metal mandolin pieces: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUiy_6hI-xU - Swedish polska on mandolin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Gx5qXmN8tk - Vietnamese folk music on mandolin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e13JmQwQXrM - Delta blues from the famous Yank Rachell (towards the end of his life): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfYMsRzVFXQ (he's pretty old and stiff by 1993, but you get the rough idea, his old recordings are impressive) TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 05:53 on Apr 22, 2014 |
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Apr 22, 2014 05:49
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barren_sky posted:TapTheForwardAssist, thanks for directing me to this thread from my 'sore thumbs' thread. The idea of picking up a concertina has got me excited. I love those old celtic sea shanties and it would be really cool to play with that sound. If I understand the differences correctly, the anglo concertina is the type i'd need for this sound, correct? I see one for sale in my local classifieds. How does this look to you guys for that price? No worries, glad it's of interest to you. Anglo is the traditional type for sea shanties, but English and even Duet styles work for that too. The latter two aren't quite as "bouncy" in rhythm unless you add it in intentionally. The "bounce" in Anglo playing comes from the fact that, exactly like harmonica, the note changes whether you're pushing (breathing out) or pulling (breathing in). Whereas English or Duet the note is the same on the push or pull, so you can play it fluidly or deliberately change directions for effect. Big picture, any of these would work for you. If you want something really straightforward and harmonica-like, where the keys are limited but it's very easy to naturally harmonize, Anglo is good for that. If you want something that's a bit more melodically agile (kind of like a fiddle) with some options for simple harmony, that's English. Duet is kind of in-between, able to do complex melody/harmony but neither quite as fast as Anglo or English. For your stiff thumbs' sake, Anglo just uses the right thumb to "flick" the air button occasionally English doesn't "use" the thumbs for buttons but does strap to the thumbs to stabilize itself, with the pinkies resting on a shelf (no idea if this would be good or bad for your purposes, take a look at a pic: link). I note also that while not a stock item, some folks rig/improvise "wrist straps" to their English to further spread-load any pressure, which would be even easier on your thumbs (photo). Anglo: playing some basic Irish and English trad tunes. Note how his right thumb occasionally hits the air button when he needs to get more space for a long push or pull coming up: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHg6la96sNs. And here's an amateur singing a sea shanty with Anglo, note again the many small back-forth direction changes to change notes (and this guy is playing a modern cheapie): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5tjRshOZdo English: a few Irish hornpipes, note how compared to Anglo he only changes directions when he runs out of space, but he can still add rhythm by just varying hand pressure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p90KS-rK8eQ An Irish lament sung with English concertina: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpCrFbf_ZDY. Oddly enough there are limited shanty concertina clips on YouTube, but historically Anglo was big, but in the 20th C. English concertina got big for singing old sea songs, so again, 6/half-dozen.  I'll only partially agree with sss, in that the cheaper Anglos make decent starters/beaters, particularly if you're not doing something crazy fast like Irish dance music. And in the $300used/$400new range the "Concertina Connection" brand of offshore concertinas are clunky but sound and used by a large number of beginners and recommended by the Concertina Forum. Upgrading to a nicer 30-button Anglo concertina can be a little pricey, but if you find a 20-buttons sufficient there are really nice vintage 20b for as low as $500 or so for a refurbished Victorian-era instrument, some really nice ones. Similar for some of the smaller English and Duet concertinas, you can get good refurbished vintage ones in the $600 range or so. The vintage market has huge demand for 30b Anglos for the Irish scene, but good deals otherwise, and great "they don't make them like the used to" quality. If you're strongly interested in concertina and not too short on cash, you might find buying a less-expensive vintage one from refurbisher Greg Jowaisas to be a good way to start strong, particularly as you can easily make your money back re-selling most reconditioned vintage concertinas if you move on later. For the Stagi you link, it's not a terrible price but not an amazing one either, but being able to try it in person locally is a big advantage. I'd suggest reading up a little on what to check for in a used concertina, and giving it a look, and also seeing if it's comfortable for your hands, and if flicking the air button isn't bad on your thumb. But it's not such an amazing deal that you have to leap on this if you are more curious about English. If it has no leaks, and sounds all in tune, $100 is a solid deal. While a very, very rough approximation, TradLessons makes smartphone/tablet concertina apps for 99¢ if you want to just get a quick feel for how Anglo vs. English operate: http://www.tradlessons.com/apps.html  slap me silly, if you have any clapped-out concertina you've run into the ground, I recently gave a Cnet guy a junked Stagi (he paid for the shipping) and he rebuilt it to give away to a beginner. So if yours won't go and you're willing to give it up, I know a guy or two who can clean it up to give some new kid a start on an instrument. Did you wear out the joints on the keys (easy fix), or wear out the bellows, have some reeds get clogged? TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 03:20 on May 1, 2014 |
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May 1, 2014 02:59
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barren_sky posted:Such tremendous help! Thank you guys so much! I can't afford to sink too much money into what may be a passing fancy, but i'm at least going to get my hands on some different devices and see how it feels. If It ignites a passion, i'll buy something nice then! I'll update here once I've tested the waters a bit. No worries. Tell you what, if you're okay with very basic low-skill mucking around (gluing cardboard, bending springs, nudging pieces of felt for a better seal) I might have a good deal for you on a 20-button Anglo, even counting shipping to Cannuckistan. PM me if you want to hear about it before I post it on SA Mart. Other folks: if anyone is into weird instruments and has the skills to design a banner ad, I could stand to have a new one to draw in yet more readers to be corrupted into playing weird music. quote:Finally, the sackpipa which intrigued me because it has an awesome sound and some pretty cool music for it. I looked up Seth Hamon based on the reference to him that TTFA had on page 2 of this thread, and grabbed a set of his poly pipes. Outstanding, I think you're the first reader to buy a Swedish bagpipe and report back. Hamons sets are great and sturdy little things. Did you also buy his synthetic sackpipa reeds? While not necessary, they can be very convenient. I need to get back into playing sackpipa, been distracted by concertina for a while. And you're right, sackpipa has a much less rigid sense of right/wrong in playing, largely because the instrument died out entirely in the 1930s before being revived in the 1980s, and zero recordings and only a brief writeup/pics of the last player exist, the rest is all just musty cardboard boxes of bagpipe bits in various Swedish museums. The Swedish historical society in the US is quite sure that several known sackpipa players (including women) emigrated to the US, so there's always the hope that someone digging in great-grandma's old junk box will find some sackpipa parts in Iowa or Minnesota and bring it to the attention of historians... 
