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TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Base Emitter posted:

A long time ago I was doing some DIY music instrument projects, then got sidetracked by a bunch of non-fun bullshit. I'm trying to get into it again.

So this is my (casual) reproduction of the Jorvik Viking panpipes, from specifications on this page: http://panflutejedi.com/viking-pan-flute-tutorial.html Basically its a small instrument that was found in an archeological dig in York from the 9th century when it was invaded.



That's pretty severely awesome. Did you tune yours to the standard first five notes of a major scale? Were it me, I would definitely adjust the tuning slightly and go pentatonic. But the thread is already pretty familiar with my views on pentatonic instruments.

By "shrill", is yours higher pitched than the one in the Corwen video? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LqBJudLYFsY

Is this a one-time project, or could you see yourself making more and messing around with tunings, pitches, etc?

Always so cool to see goons building interesting things.

EDIT: is the e-gurdy still on the backburner, or did that just not pan out?

A German dude on the concertina forum just worked up a functional prototype of a MIDI concertina, so looks like folks make strides in the quest: http://www.concertina.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=17509

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nugTz-mpDJI

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TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

virtual256 posted:

Popping my head back into this thread after a bit of a hiatus. I've dropped the hammer and acquired a mandolin! Fun to play, great tone and easy to pull out, noodle a bit, and put away.

Now I just need to learn some basic music theory - chord progressions, basic scales, reading music, etc. Got any recommendations?


How much music theory (if any) do you know now?

What style of music do you want to play?

And overall, congrats! Mandolin is a great instrument, works for a huge variety of music. It's kinda halfway between guitar and fiddle, and also makes a great rhythm instrument.

If you're not already, I'd highly suggest signing up for the forum Mandolin Cafe, great resource.

Also, strongly advise spending the $4 to get this book, and keep it handy in your mandolin case: Niles Hokkanen' Pocket Guide to Mandolin Chords http://www.elderly.com/books/items/46-8.htm

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

virtual256 posted:

I've poked at that one already, decent primer.


I know basics on how major scales are built, how minor scales differ from major ones, bare bones on how to read music (slowly), I know that chord progression is a thing but not what any progressions are or how to translate a chord into something I can play. Beyond that, I don't really know what I don't know.

At the moment, most of the music that is at my fingertips and begging to come out is from the Old Time/Contra dance tradition, with a few waltzes thrown in for good measure. The other set is figuring out how to accompany myself while singing, so folk songs.

Bluegrass, and a lot of Anglo folk music, is really formulaic, so if you just google up things like "bluegrass chord progression" you're likely to find some good ideas.

The 2-minute summary of what you need for bluegrass, aside from scales, is that the I-IV-V progression/assortment is incredibly common. That is, if your song is in D, your chords are most likely D (you "I"), G (IV) and A (V). If the song sounds major-y throughout, it might need only those basic chords to accompany. If it has passages where it turns darker, to a minor key, usual culprits at Em (ii) or Bm (vi).

I haven't gone to bluegrass jams in forever, but just when jamming with friends its common to say "this one's in G, it's a I-IV-I-V", and then everyone knows where we're at. Here's a brief layout of the idea: http://www.victoriabluegrass.ca/docs.htm


I would definitely watch some YouTube on mandolin chording technique though. Mando does a lot of rather muted chords, creating an effect similar to a snare drum to accompany the upright bass's serving as the kick drum. For that it's just a matter of timing strums so that you get a brief second of a clear chord, then relax your hand slightly so the notes stop ringing, creating a percussive effect.


This shareware book also looks interesting for melodic stuff: http://www.petimarpress.com/pdf%20files/Easy%20Music%20Theory%20for%20Fiddle%20and%20Mandolin.pdf


As an FYI for folks lurking the thread: bluegrass is a very modern genre, basically a post-WWII development, so don't confuse it with general Southern folk music or with Old Time music. Bluegrass is kind of conglomeration of the Anglo-Celtic Old Time music of the South, along with jazz and blues influences.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Hedningen posted:

What's the general thread agreement for acquiring a shamisen for a beginner? A friend of mine is quite interested in the instrument thanks to studying bunraku theatre, and I'd like to help her find a decent instrument from a reputable dealer that can ship to the states.

An actual serious starter instrument for studying Japanese music, or something to muck around with?

If the former, I'd go with these guys: http://bachido.com/store/beginner-shamisen

They're American shamisen enthusiasts and seem genuinely into promoting the instrument. One of them also did the laborious work of translating some famous Japanese instruction book into English. Their cheapest one is $300, and then another $100 or so for all the accessories and bits.