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May 5, 2014 06:39
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quote:Could you give me some suggestions of a good synthetic didgeridoo shop to buy from online that will ship to the states? That one I don't have a lot of good gouge on; do we have any didj players in the thread this week? QuantumCrayons posted:...I'm currently torn between the Irish bouzouki (or a cittern, if I were to find one), a mandola or a 12-string guitar. Essentially, the mandolin has made me realise that double courses are what I need in my life. How easy is the bouzouki in terms of tension? I'm finding that due to the mandolin being so small, the strings don't ring for all that long compared to a guitar, so I'm trying to find the perfect combination of mandolin-style sound, but able to hold a note. Being in the UK isn't as disadvantageous for CBOMs (citterns, bozoukis, octave mandolins/mandolas) as it is for a lot of other instruments; there's a good selection at decent price and sizeable used market. Unless you're dead-set on having more than 4 courses, I'd stick with 4 since there are very few <£1000 options in 10-string citterns, but tons of affordable 8-strings. Mentioned earlier in the thread is Hora or Blue Moon, Romanian-made bouzoukis. I've generally heard these are okay for the dirt-cheap price of £100-150. Though if you get one, do the reading for how to tweak the action to make sure you QC your axe. The next step up are the semi-generic imports, Johnson/Ashbury, Trinity College, Goldtone. Some Korean-made, some Chinese, relatively similar design with differing levels of attention. Maybe £300-400 used on a good day if you check around, and I've seen some of the smaller non-famous makers pop up at decent used prices on eBay UK.  As a terminology aside: for Americans it's violin:viola::mandolin:mandola, so a CGDA instrument, but the Brits and some others use "mandola" also for the Low GDAE instrument. One potential in-between option, which I've seen some folks mention online: you might be able to get an OM/bouzouki and then get some lighter-gauge strings meant for a CGDA tenor banjo, and thus get a long-scale mandola. That'd be if you want an instrument not as deep as the OM, but want the string length to get good resonance. If you have decent-sized hands, I say go for one of the longer-necked options if resonance is a key concern. And even though you're used to mando/fiddle GDAE, don't be shy about trying out alternate tunings like GDAD and the like to get the proper droney sound. Does this at least give you something to start with?
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May 12, 2014 03:57
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QuantumCrayons posted:Definitely, thanks! I play guitar in both standard and DADGAD, so I'd be going for the GDAD bouzouki tuning. I'm happy enough for a deeper sound, so I'll look into the makes you suggested. Cheers! A couple more ideas come to mind: - eBay UK has an entire "bouzouki/mandola" section, probably worth perusing, or hitting the "Used" option on to see just those - Hobgoblin.co.uk carries a pretty good range, new and used. Note they call the Lo GDAE instrument "octave mandola"and the high CGDA instrument "tenor mandola". I really think the US terminology is easier. I'll correct myself slightly: not so much in the US, but in the UK a few of the generic brands do indeed make 10-string cittern instruments, so if you are set on having a fifth course there are Blue Moon (£199) and Ashbury (£499) options for those, though still not as developed a market as 8-strings. I'm amused too that Hobgoblin lists Portuguese guitars (the 10-string things with the twisty-pegs) under "Citterns".  EDIT: Posted another cheap 20-button Anglo concertina on SA Mart: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3634019 TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 21:49 on May 13, 2014 |
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May 13, 2014 17:01
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Ran across a band in my iTunes that QuantumCrayons might find interesting, since half the duet is bouzouki: Murphy Beds, saw them play a small house concert in DC. I like their overall selection of tunes and voices, though I find their particular noodly style to get repetitive after a while. But overall fun, and they have a scattering of good YouTube clips: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sc2Zyz-JNdQ
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May 24, 2014 07:10
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QuantumCrayons posted:Good call on this! Really like the "noodliness" of these two, if only because it gives me something to aim for in regards to my own playing ability. I've also considered the choices over the past three weeks of coursework and exams and I've decided that the bouzouki is for me. Now to head to Edinburgh and find one that suits me! Sounds awesome, are you headed to check out Scayles Music? Just glancing around Google, that's the one that jumps out at me for Edinburgh shops that have a good selection of 'zouks. Like, surprisingly good. They have a decent span of affordable imports, but also carry the better-quality Fylde, so you'd be able to compare the budget models to a higher end one to get a feel.  With the budget models, I'd definitely suggest that you do some basic action work to improve the one you get. MandolinCafe has folks that can surely give good advice on that, or your local guitar shop can probably do it some good for £50. A cheapie with good action is leagues better than a cheapie with poor action.
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May 24, 2014 17:47
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Butch Cassidy posted:Concertina: The squeezebox needs regular fiddling to keep minimally functional and I would need a better one to take it seriously. It will happen in the next few years. Very grateful that TTFA sold it to me and let me realize how satisfying it is to play. Huh, what specifically is going wonky on your Stagi? Is it the reeds/valves, the buttons, general airtightness, which? We should be able to diagnose this and get it smoother. So far as 20-button Anglo, the good news is Gary Coover put out a new book, Civil War Concertina, which is all based around the 20-button, since such limited 'boxes were the common variant of the time. Gary includes some sample tunes in this thread: http://www.concertina.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=16582 and will also be posting demos of many of the tunes on YouTube as a learning aid. In the meantime here's Jeff Warner doing a Civil War song backed up by (albeit English) concertina: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDud8Q377zE&t=1s I really do love concertina backing up voice; yet again a reminder that I need to bring my singing up to par so I can sing along with my squeezebox for shows. Here's Jeff Warner and his vintage English; btw Butch, is your long-term intent to pick up a sturdier Anglo, or to try out an English or Duet? 