If she wants something cheaper and more basic, if you glance around the thread or around google you can find someone reasonably reputable who carries any of the following relatives:
- Okinawan sanshin (and these tend to come with synthetic heads by default, which is durable), I think in the past you could find those around $150. It's not really the same instrument, but it's close-ish. Maybe like the difference between a tenor banjo and a five-string, in terms of very similar body but different concepts of playing?
- Gottan, a wooden-bodied shamisen. Bachido has these as low as $125
- the "kankara" is an Okinawan sanshin made using a repurposed metal food tin. It's a legit instrument, in the same way a cigar-box guitar is. You can get an "assemble yourself" kankara kit for as low as $50 or so, but then another $30 for shipping.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Pham Nuwen posted:

My wife is Indian, which means of course there's a harmonium tucked in a corner of her parents' garage. At least, there was a few years ago. Next time we go over we're planning to grab it since no-one else is using it.

poo poo yeah, harmoniums! They're like half of an accordion!



Harmoniums are awesome, though I satisfied my desire for one by getting a concertina instead, which sort of meets the same need. If we can ask, what culture in India are your wife's parents from? Given they have a harmonium but don't play it, my gut guess would be Sikh.

Speaking of which, anyone who likes harmonium, go listen to some stuff by Brooklynite indie-blues singer Shilpa Ray: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQ3ZMka23-A



quote:

Edit: Also, my wife says she wants to try tabla... anyone here bought a set online? I'm wondering if I should go ebay or amazon.

Ho boy, we had a discussion about exactly this issue back on page 41: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3415486&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=41

Take a glance at that back-forth and let me know what you think. For the rest of y'all, the issues I raised with the other goon is that tabla is not really something you just pick up and muck around with. It's not really just a drum, it's pitched percussion, you can't just whack on it rhythmically and expect to sound remotely like a player. It's a drum you actually have to routinely tune, even adjusting it between sets. If you seriously want to do tabla, you probably need to go to a tabla teacher. Worth reading is Pete Lockett's e-book on learning tabla basics: http://www.petelockett.com/lessons/essential%20tabla%20guide/ESSENTIAL%20FREE%20GUIDE%20TO%20TABLA.pdf

I'd suggest to watching some YouTube videos about introductory tabla, to get an idea of the intricacies of it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1mfZyeP05A



If you're determined to get a set, I'd really stick to serious musical instrument dealers, since guys on Amazon or eBay likely know zero about drums and are just opening a huge shipping crate from a random factory in Pakistan and chucking it in a box for you. An actual musical store like the Ali Akbar College of Music shop in Berkely has stuff as low as $200 some, and that way you'd be much more confident in getting a working drum, properly QCed with all the proper gear. I'm all for finding bargains in music gear, but if you're brand new to an instrument and want to play more than make it a rebuild project, especially when the price isn't that high, choose a trustworthy dealer: http://www.musiciansmallusa.com/tabla-sets/


But like I mention in my reply to the earlier goon, there are a lot of other percussion instruments that can scratch the general tabla itch but are less complex to play and less finnicky to maintain. You can buy a solid synthetic-head Remo kanjira for $80 (I have one, it's cool), udu drums can do a great job imitating tabla-type sounds, and if she likes udu but wants something more explicitly India, the ghatam is a similar clay-pot drum but from India:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVwufFba1l8

And if she just wants an Indian drum of the sort that anyone who has basic rhythm can just whack on and make some rhythmic sounds and enjoy, there are a goodly scattering of options for those in the folk branches of the tradition. Indian classical drums are just pretty intricate stuff.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

No Gravitas posted:

Anyone in Vancouver in a guzheng mood?

....
I'm looking at getting mine from China via a taobao agent. 100$ for one. 150$ shipping. Sigh...

If you want to avoid China shipping, and aren't too picky about having exactly the Chinese style, the Vietnamese "dan tranh" pops up a lot on US eBay, including used ones. I'm not clear on the exact differences (if any), but another option to consider.

This one would look like a really good deal, but it's from a seller with zero feedback, which is too much risk for me: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Dan-Tranh-C...=item27fbd08b84

But if you wanted you could get a hold of the seller, see if he'll show you it on Skype or anything similarly verifying. Or just wait for the next good deal on a used Vietnamese one.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

I was gonna say "wow, your wife is pretty tolerant of you filling the house with a huge instrument" but then I remembered that I made my friend in Austin drive to Houston for me, pick up a clavichord, and store it her bed in a house she's renting from me.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Pham Nuwen posted:

Sindhi, actually. The harmonium is home now and I spent some time playing with it Saturday and Sunday. Seems to be in pretty good shape and plays fine. Three octave range, two drones, three stops, and tremolo. I mostly bashed out poo poo like A Whiter Shade of Pale and Greensleeves because I had the sheet music handy.

I've been saying forever that I need to learn more Indian harmonium licks on concertina, and then I don't get around to it. And at the moment I can't because I'm vagabonding about the South and don't want to carry a $4k concertina with me. But if my money/common-sense ratio increases, I have a vague vision of someday going with my concertina to a real harmonium instructor and telling him "teach me to do on my thing what you do on your thing".

Do you perform much, or mostly play at home for fun? Harmonium is unusual enough that I can see it adding some zazz on stage.

quote:

I looked at the back and forth... I'm going to try and convince her to go try an introductory class at the local Gurdwara or something, just to get some time at the drums, then if she likes it we'll try to buy a pair from Ali Akbar College. It sounds like she wants tabla specifically, so I'm going to focus on that for now.

If she's aware of how tabla works and the role it plays, and still wants in, by all means give it a shot. But I would definitely start out with some formal instruction first. Probably want to find a teacher prior to buying the set, that way you can get some shopping advice from the teacher, and have someone to help you inspect them as soon as they arrive in case there are any flaws.

Tabla is a really amazing instrument, it's just that whenever I hear anyone say "I want to play tabla" my reflex is to ensure that they aren't thinking of tabla as just something you can smack on rhythmically.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Pham Nuwen posted:

She's very aware of how tabla plays in Indian music, although she's never tried playing one. We'll see about finding her a teacher, although we're probably moving in the summer which means 1) the next few months will be busy, and 2) we probably won't be able to find a teacher in the new place. Like I said, I think the Gurdwara has free lessons, which could be a convenient way for her to get some basic instruction. Then we have until our move date to get up to AACM and check out tabla sets.

If you move somewhere sparse on Indians, don't give up on instruction entirely. Though I haven't tried it myself, some people have really gotten in to taking lessons on Skype, particularly for things that would be impossible to find locally, like if you're in Tokyo and need a bandoneon teacher, or in Austin and need a nyckelharpa teacher. That could be worth a shot, plus you might get some advantage on price there since India has a lot of a) tabla players b) English speakers c) internet connectivity, there have to be a good scattering of folks who combine those three factors and can teach.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Been meaning to for years, but now that I'm chilling in Savannah for a month I figured I might as well take voice lessons, so doing that twice a week now. Feeling a lot better about getting diaphragm breathing into play, and it's getting me a ton more sustain.

As another example of "finally", after probably decades of occasionally picking up a fife, trying to blow it, and not getting a proper tone, I pulled up an article on it: http://www.firstflutes.co.za/BlowFlute.html

With about 10 minutes of trying the things it suggested, I could actually get a decent flute sound. Good enough that it's something I can build on at least. I have the plastic "Professional" fife by Sweetheart; ran $120 and seems a really nice piece of gear.

So yeah, if you're trying a new kind of instrument and not having success, might want to read up a little. Don't be like me, who just assumed that pursing your lips like you're blowing a pop bottle works. Apparently instead the embouchure you need is more like what your lips do if you make a long "ffffffff" sound, lips wide and tight.



When shopping on fifes, bear in mind there's some major variance in the family, so make sure you get the kind that matches the music you play. The common cheapies are the ~$15 wooden fifes, replicas of Civil War era fife-and-drum pieces. While the uber-cheapies might not be worth messing with, there are a couple companies that make decent military fifes that are pretty cheap. http://www.beafifer.com/ has their Model F for $120 that some reenactors favor, and they have a $10 cheapie that supposedly a decent starter for the money.

Those "military fifes" are really different from what I'm messing with. The military ones are in keys that play well with brass instruments, like Bb, and most importantly are made with the intent that you play them in their shrill highest registers. The stuff I'm interested in is instrument pitched like tinwhistles, like D and so on, and are set up to play well in their lower registers, same as tinwhistles.. Sweetheart is known for making good ones at reasonable price, and Jem Hammond makes simple plastic ones that are just £19 and have a good rep on Chiff and Fipple.

Fifes/small flutes made to play well in tinwistle registers also get called "band flutes" and "piccolos". In terms of the last, different from modern piccolos in the same sense that the modern silver flute is different from the older wooden flute now associated with Irish music.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kk8-X6A81z8




In the weirdly circular world of folk music, some of the Irish flute players are buying older classical piccolos from before the instrument evolved into the modern piccolo, and playing Irish flute stuff on them, an octave above the big flute. You can find some pretty cool stuff if you Google up "Irish piccolo", and basically all the fingering from Irish flute or tinwhistle crosses over.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

thousandcranes posted:

What sort of temperament are harmoniums in? I'd love to play non-western free reed music on my concertina

The default is equal temperament, because it's an adoption from the West, and because off-the-shelf it has to be set up to play within any given key. That temperament (and in general its ability to adjust temperaments or bend pitches) is part of the reason the harmonium is derided by a lot of purists, and so the story goes it was banned from All India Radio (their NPR?) for decades.

However, I have heard that some musicians who include a harmonium in their crew (such as a singer who has a harmonium accompanist) will have their harmonium custom-tuned to be tempered around the scales that artist tends to use. That makes it pretty un-useful for playing outside those scales, but does allow the instrument to sound really good in a few select scales.