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May 27, 2014 05:42
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Butch Cassidy posted:Some sleeve and button arm issues plus "I'm learning as I go servicing this thing." Which is fine to toss in a bag on a river walk, but I will want a sturdier Anglo in a while. Hmmm, are the sleeves dried out and cracking? That's one of the most common problems with Stagis and similar makes, and one of the easiest things to fix. This article is a bit dated, but gives a rough idea on how to fix it, with maybe $3 of materials off eBay: http://www.concertina.net/gs_stagirepair.html The article hasn't been updated in forever, but there are a bunch of threads on Concertina.net/forums with better pictures and more info.  When you eventually upgrade to a nicer Anglo, note that the 20b models are way cheaper than the 30s, so if you find the number of buttons you have now sufficient, and just want better quality, refurb vintage 20s are great. I was surprised that you didn't pipe up a few months back when alpenhorns came up again; you're among the goons I could imagine scavenging a bunch of PVC and building a 15ft long horn. EDIT: Huh, a skiier playing his crutch as a small alphorn. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62fAm1QvEIk 
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May 27, 2014 23:14
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Chin Strap posted:And why do they have to be so expensive This is a pretty tricky question, so I'd hope that users like WAFFLEHOUND might have some good insight. Long story short, as I understand around 2001 some Swiss dudes invented the [it's totally not a drum] Hang instrument, a basic pod with toned percussive points. That crept up in popularity, and other folks developed pretty near-equivalents of surfaces with dimpled and pitched points, and other folks found a cheaper/easier way to do it by cutting out "tongues" of material into a metal surface rather than the more laborious process of dimpling. None of these is completely novel, as dimpling metal sheets for pitch was well-developed in the Caribbean in the 1930s or so and undoubtedly known in East Asia far earlier. The specific "Hang" style gained popularity going into the mid-2000s, got YouTube and wider interweb fame, and folks started working up copies/takeoffs. Eventually the Swiss Hang folks totally severed from that scene and started making instruments that deliberately didn't fit into standard musical scales, focusing on "tonal sculpture" or whatever term they're using. In any case, you end up with "hand pans" being metal surface with dimpled tone points, and a "steel tongue drums" where more cheaply/expediently instead of dimpling a metal surface the makers instead cut out "tongues" of metal which vibrate at given pitches. For what it's worth, as an outsider I consider these pretty related. Both involved a metal body that you smack your hand into to make a specific note. The dimpled tongue drums produce a note with clearer harmonics that fade more rapidly, cut tongues produce a note with richer tones that last longer, but the former is harder to achieve and thus rarer/pricier. It's pretty similar on some level to concertina, where "true concertina" reeds have fewer overtones and behave slightly differently, but for half the price you have concertinas using accordion reeds which have a richer but less sharp tone that responds slightly differently. In "hand-pan" circles there's some debate as to whether a device with cut steel tongues is a decent "substitute" or simply isn't comparable to a true dimpled handpan. At risk of being a dick, I'll note that the tone is somewhat different, but the general "smack hand here, get note" concept is pretty similar. While dimpled and cut-tongue pans certainly sound somewhat different, me personally I don't think it a terrible compromise to try a cheaper cut-tongue pan if you want to try out the idea, and in the end you may like it more than a dimpled perhaps (same as "accordion" vs. "true" concertinas).  Tongue-style  Dimple-style My vague impression is that the HAPI line ($200 for their cheapest models) is amongst the cheaper and more popular tongue-type steel drums. A lot of these instruments are made for playing in just one scale, so bear in mind these aren't so much piano-like versatile instruments so much as somemthing (like the Native American flute) that you can freely wander around on and make patterns without worrying about key or clashing notes. I do genuinely think it's a great area to expand music for a broader audience but still responsive to experts, so look forward to both dimple-type and tongue-type steel pans expanding in the market. In the shorter and smaller/cheaper term, pentatonic kalimbas and synthetic Native American flutes are capable of similar levels of expression-with-simplicity.
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Jun 27, 2014 06:51
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That probably won't stop me though.
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quote:So... ummm.... Thanks! Infected for life; someone get some cork grease and trace "WELCOME TO THE MUSICIAN CLUB" on his bathroom mirror. RebBrownies posted:I'm looking to learn a stringed instrument, and after reading some info on the lute and cittern in this thread I'm a bit confused as to which instrument to get into. Really interesting question, did some pondering on this one last night. A few questions that would clarify: - Overall what kind of music do you want to play, and for what purpose? Do you mention "medieval" in the sense that you want to play some historically-based repertoire, or just like the overall sound of historically-influenced modern neo-folk/metal etc bands? Or is it more that you've listened to some recordings of Ren music and thought "that sounds good, I'd like to be able to do that"? - Are you looking for a committed hobby step, like buying a decently nice instrument and taking lessons, or are you looking for something more inexpensive and casual that you can pick up, putter around with while learning technique from YouTube videos? Fretted, non-bowed string instruments aren't unduly hard to learn (as a huge generalization), and most of them aren't any harder than guitar, just there are fewer teachers and learning materials out there. The modern cittern is inspired by the medieval/Ren one but kind of a new creature, but if you like the sound and aren't dead-set on historical accuracy, a cittern/bouzouki/octave-mandolin is a fun instrument. Almost all the learning materials for them are Celtic-based, but if that doesn't bother you that's a good way to get at least a base feeling, and then expand repertoire from there. If you want something that's less formal to play, and something more intuitive (albeit limited) both Anglo-Saxon lyre and kantele are pretty inexpensive, and the kind of instruments you can just tune up and then wander freely around in puzzling out chords and tunes by ear. Lute is one of those instruments you have to kinda seriously step in to, since a decent lute is at least a grand, and the lute scene is pretty formally set so an instructor would be advisable. If you're in love with lute music, by all means, it'd just take a bit more focus to break into, but not necessarily crazy hard.  If budget/space is a concern, historical accuracy not a huge deal, and you want something you can approach casually, in all seriousness people are doing some great lute-inspired stuff on ukulele these days, even including serious classical musicians. The ukulele is a reasonably close relative of the Baroque guitar, so works well for that repertoire too. If that sounds appealing to you, spend some time on YouTube searching "renaissance ukulele" or "lute ukulele" and see if that sound appeals to you. While a novice can't quite jump right into that style of playing, uke is pretty easy to get down the basics of string playing, learn some fun four-chord songs so you can play/sing R&B covers at parties, etc. And once you have the basics of strumming, you learn the basics of fingerpicking, and from that point on there are a number of good books of written tablature (that is, sheet music that says where to put your fingers instead of being abstract notes) translating old lute and Baroque guitar pieces to ukulele. Here are a few examples: - Rob Mackillop is probably the musician most famous for Baroque uke, done various albums and books: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQzirvk2kOM - Medley of Renaissance dances on uke: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-SS-YoNbbc - Some British lute music on 8-string uke: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTcANXGe3eA For contrast: - Renaissance lute music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_K5zRA2APo - Baroque guitar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-0ycGy8lpc If the uke option jumps out at you, hope over to the ukulele thread in A/T (might be a few pages in) to get the most current word on where to shop, what websites to learn from. Ukuleles are very affordable these days, there are tolerably decent ones for around $100, and the thread can direct you to which sellers do proper quality-control (vice just take them out of a crate from China and mail them out).