If you're looking to learn some harmonium riffs, I'd expect most demos/lessons online will be ET models. However, a lot of them are pitched somewhere slightly off of a=440. Not as terrible as Baroque A=415 or anything, but IIRC things like A=446 or A=432, so if your concertina is at concert pitch, it might sound a little warbly playing along (unless you get fancy and put the track though a DAW to tweak the frequency slightly). One of the better reasons I've heard for this lack of precision is basically "*shrug* you don't usually have more than one harmonium in a band, and everyone else is tuneable, so they just tune to whatever the harmonium is doing".





Can't recall if I mentioned in this thread before (it's 40+ pages anyway), but a few years back when I was in Afghanistan, I was walking through a small military FOB, and heard someone singing inside a tent. Poked by head in, and one of the translators was sitting there in his camo outfit, sitting cross-legged on his bunk with his laptop open to a scrolling display of sheet music, while he was playing harmonium and singing along. I really wish I'd gotten video of that, since it was such an interesting confluence of culture and technology.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

No Gravitas posted:

EDIT: All this only to have my order cancelled for size reasons. Oh, come on! I checked with them twice if they can handle a small guzheng. Ah, well. At least I get my money back.

You have really gotten adventurous with this AliBaba stuff and whatnot. Curious to see how it works out big-picture. I can't figure out if my eschewing them is a wise cost-benefit analysis or just pure nationalist bias. Are your native woodwind pieces from China working out well?

Been taking voice lessons while living in Savannah, and while it's helping with range and sustain (breathing exercises and all that), it's having a huge impact on confidence. I'm using some Tim Eriksen tracks as my training pieces, and while obviously I don't have his nuance or power, I've been really pleased to find that with a warmup I can hit ranges and sustain beyond what I thought, and pretty decently mirror his tracks on an amateur level. Also went to a Shape Note sing out in the islands off of Savannah. I can do a refresher Shape Note post later, but for anyone that likes vaguely medieval-y/primitive/organ-like acapella music, it's an amazing genre and relatively easy to find community groups singing in the US (and dashes of Europe).


Quick question for the group: I've got that $89 Puerto Rican cuatro, made in China, as my main string instrument for my 2-3 month sojourn in Savannah. Plays decently except one course has bad intonation, so I have needle files here and $5 set of feeler-gauges on the way so will lower the action to the right level, and then try to compensate the saddle to lengthen that off course slightly. Pretty basic hand-tool butchery, but I'm optimistic. Plus drill a hole for a strap button and put on a $5 Amazon rainbow-patterned strap. Thing is, I hope to be leaving here for Africa sometime in May, so plan to ditch this instrument here. As much as the crust punks flopped all over Savannah can be annoying/silly/smelly, I'm thinking that if I give it to a musician amongst them, that'd be one of the best ways to keep it out playing in public, since these folks are almost sure to busk with any instrument they own. Like it's not going to just sit in someone's closet because they have no closet. My only issue is that I want to keep it on the street performing, so I figure I should deface it so that no pawnshop will want want it, so that even if they trade/sell it it'd only be another crusty/hippie type who'd take it.

Any suggestions on cosmetically loving up a string instrument to reduce its marketability outside the crusty community? Maybe just take a knife to carve a bunch of notches in the thick parts of the headstock, and gently put a bunch of scratches in just the surface layer of the finish? Or see if I can wrangle a few seconds to dip a piece of newspaper into some wall paint while they're repairing the flop-house I'm living in, and flick paint flecks all over it? I figure the next owner can always paint/sticker over it with their own pattern, but I just want to get it to a funky-enough level that it will never re-enter the straight world.

Does sharpie stick to guitar finish well? Can I just hand a different crusty a tallboy and a sharpie and have them vandalize the surface for me, and then give it away?

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
If he's still up and doing business, I'd recommend trying to get a hold of him through the music community. Is he selling mainly dulcimers? If so, I'd post on everything dulcimer, some title that clearly lays out the problem "Anyone in touch with Smith? Not responding on paid for commission" or whatever. That way at least other folks in the community are made aware, which gives him incentive too if he actually is dodging you. And there's a decent chance that there's someone on the forum who's a colleague and can help give him a push. Occam's Razor, but if he's still around and making instruments, it's probably less that he's totally deliberately trying to rip you off, and more that he's caught up in things and not dealing with obligations because he's flustered. It's unprofessional and no excuse, but that's overall more likely than scheming to take small commissions and not deliver while still building.