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Jul 2, 2014 23:10
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lilljonas posted:A shamizen or a biwa is probably way too expensive for this though, as it would be more of a side hobby as I can barely come far enough with my guitar to be able to play some simple chords. Which region of Japan will you be in? That might make some slight difference (if Hokkaido, get a tonkori!). While the classical shamisen can be kinda pricey, the more folksy variants like the Okinawan sanshin, the cigar-box like gottan, or the tin-can kankara. For a casual player one of those would be much of a muchness at a much lower price. Sanshin and kankara are reasonably easy to order online in the US, but gottan is a bit rarer, so being able to shop around for one in person might have a more pronounced advantage there.  Another unusual Japanese instrument is the taishogoto which we discuss earlier in the thread. They are apparently quite easy to find in Japan, and tons of them floating around the used market for like $100 or less there, so you could shop around to find a used of reputable make in good shape. They're a bit odd and jangly to the American ear, but are certainly quirky and bring in an unusual sound.   - Here's some fancy playing with looping: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnXtrcYjock - Taishogoto and guitar duo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqQoU2rA-e8 - Here's an electric one sounding cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=paJnABh4bq0 Aside from the above, your best bet would be one of the flutes. Shakuhachi is popular enough in the US that you can find plenty of options back here, but for the less-common forms of bamboo flutes it might be helpful to shop around in person. If the prices are low enough, you could probably do one string instrument and one flute. Plus any of the above string instruments would look awesome hanging on the wall when not in use.
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Jul 9, 2014 02:50
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Noeland posted:
IIRC, the smaller and fine ones with the really wide loop are called "Austrian" and the larger ones of heavier bar what have a more circular loop are "Ozark". European tradition has mostly metal jawharps, but eastern Asia in particular has a lot of wooden/bamboo ones. I used to play jawharp a lot, but due to some mouth damage in the miltiary I have this real paranoia about my fangs, so my intent has been to focus on mouthbow, which accomplishes a very similar thing but doesn't involve having anything near the teeth. Weird long-shot, but for kicks I bid very low on a taishogoto on eBay, and got it for around $18 shipped. I can't guarantee condition, but taishogoto are pretty durable, and it still even has the box which makes me think it probably wasn't played much (not that many Americans would log tons of hours onone). <s>If anyone (US only) here wants it for $18 shipped, shoot me a PM or email me at my username at yahoo, and I can have it shipped to your house rather than mine.</s> UPDATE, WENT TO ANOTHER GOON It looks kind of like this one except no painting or fake gold: 
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 04:04 on Jul 11, 2014 |
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Jul 10, 2014 17:13
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quote:I ordered from http://www.laughingcrow.com/ for my PVC NAF, and decided to purchase it over the other $25 Sounds We Make flute, simply because I was able to hear this flute being played and liked its sound a lot, while I wasn't sure about the other flute's sound other than a single 240p video. Once I receive it and screw around with it for a week or two, I'll try to give a review on its quality for any future NAF players.  Definitely do, NAF is one of the chillest instruments to mess with. And though less traditional, I'm fond of the plastic ones because they're easy to just chuck in a backpack, or carry around with you during the day to play when you have a spare moment. Just take a glance at the most basic fingering charts (you don't need the fancy cross-fingered notes at first, just the simple notes), and then just mess around by ear. Out of curiosity, have any NAF goons here actually learned any traditional songs on it? I mess around playing some familiar Anglo melodies just as an exercise, or I'll wander around riffing, but I've never really tried to figure out what the "classic" tunes of the genre are. Although presumably any standardized repertoire would be a pretty modern innovation given how disparate the American Indian cultures that played these. quote:Lilljonas, if you are going to Hokkaido try looking for a Tonkori (five string lyre sort of thing played by the Ainu). Apparently folk revivalists are trying to bring them back. I don't know if it's the kind of thing you can just go and buy easily, though, or the kind of thing where everything is either cheap-touristy or heirloom-expensive. Tonkori would be pretty awesome; it's a very limited instrument in the sense that Anglo-Saxon lyre or traditional small kantele are, but for making personal chill-out music that's no problem. The only place I personally know of selling them is the Ainu Museum in Sapporo, but it may be that some local makers turn them out. But not sure what places other than the museum would have them as an off-the-shelf item. We have a goon here who was building an Ainu-Siberian hybrid lyre, not sure where that project is at the moment. Khioniia posted:
 It is indeed a really reasonable starter instrument. The tone on my Elise is actually pretty good, reed response decent. What got me to upgrade was mainly the fewer buttons (doesn't apply in the Anglo case), the stiffness of the bellows, and slow return of the buttons. But even having a nicer Morse duet now, I still keep my Elise as a decent backup. Good pace on shipping; Wim got mine out to Afghanistan in about that much time too. What kind of music are you looking to play, and how did you come to choose Anglo from amongst the three types? FAKEEDIT: I usually pick up beater 20b Anglos in the $50 range if I see them (used 20b are way cheaper than 30 since Irish players want 30), but I don't as often see cheaper English concertinas, but I just picked a 30b Scarlatti English up for $150. I'll check it out when I get it, and if it's decent of fixable I'll post it in SA Mart (and link here) in case we have any goons who've wanted a cheap English. The Concertina Connection instruments are better and more reliable, but those are usually at least $275 used, so this Scarlatti could be a serviceable cheap-cheapie.
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Jul 14, 2014 16:08
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I just went and updated the OP list of goons who've taken up instruments, caught up to January of this year. As y'all can imagine, the top three categories are Tinwhistle, Accordion/Concertina, Dulcimer, and Ocarina. Wow, lots of goons taking up instruments here. It is always cool to have goons check in when they're taking up something new, but if any of y'all following took up an instrument in the last few years and ended up sticking with it, that's cool to hear about as well, so don't be shy.
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Jul 16, 2014 06:41
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Got a few posts to catch up on:quote:Aaaand I just bought another Night-by-noble ocarina for my father in law. I'd never really heard of that brand until you brought it up, but I'm seeing a lot of good things, and they have some really interesting models. You really have gravitated into the whole winds thing, glad to see it's caught a hold of you! lilljonas posted:Trip report: after scouring Sapporo and the closest area, there's pretty much nothing more exotic than Fender guitars available in the shops. However, I could pick up something from Amazon.co.jp before leaving, and I think a flute would be the easiest since they don't take much space or weight in the luggage. I found that there are plenty of cheap shakuhachi and shinobue available, while the only ryuuteki I find is more in the "not quite buying for a lark" territory. I haven't bought a flute in 20 years, so I have really no idea what to watch out for. Is there anything special to be on the lookout for? You didn't see any taishogotos at shops? Not that such is necessarily what you'd want, I just would've thought those would be common. Some other goon who I believe was also in Sapporo said she saw a bunch of taishogoto dirt cheap in pawnshops. The Ainu tonkori, I think is still so obscure and near-death that I can't imagine it can be bought off-the-shelf anywhere other than at the Ainu museum. I'm sure all the rest are made-to-order by likely a very small number of luthiers who probably normally build guitars but will build an occasional tonkori as a one-off, probably not a profitable segue but culturally significant. We have a goon making a tonkori, and I will be very excited to see it when he posts pics down the road, in the fullness of time, etc. Hmmm, bamboo flutes aren't my strong suit, but my biggest advice would be to be very conservative on quality/maker. Avoid any "looks like a good deal" unless you have very clear reason to believe it's a reputable brand. Shinobue is something that would have less of a following in the US, so a bit more novel to bring back, whereas with shakuhachi there's a more established online community of English-speaking players, tutorials, etc. So you really can't go wrong either way. And if you're more interested in being experimental than trying to be traditional, I'd honestly just go with whatever look/sound/feel jumps out at you.
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Jul 31, 2014 18:39
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lilljonas posted:That said, I haven't really had the opportunity to check pawn shops. I'm actually starting to think that I should just save up some more money for when I plan to be in Nagoya in five months, as that's a much more "traditional" area and might have actual shops where I could see the stuff in person before buying anything. If nothing else it seems that my sister-in-law's mother-in-law is a koto player there, so she might have some good recommendations. This sounds a much better idea, and the SIL's MIL may be a good resource for where to shop, though koto itself it quite large and involved. For casual and reasonably-affordable stuff that's trad Japanese, I'd tend to either the vertical or horizontal flutes, or for stings a shamisen variant, or if you're willing to stomach the initial annoyance of a bowed instrument, the kokyū knee-fiddle. Taishogoto is always a novel option, and good used ones should be easy to find. For something shamisen like but a little easier to maintain, a bit mellower, and a bit more novel, the all-wood gottan is pretty cool, and generally quite cheaper.  By the way, here's a great thread of a guy who participated in the "build a cool instrument for $100 or less" at Musical Instrument Makers' Forum; built a gottan for like $20 in scrap wood and small parts: http://www.mimf.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=702  quote:I did this. Anybody else got one? Let's trade war stories. As for me, I am in love but my wrist hurts. That's me, except I played 1-row D casually for Irish just around the house, have in the past owned a few 2-stop and 4-stop. Then I got a Hohner Erica C#/D thinking it'd be cool to have the chromatics and more chords, but I just didn't warm to it and sold it quickly. Still have a little Hohner 2-stop in D, but really need to challenge myself to tighten up my repertoire and take it to a slow-session. As mentioned earlier in the thread, the albums by Johnny Connolly and John Doherty (the one who recorded Dance Sean Nos) are outstanding 1-row fodder. A little harder to find, had to order from France, is a tribute album to John Kimmel, a 1910s-1920s German American player of Irish music in Brooklyn. You can listen to his old scratchy 78s for free online, but somehow he has this cult following in Quebec so there's a double-CD tribute album called John J. Kimmel, un héritage fabuleux that's good listening of a somewhat archaic style of playing, but really well-executed. quote:I'm also getting a set of Scottish smallpipes made, but I won't get those until March or so, Ooh, whose waitlist are you on? Have you yet chosen your configuration, and types of wood and mounts? I have but have still not go around to using a low-pitch sackpipa chanter that's just gorgeous figured birdseye maple with black bison horn mounts. Here's an example of mesquite with moose antler by Banton: 
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Aug 4, 2014 00:22