Speaking of which, I'll ping the alboka maker again about our order. Like discussed in TFR threads, hobby "businesses" like instruments, guns, etc tend to attract people into the hobby and not great about business, or who are running a business that takes away from their real work, making them pretty lackadaisical, which can suck when you're trying to be a normal paying customer.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Meldonox posted:

I've been following this thread for years and I think this might be the right summer for me to learn a weird instrument. I have some history playing recorder as a kid and trombone as an older kid, but I was never terribly good at either. I own a guitar and banjo that I'd like to learn, but I figured before I start trying to vet instructors I'd check here to see if there's something that fits my situation well:

I have a commute; I know people deal with worse, but it sucks for me. I spend about an hour in the car every day commuting and I live less than ten miles from the office. Needless to say a fair portion of my day is spent listening to lovely music on the radio and waiting for cars to move so I can move forward a few inches more. What's something fun and cool I could practice in the car? Price isn't a huge concern for the right instrument, but it would need to be small enough to play in the car. I understand I could practice guitar or trombone behind the wheel, but I'm looking for something that wouldn't be unwieldy.

My gut reaction is that trying to play instruments while driving is a terrible idea. Granted, I've done it sometimes myself, but it probably wasn't smart. The dominant pre-internet world instruments catalog, Lark in the Morning, was owned by Mickie Zekley, who wrote about playing the tinwhistle while driving, manning the wheel with his elbows. Sometime in the mid-90s he got into a major car crash, so by the time I cut some deals with him at his Seattle shop he was getting around permanently on crutches. So, that kinda put a damper on that for me.

That said, if you pick an instrument that is hands-free and doesn't take your eyes away from the road, I figure it's not any worse than talking on a hands-free cell, probably less bad. The obvious choice would be singing: at one phase I used a commute to teach myself the basics of Tuvan throat singing, and at another point got an instructional tape from the library on blues yodeling (less success there). Cars are great for singing too since they have good sound insulation, so you don't feel as self-conscious.

The other option would be a harmonica with a neck-yoke. You can't play all styles hands free since you can't cup, but you can definitely work up some good music. Also a good harmonica and yoke are pretty affordable. Kinda gadgety, but Bob Dylan and a bunch of other serious musicians used them all the time to be able to play harmonica while playing guitar:




Here's a dude with a one-side neck holder playing harmonica along with the radio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9THe1t54tTg

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Verloc posted:

Weird instrument update: Now on month 6 of GHB instruction. Spent a month with my instructor dialing in my Naill DN0's and learning small bits about the dark arts of tuning GHB chanters/reeds. If you ever want to gather a crowd while practicing, strike in a set of GHB in a public park. I want to get better at this, but drat is it hard to practice when you draw onlookers every time you fire up the pipes. On the other hand, being applauded for playing a few measures of a basic pointed jig is loving amazing.

Exciting times! I sympathize with the attraction of bagpipes, because I've had people gather in front of me while I'm sitting on a park bench literally just *tuning* a Swedish bagpipe. People just find bagpipes interesting, so double-edged sword there. I guess all you can do is just appreciate their appreciation.


quote:

Aside from cigar box guitars and the various homemade PVC flutes I've already done, any good instruments that have that "junkyard" aesthetic for inspiration? We're both involved in a post-apocalyptic LARP (Terminal nerd velocity, but hey, these kinda games are a good excuse to wear weird costumes and bust out the more obscure instruments because enough mead/cheap beer makes people want to hear weird folk music), so the first couple days are gonna be devoted to building about a dozen CBGs to sell at the next event, but I'm looking to stretch out a little bit and see what else we can hack together. I might try and make a few PVC härjedalspipor and send 'em to any goons who wanna try their hand at at it.

Voting for making some crude lyres (plucked or bowed) out of 2x4s? Just take the overall board and cut out two big square holes for the body and for the open area, then lay a soundboard and back on the body part. Also, tonkoris are pretty uncommon and they're almost exactly the right size of 2x4s. So you could make a pretty large metre-long+ tonkori from one board without too much hassle.



I've been living in Berlin for 10 days now, and within my first week I went to a flea market and got a 3-row GCF diatonic accordion €40, got signed up for clavichord lessons, and sang in a local Shape Note sing. The only things I prioritized over music stuff was getting a bicycle (day 2) and getting a Euro SIM card for my smartphone (day 3).

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Casca posted:

Chalk up one more instrument buyer as a result of this thread. I bought a Clarke D tin whistle back in January. After doodling around with it for a couple months I decided to try a Native American flute in the key of A. That loosed the floodgates- now I and my husband are both playing NAF and own 5 flutes between us with no sign of stopping.

I've got a Northern Spirit plastic one as well, though I don't take it on the road with me still since NAFs are a bit on the large side. And by coincidence I also just bought a High Spirits Pocket Flute for my da as a Father's Day gift. Good taste.

Do you play any specific kind of music on the NAF, or do you more use it as a free-form improvisational instrument?



Hedningen, nice work on that cigar-box shamisen; that's basically the same thing as what a gottan is. If you're trying out lyres, do note that I'm not aware of anyone in the US who's built either an Ainu tonkori or a Siberian nares-yux yet, so those might be fun areas to groundbreak in if you have any big cheap chunk of wood. Along which lines as well No Gravitas, you might have an easier time reading up a little on Siberian instruments, since the main body of coverage on those is in Russian. The Siberians, as well as the Volga Finns, have a bunch of smaller wind and idiophone instruments, as well as a few interesting strings:





Been kinda busy bouncing around, and got way too much life stuff in limbo right now. On kinda short notice I decided to leave Berlin by this weekend, haven't even really decided where yet but will probably fall back on Portugal since I haven't been there, but I do speak the language (worked in Brazil), and I gotta go somewhere. Hopefully in the next month or two I'll finally get job stuff sorted out and be a little more stable.