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Yoshi Jjang posted:Can someone give me some tips on what to look for when buying a set of Indian tablas? I'm no percussionist, but I am familiar with music, having played piano since elementary school. Ahhhhh, stop, hammertime. tl;dr: It's worth paying the extra to buy from a reputable dealer vice eBay; a novice won't know a good drum from lovely and you'll end up blaming yourself for the instrument's faults if you get a lemon. Tabla is pretty complex and worth reading up on, not simply "a drum", it's not impossible but it's harder than just learning basic hand drums. Let us know if you're more dead-set on playing solid traditional Indian classical, or if you just find tabla cool sounding and would be open to easier ways to get similar sounds for your jams. Longer answer follows photo  Re eBay tablas The huge portion of people selling Indian instruments online are just a ton of schmoes doing drop shipping and the like from just a handful of major factories/importers. That's largely why their pictures and often layouts are pretty identical. While it's not impossible that some of their stuff is decent, and the initial craftsmen may be okay at his job, the factory largely doesn't care about the final product so long as the sellers can keep moving them, and the sellers don't care unless the product is so egregiously lovely that eBay buyers scream at them and give them bad feedback. Much like in the ukulele thread, where we tell goons to absolutely look for the keyword "settup", you want to be confident that somebody who actually cares about tablas and their business's reputation amongst musicians has actually picked up your individual item, looked it over, played it a bit, made needed tweaks, etc. On eBay and the like, "professional" means jack poo poo. Most likely "I'll sell just about the same thing in hopes that some people will pay $20 because I call it Pro, and the people that pay $20 less will feel wise and thrifty". To one degree, buying used tabla wouldn't necessarily be bad (I think), but absolutely only if you're buying it from an actual musician, not from someone who bought it at an estate sale, or bought an eBay cheapie and is unloading it at half-price. Fundamentally, it'll be penny-wise and pound-foolish if you save a hundo or two on a set of tablas, and they end up gathering dust because they just aren't responding right to your playing. Like buying a cheap guitar with an action so high it throws off your pitch and hurts your fingers, or a beat-up oboe with leaky joints and bent keywork. I'm absolutely not at all saying don't buy inexpensive/used instruments, I'm saying that as a novice be sure whatever you buy, you're getting it from someone who knows about and cares about that instrument. Other dealers Are you in the US or elsewhere? If the US, the Ali Akbar College of Music in Berkeley is a respected outfit and runs their own store. They have brand-new solid quality Bombay-style tablas starting at $325, and occasionally have blemished but workable sets as low as $250. And they'll actually include all the proper accessories (which some drop-shippers may not know or care about, leaving it to you to figure it out). To generally read past threads to get a feel for where happy folks are buying from, I'd check http://forums.chandrakantha.com/viewforum.php?f=3 (I've gotten great advice in their harmonium subforum), or pull up past threads on tabla from Drummerworld.com where you might get a more US/Euro view on the issue. Not advising you to go spending $800 for your first set, but if you managed to save up $175 for an eBay set, it's likely a very smart idea to save your pennies just a little longer for $250-300 to buy from a reputable dealer. Choosing tabla If you've read up a lot on tabla and you're sure that's what you want, by all means rock on. But if you're just generally aware of tablas from glancing around, it's important to realize that it's a bit misleading to think of tabla as "a drum" or "percussion". A tabla is a pitched percussion instrument, something you don't see as much in Western music except for the orchestral timpani. While you aren't exactly playing a melody on it, you aren't simply knocking out a rhythm like it was a snare drum either. So it's a bit of an involved instrument, and AFAIU far more than most drums you'd want to take at least some formal lessons on it. Are you wanting to take up tabla to get serious into playing Hindustani music with others? I'll defer to the actual players of Indian music, but if you find tabla a bit complex for a start and want to focus on rhythm, there are a number of Indian drums which are either unpitched or less-pitched and thus more forgiving to a beginner, like the dhol (double-head drum) and its many relatives. One option that I personally own and have messed with just a little, and is nicely affordable/durable/available and pretty cool is the kanjira. I believe I have a megapost on kanjira from around Dec'12-Jan'13. I haven't gotten back into it serious, but find it really fun to mess with. It's a Southern/Carnatic instrument, so if you're set on Hindustani/Northern it wouldn't be your thing, but if your current stance is just "I like what I hear of Indian music I run across casually, and want to play some kind of drum", trying Carnatic might not be a bad way to go. If your interest in tabla is more simply "tabla sounds cool" and you're fixing to play it in Western music for effect, a world percussion flavor, I would strongly suggest you shop around on some other instruments that might tickle your fancy. I play the udu some for bar gigs (Nigerian water pot), and a number of folks online compare it to tabla for the types of sounds/techniques that work on it, and it can also get a sound very similar to that deep "gloop-bloop" that makes tabla so distinctive. You can get good starter ceramic ones for under $100 from mainstream online music stores, though myself I have a fibreglass Meinl (paid around $125) since it's much lighter and I can toss it around at pub gigs without worrying about it. Udu would, no exaggeration, be my strongest recommendation for someone who "kinda wants to learn that tabla thing that sounds cool". That aside, there are a ton of drum options out there. If you post back giving a bit more detail about what your priorities are, I (and maybe Yiggy if he drops in) can give much more concrete advice. Just where you fall on the spectrum between "I really want to learn tabla since I idolise the work of Anindo Chatterjee and want to play in a Hindustani trio like he does and I want to start lessons in a month or so" or all the way to "I saw a tabla in a movie and it sounded awesome so I want something that sounds like that so I can jam out." This is a less-common modern double-udu drum, but even the traditional single-body udus can get tabla sound, I just picked this model since it also visually resembles tabla so I thought it cute. Here's a guy playing this model: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FeC1SITxA8. Check out the tabla-esque sounds he does. 
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 00:57 on Aug 7, 2014 |
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Aug 6, 2014 16:17
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Hedningen posted:So talharpa update - I'm still waiting for the thing, and I have gotten no responses from the maker. So yeah, never buy from ArCane Lutherie. That must be really frustrating; have you tried multiple options to contact him (his personal email, his Facebook page, etc?). While even decent artists can be dirtbags sometimes, Nathan Sweet seems to have a pretty good online rep over the last few years. Not to excuse such delay, but it's possible he's had some health crisis or similar that's interrupted work. So I definitely would suggest a gradual good-faith effort to get a hold of him to ensure he's not just blowing you off. Pham Nuwen posted:I'm still waiting for my jouhikko You ordered from Nogy, right? While the delay is annoying he's a pretty trusty guy, serious enthusiast in the lyre community and pleasant person. I think he's just one of those cases of a "gentleman luthier" who has a day job and just chips away at luthiery work as a hobby, so the pace on such guys is generally slow. But really looking forward to seeing your result.  quote:(kantele kit) Update: we've glued everything together and are now sanding. Holy crap, be prepared for a lot of sanding. We don't have an electric sander, so we're doing it the old fashioned way with 60-grit glued to a block. For future projects, have you considered getting a small finger/thumb plane? That can be a much more efficient way to remove big overhangs on joints and all, "shaving" the excess wood off rather than abrading it off. Plus for joining pieces, a big advantage of a little finger plane is that you can get nice sharp angles with it, whereas sandpaper rounds out edges like melting soap (good in some cases, not in others).  quote:Wow that's a gorgeous looking set! I'm going to be getting a set from EJ Jones with the 4 drones and hopefully both A and D chanters if I can spare the coin. I haven't settled on a wood/mounts just yet. My initial leaning would be mopane with either blackwood or a black horn type of mount, but I think next email I get I'm going to ask him if he has any really cool/unique ideas for pipes that he's been wanting to make. I want something unique more than a specific look but I definitely want wood that is light enough to see the grain. I'm just so tired of seeing blackwood pipes with bland mounts. I really like mesquite; I think Dow was the first American to publicize it for smallpipes, and somewhere on the internet there's an old glowing paper he wrote on that wood. EJ Jones has done mesquite in the past, and Nate Banton got into it a few years back for smallpipes. It's very dimensionally stable so bores stay symmetrical over the years, and it's very lightweight which is good for the passel of stocks laying across your arm. I'd at least discuss the idea with Jones. Would look good with either very light or very dark mounts. I'd suggest talking to Jones a little about alternate tunings and the like, as he's above-average into those. Personally, though I'm a lovely smallpipes so play sackpipa instead, having the additional back-thumbhole to play in Am was amazing. And you can always temporarily plug that hole if you want to have just the standard holes, so it's really no additional hassle. Jones might also have some tricky little mods to drones allowing you to set them to unconventional combinations. Do you have a really clear reason for wanting a D chanter? Recall that the Amyx standard chanter does Dmaj just fine. A D chanter you'd mostly want for playing in Gmaj in whatever tradition. If you want a second chanter just for general shiggles, the C is an oft-overlooked option; fingers in Cmyx so can pull off Fmaj and the like. But you can always just get your set first and order others later. Did you intend to play SSP before, or did you get into them because of this thread? quote:I've been pondering about getting the tabla for years now. This isn't some sort of on a whim thing. I've been aware that it's a tonal instrument, and that's what draws me to it. But to be honest, I don't know much about Hindustani music, though, and I don't think I'll go far enough to actually take lessons, let alone pay for them. Okay, so you're aware of the tricky bits of tabla, but you aren't dead set on being a serious Hindustani guy. Especially if you're new to percussion (especially pitched percussion), I would really advise you get something simpler for your first go-round. Tabla is one of those instruments where they strongly, strongly advise actual formal training even at the beginning. Otherwise you'll end up just banging on out-of-tune heads until you get bored, and they'll gather dust. If you want to at least try tabla a little and see if it grabs you more than you expected, since you're right by the Akbar School, check in and see if they have any "Intro to Tabla" workshop for total noobs where they set out some basic drums and walk you through utter basics. Failing that, maybe you can take just a lesson or two (or share in a small group lesson with other noobs) with Akbar's pandit for tabla. That way you'd at least give a little shot at formal tabla to see if it grips you. If all that sounds too involved and pricey, and playing Hindustani isn't in your cards, then definitely picking a different cool drum would suit. I do genuinely think udu (also called "ibo") is the most tabla-like option. It is not at all a "tabla substitue", but it's an instrument that speaks to some of the same tonal varieties, though I do think it could convincingly sound "Indian" to an audience not used to Hindustani music. I think a lot of the similarity is the way it replicates both the high "tek" of the small drum, and that heel-strike "whoom" on the low drum. Do note, while there are a few modern-designed double udus, a single-body udu can sound just as tabla-like. It's not the doubling that gives the tabla effect, it's that big hole on the side and the hole in the neck, which allow you to tonally shape and change your pitch, and whomping the side hole just right with the palm gets that deep tabla "bloop". It's not so much that the technique is similar, since tabla is dealing with flexible heads and udu with a rigid body, so I'm not saying you could seamlessly move from one to the other, but there is a YouTube trend of people showing how to apply tabla techniques to other types of drums, and the skills from udu would translate better to other non-pitch world percussion than the more specific tabla skills would. Here's a neat clip of multi-udu playing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJ44TcvX5Q4 EDIT: here's the best example I can find of really tabla-esque udu playing. Watch for example around 0:21 when he gets those great "bloops" by hitting the hole with his palm. Again, I emphasize you don't have to buy a double to get these tabla sounds, so buy a double if you like but be aware a single can produce basically the same sounds too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FeC1SITxA8 EDIT2: lovely recording quality, but some good tonal work on the "utar", a flat-lying smushed udu that LP designed. I'm not totally clear what the advantages are of this layout, but they seem to sell just fine for the last decade or so. If I had to guess, it's because players of other drum types didn't like having to change to embracing a round pot, so wanted something that laid nice and flat so they were using a hand motion they're more accustomed to.  