To one degree, I've been telling myself that I need to just stick to my small traveling instruments for now rather than picking up stuff in new places and having to sell/gift it on when moving, but then I remembered that in Portugal you can find these really cheap ($200 or so on a good day), and I'm kinda resigned to the fact that I'll probably be lured into getting one:

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Whoah, I think we're really skipping past mandolin! Mandolin is nice and compact, easy on small hands, good basic ones are very inexpensive, and they are nearly ideal for bringing to a jam session. Everyone has a guitar, so a mando gives you a lot of versatility, whether backing up the guitarists with some rhythmic chops, or knocking out some solos. The only contraindication you've mentioned is not enjoying steel strings when you tried guitar in the past, and mando strings are slightly tough to get used to at the very beginning, but no real problem after that.

Mandolin is also a vital ingredient for a bunch of Greatful Dead songs; it's hard to envision Friend of the Devil or Ripple without mandolin. So mando gives you a chance to fill an important role that the guitars can't really replace.




Here's a good clip of a guy by himself singing Friend of the Devil while playing mandolin:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znmDtnTt3Ds

Here's a post from some years back about mando, but largely still applicable: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3415486&pagenumber=7#post393390811

Rogue, Rover, and Kentucky are some decent cheap import brands, as in like $100ish cheap. I would suggest paying a little more to get one from an online dealer who explicitly mentions that they do "set up" and quality control on the instruments, rather than just opening the crate from China and tossing it in a box. Usually for slightly more cost a dealer will do set up, adjusting string height and bridge position and all that. Alternately, get one from the cheapest seller, and take it to your local guitar shop to see if they can do a quick-easy settup on it for not too much.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

minidracula posted:

Fretted strings are still not really my forte (never learned guitar; I have a p-bass I noodle around on some, but I'm not practicing as much I should be), but the mando is nice and portable, fun, and seems easy to get into. Thanks Tap The Forward Assist! I'm bummed that I'm not in D.C. any more, and that I missed out on your mando sale a couple years ago, but this thread finally had its intended effect on me.

I'm down in Liberia now, so even DC goons are missing me, but I've run across multiple goons in town who've gotten the music bug from these threads, so that's always cool.

I've had a number of things to say about weird music stuff in Berlin, Portugal, and now Liberia, but I've been pretty caught up with other stuff in life so haven't been as focused on the thread. One odd experience from the other day though: I was walking downtown in Monrovia and saw this scruffy street musician dude, with henna-dyed hair, coming towards me with what looked to be an Ovation acoustic bass guitar, with the four huge tuners. He was kinda rhythmically strumming it without fretting it, and it was way higher pitched than a bass guitar, so my brief impression was that he'd restrung it with light gauge strings in an open tuning. I would've asked him more about it, or maybe even filmed it, but as I got close he reaches out and pokes me in the shoulder and says "ya got da Devil in ya". Echoed by a bystander agreeing "Devil in 'im". So I decided this was not the best context for a longer conversation, but I do have the goal of visiting a couple used guitar shops I've heard about, and also I've driven past a big workshop that makes a variety of drums, including talking drums, so I've got stuff to look into.



Separately, Jerry Freeman is a dude who "tweaks" Generation tinwhistles, modifying the head to make them play smoother. Apparently Generations were way better back before the 80s or so, when the old molds wore out and they made newer/inferior ones for the plastic heads. So Jerry gets in there with needle files and sandpaper and makes them play way, way better for $30 or so. He's got 10 days left on an Indie GoGo campaign to raise funds for him to digitally image his best whistle-heads, and then recreate them in some new kind of high-quality 3D printing so that he can mass-produce the kind of whistles that take an hour's work of handwork to get playing now. There's no donor bonuses since it'll be at least a year until he's in production, but if you're curious to see fancy science applied to make high-end whistles, you can chip him $5 or whatever to help out. I'm definitely up to buy one when they go into production:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-world-needs-an-affordable-great-penny-whistle#/story

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Brief Liberia update, we finally have wireless internet so I'll try to get more back into this thread.

I'm mainly playing my Parks PVC tinwhistle, and glad I didn't bring much nice stuff here since my leather boots, belts, and goddam silk necktie are all developing mold from the monsoon season's constant damp. I'm totally buying a plastic ukulele as soon as I get access to APO mail, probably an Outdoor Ukulele tenor. Also I bought a plastic-bodied Stagi concertina on eBay to muck with, but that'll also have to wait on mail. I think I may also spring for a PVC shakuhachi from one British dude on eBay, and might get a double-drone NAF from Northern Spirit, made of ABS plastic. This hitch is really making me value durable travel instruments.