If you want the cheapest decent option, get the Meinl ceramic one that's like $70. If you want a double-udu, all the affordable ones I know are by LP (Latin Percussion) and ceramic. If you want an udu that you can toss in grocery sack and run around with all day, and not freak if it gets knocked off a table or falls of your bicycle, get a Meinl fiberglass one. They're like $130-150 on a good day; I would stay away from the one with the rawhide head just because it adds fragility, but what I do own and enjoy is the "Trio" model which is a standard udu but also adds a little flattened drumming surface on the side to allow additional sounds. Nice thing about udus is that they don't go out of tune or age poorly, so if you just play yours occasionally and toss it in and out of the closet, or leave it in the corner for decoration, it's no big deal. Also, there is an Indian relative called the ghatam, a clay pot used in Carnatic music and also in the Punjab. So your udu skills could still cross back to Indian down the road (cool ghatam clip), though ghatam lacks udu's awesome side-hole and is more a straight drum. If you watch some udu clips and just don't get into it, but still want to figure out a drum, poke your head back in and let us know what features you do/don't want in a drum, and we can talk djembe, ashiko, bongos, frame drums, kanjira, zarb, etc. EDIT: Udu still my top tabla-sub, but for drums in general, I really just haven't sold many goons on frame-drums in this thread. I think hand-played frame drums are really underrated in the Anglosphere. Aside from just sounding cool and a bit different from other hand drums, they come in several neat varieties (with snares, rattles, jangles, etc). Also logistically convenient in that even nice big ones are pretty affordable, and yet easy to carry and store since they're so slim. Anyone looking for hand drums and maybe right now torn between djembe vs dumbek or what have you, go peruse some frame drums on YouTube for a bit and see if any speak to you.  I would own a moderately-big basic Remo or Meinl frame drum (maybe with a snare or jangles on back), but instead I bought a Carnatic kanjira because it's really small but can put out great bass. Seriously, if you watch kanjira on YouTube on your laptop, it's kinda meh, but if you listen to it through a decent sound system it's night and day and sounds amazing. EDIT: Just switched on my bluetooth amp from my laptop, and the clip goes from "wait, why did I buy a kanjira again?" to "drat kanjira is awesome". You really need bass in your speakers to hear it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ukn0UWHc6Kg TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 16:14 on Aug 7, 2014 |
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Aug 7, 2014 15:45
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quote:The kantele is now sanded to our satisfaction, so we started the finish last night. I applied two coats of boiled linseed oil, then a very light coat of polyurethane before going to bed. This one is for your wife? 10-string? Should be awesome. Does she play music already? Are you getting any 10-string book for her to learn some basics, or just going with intuitive playing? My understanding is there aren't a ton of 10-string books (or many kantele books in general), but in Finnish there's Kymmenkielisen Kanteleen Opas (and apparently with the diagrams and music language skills not really an issue), and Lani Thompson has several books for 5/10 string kantele: http://www.kantelemusic.com/product.html Yoshi Jjang posted:Yeah, I've been really digging those udu clips, and I think you've convinced me on getting an udu instead of tablas solely based on how I'm probably going to mistreat them in the future if I'm not classically trained. (I still really, really want tablas, though) Ah, so it's really the tonal/pitched aspect that draws you. That clarifies a lot. So far as tabla, I still opine it wouldn't be a wise starter for your situation, but Summer TYOOL 2014 is not like your final chance to ever learn tabla. Get another easier/cheaper drum to start on, and if you learn some good basic pitched percussion skills, and tabla still draws you, maybe down the road you'll have a clearer desire to take some formal instruction with a decent student set. And/or maybe you'll get really good on udu/bodhran/whatever and be at a point where you'd feel confident just messing around with tabla and watching YouTube and getting, if not true Hindustani schools, some cool sounds out of it that make the most of the instrument. I'm not at all against forging a "Western school" of tabla-play, just noting that a novice just isn't going to end up waltzing into tabla on his own and feeling fulfilled. Bodhran is an interesting point: I'd vaguely heard it compared to tabla before, but googling around it's not an uncommon comparison. Clearly tons of differences, but some key similarities in that both involve selectively striking and use of hand-bending to vary tone. Interestingly, the German bodhran maker Metloef takes a cue from tabla and applies a thin patch of extra goatskin to the center of the head to add weight, much like tabla players add syahi, that paste of rice/glue/iron-powder which forms the black dot on the drumhead which helps it produce varied pitches. If you were to take up bodhran, it has its challenges, but compared to tabla is way easier for a home-learner to figure out using some DVDs, YouTube, etc. Plus in the Bay Area there must be hundreds of casual players you could hang out with, pub sessions you could drop into to watch players, etc. There is some in-joke about bodhran having a bad rep, due to the cliche of some novice thinking "it's a drum, how hard can it be? I'll buy one and go to the session next week" and then just making a mess of it. But if you get a decent one (not spending big bucks, but just not buying eBay junk) and maybe a DVD or two, you could probably be playing casually with friends in a month or two. As I've noted earlier in the thread, it's really remarkable how the preferred construction of bodhran has changed so markedly even in my lifetime, from everyone buying pretty shallow rims with a big crossbar on the back, but now everyone buying really deep rims with no crossbar at all. BTW, here's a fun clip of a bodhran player with two nyckelharpa (key-fiddle) players, doing some Scandi and Irish tunes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR349svGkao  While we're talking tonal, though I still think udu is your bestest bet, I want to mention another pitched drum. Partially because I haven't done a megapost in so long: Talking drum  The talking drum is a relatively distinct design, found almost entirely in Western Africa, with a few blips of similar styles in other parts of Africa, and in bits of South Asia. Talking drums generally are long narrow goblet-drums with a double-head, and the feature that makes them unique is a narrow waist with extensive tuning ropes deliberately designed to be squeezed by the player's arm, dramatically shifting the pitch as the head is tightened and loosened.  Generally played with a single hooked mallet in the free hand, and the holding arm hand can be used to mute/push the skin for further tone control. These have some small following with serious cosmopolitan/world music percussionists, but are still extremely niche compared to more popular (non-pitched) drums like West African djembe, Arabic dumbek, Latin conga, etc. If you were to buy one of these, note they come in a pretty wide variety of sizes, and are relatively small compared to non-pitched drums like djembe. Like the largest sizes are only a couple feet long, and the small barely a foot tall. The commercial ones I see, broadly speaking have a body length around double the head diameter. If any goon thinks to buy one, again don't buy the cheapest, and for a novice avoid any trad/"tribal" ones of primitive quality until you know how to choose wisely; stick to standardized commercial products from Remo, Meinl, LP, Toca, etc. Not Mid-East Mfg or similar sweatshop types of indifferent QC. The cheapest ones are the Meinl line, with their smallest just $50. Most of these are natural materials, though if you need absolute durability and all-weather stability, Meinl for like $180 has a small all-synth, and I believe LP's discontinued line had a synth model with nylon tuning straps. Whatever you buy, check to see if the mallet comes with or is sold separately; if you see them cheap (like $5 Meinl TD mallets) you may want a spare or two.  - Not best vid quality, but a master Nigerian player: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4oQJZ2TEVI - White guy unconventially playing TD with the fingers of two hands, and using his knees to change pitch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AgJBcWqQkw - An even weirder innovation: B-Rad makes TDs that are attached to a foot-pedal which controls tension, leaving both hands/arms free to beat rhythm: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuTQYpFIEys EDIT: If anyone does need a talking drum that's fully-synthetic for throwaround use, there's a Meinl fiberglass one (the synth is only offered in the smallest 7" head size afaik) for $100 shipped, so about half the new price. If one of y'all doesn't buy it, I probably will, so somebody buy it: http://www.ebay.com/itm/like/350976333936?lpid=82 TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 18:32 on Aug 8, 2014 |
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Aug 8, 2014 17:31
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