Still no dice on finding music stores in this country, but I should be getting a motorbike soon so it'll be easier to explore. The drums I've seen for sale have all been tourist-quality junk, but the elementary school down the street from me lets this drumming club/band/whatever practice there in the evenings and weekends, so I really need to get bold and just wander in and start meeting people and find out from them where I can get a decent talking drum. Though I still might end up wanting to get a synthetic body/head talking drum from Meinl because, goddam the climate here is nasty on gear. Plus I'm living right by the ocean, so metal likes to corrode.

This tour is going to give me a good excuse to acquire more plastic instruments, might get a set of plastic rhythm bones, plastic ocarina, etc. Does anyone currently make a plastic baritone ukulele (not counting crazy-expensive carbon fiber ones) or is the OU tenor the largest option? I know plenty of companies are making inexpensive plastic soprano ukes now, so I might buy a small case of those for friends or to give away to a school or something.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

a7m2 posted:

Ah, right. I'm not very experienced with instruments, especially flutes and the like, so I'd like some material to work with. I might just get lessons, but finding a teacher in China who speaks English might be a challenge and it'll be a few years before my Chinese is up to snuff.


I wouldn't sweat the language issue, a lot of music stuff can be taught pretty well non-verbally. If you have a Chinese friend that can handle the internet hunting and emailing for you, you might want to just give a shot at trying a lesson even with a teacher that doesn't speak English (if the cost is low) and just see how much you can figure out. I took some lessons on duty in Tajikistan with only okay Persian skills and no musical vocal in Persian, and took a clavichord lesson when I was in Berlin this spring from a woman who spoke little English. Worth a shot in any case.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Good news, bad news.

The good is I was catching up on stuff that's been released in the past year and realized that the awesome-looking Linnstrument MIDI controller is out. It's all kinds of touch-sensitive, reads all sorts of different parameters and whatnot, and generally multi-dimensional keyboards excite me.

The bad news: it's $1500. :negative:

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Good news, I'm getting my life slightly back together and leaving West Africa soon, so I plan this week to repost the banner ad for this thread and lure in more prospective musicians. So watch for updates soon.

In the immediate moment to keep the thread from going dormant, if anyone knows any hardcore reenactment folks, on eBay for just $500 they have an early, early-style lute up right now. Don't know the maker or seller so do your own investigation, but this could be a really good deal for someone. I would be sorely tempted had I not already bought a lute this month and it's sitting in my house in Austin awaiting my return from Liberia.



http://www.ebay.com/itm/Medieval-Lute-by-Harold-Westover-1987-/182094394074?hash=item2a65abf2da:g:lSIAAOSwVghXEWSR

TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 11:23 on Apr 18, 2016

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Apple Creek are pretty hit-or-miss; I've played some ones that were decent (if unexciting) but I've heard of others having to do a lot of tweaking. I certainly wouldn't buy one new.

I just bought a couple dulcimers on eBay so that they'll be sitting at my house in Austin when I get back from Africa, figure I'll maybe teach some lessons or something when I get back, and I found several good deals under $100. I take it you're looking at the budget end of the spectrum? Mainly what I do is look for dulcimers that are either from recognized okay brands (scaling on price by rep), or made by individual makers that either are mentioned online as credible, or that visually appear to know what they're doing as best as can be told from a photo. The risk with individual makers (and really more the recent ones, internet-era) is you get some hacks who know how to build a table and figure that means they can be a luthier and sell clunky as hell and poorly set-up dulcimers at craft shows (I've bought one or two accidentally, but thankfully very cheap). And there are some kinda crappy dulcimers that are still worth buying at $50 or so, Hughes being the hands-down example, and quite common, and I can recognizes Hughes on-sight now. I'm actually slightly fond of the little clunkers, they're just not worth much.

Here's what looks good to me this week:

* Details about Hollis E. Long 1979 Dulcimer: 5 string (nice bonus), no 6.5 fret means it's limited to more traditional music (but you can have a fret added later if you're handy or want to put more money into it). I'd go as high as $100 total for it if I were you.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Hollis-E-Long-1979-Dulcimer-/282013304298?hash=item41a94d85ea:g:zToAAOSwJSJXGXKc



* Cheap older import one, just one day left to bid, probably nothing exciting but got a little retro-junk appeal, and bidding is way low; if you can get it for $50 total that'd be fine, but you'd grow out of it after serious playing, sell it to a friend and upgrade:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Appalachian...~0AAOSwJQdXCsN0


That's if your budget is <$100, if you can wiggle to $150 there are more things, but honestly I myself enjoy the funkiness of getting the cheapies, lot of interesting variety. Remind me again in a few days and I can do a new pull. This week is slightly light on cheapies, last week had probably four or five I'd have recommended (two of which I bought for myself), so easy to find something if you're not in huge hurry.

TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 15:47 on Apr 22, 2016

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Ooh, Clemmers are pretty cool, what are you looking for on yours? One of those 5-strings with the kind of curved bracket cutouts in the sides? Out of probably 75+ dulcimers I've owned, the Clemmer-kit I once had is still a mystery. I can't figure out if I loaned it to someone and forgot to get it back, sold it, gifted it, or still have it somewhere in a case. I guess it's not as bad as loosing track of a handgun amongst many, but it's still slightly vexing me.

For uilleann, have you read up on Seth Hamon's UPs since you like his sackpipa you have? I think Seth is also working to add Northumbrian smallpipes to his repertoire. David Daye is usually the go-to workable cheapie so far as I know, but Seth's polymer ones are pretty inexpensive, I just haven't read much on the reviews.

For shopping around, I take it you've checked the classifieds on the usual suspects, Dunsire Forum, Chiff&Fipple, TheSession.org, etc?

Are you looking to play mostly Irish trad (and eventually get full drones and regulators) or mostly interested in the chanter as a versatile instrument for a variety of musical styles?

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

AbrahamLincolnLog posted:

Giving a poke for this. I can't determine what's crap, other than the guy trying to sell an Applecreek for $125.

No worries, am at a backpacker hostel in Paris with a pint of beer, and just got word that the Port of Monrovia just released all my materials in West Africa, so I'm in a good mood and happy to help. Btw, at some point on this vacation I'll finally post a banner-ad again and get more victims up in here.


Dulcimer Factory is out of Texas and they're generally unexciting but decent (some models are kindy funky); I'd go $80 total on this: http://www.ebay.com/itm/DF4-4-STRIN...pUAAOSw2x1XJ8Cs

This one is kinda cool and weird in a primitive fashion, I could see $80 total again: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Three-Strin...UIAAOSwY3RXJleD

I'd go $100-120 on this one, but it'll probably go for more, so don't set your heart on it, but worth trying. Woodwork looks pretty good and nice tuners: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1983-Robert...hcAAOSw3mpXGXPv


As with absolutely any dulcimer you buy online, you'll want to buy new strings for it (about $5). Get strings intended for DAD tuning since it's more versatile, that is strings where it has two small, one medium, and one large, not three medium, though if you get a DAA set it's not necessarily bad or anything. Also assume that any dulcimer you get online can benefit from an action job, which you can do at home with just a $1-2 needle file and a few coins to measure with, I'll type up more on that later. Out of any 10 dulcimers I buy cheap on eBay, easily 5 can clearly benefit from a simple action job, and one or two are unplayable (or lovely playing) without it. It is absolutely not hard at all, probably easier than adjusting the brakes on a bicycle but with fewer tools so don't be intimidated in the slightest, I can walk any of y'all through it.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
It's not dirt-cheap, but Jerry Freeman makes a lovely A for $50 by taking a Generation Bb, tweaking the head and putting on a new body. Susato are nice and durable but personally I think they sound too "clean". Shaws sound more dirty but aren't tunable so you have to live with any quirk. You can also post a WTB on Chiff & Fipple and see what pops up. Fwiw I find Low A one of my favorite whistles, up there with my Freeman-tweaked Shaw Hi Eb.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
I loved my Meinl fiberglass udu drum, amazing variety of sounds, really simple and durable, ability to modify pitch by covering the side-hole, etc. But I sold it to a bandmate when I moved abroad since there was no point having it sit around idle. I'll probably replace it sometime, but in the short term since I'm moving back to Austin I want to get some sort of cool drum with tonal ability.

Talking drum seems a natural choice since I work in West Africa (though honestly have seen several kinds of drum but no TD in Liberia, despite the big arts NGO there being actually named "Talking Drum"). It's compact, unusual, and can bend the pitch. The way it works is you squeeze the body under one arm like a bagpipe, which pulls on the cords to tighten or loosen the skins. Usually you play it with a hooked beater in one hand, and sometimes the off-hand tapping on the head with the fingers, muting, etc.

I'd been dead-set on getting the full-synthetic Meinl Talking Drum since I like synthetic so I can knock it around in parks, and don't need to worry that it's rotting while I'm away overseas. But seems it's out of production and it's slightly pricey at $180 from what dealers still have them. I looked at the Toca Talking drum, synth shell with goat heads, for just $50, and I ended up buying one for a teenage cousin who plays strings but no percussion.

But I ran across the Remo Tamani Talking Drum ($150ish, 6"x15") and I'm inclined to that instead now. It looks pretty badass with the faux-fishskin head, all synthetic so I needn't fret about it, etc. Any big check-holds before I place an order to ship one to Austin in June?

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

canoshiz posted:

I want to buy a (tenor) ukulele! What's a good recommendation for something in the $200-300 (flexible if the ukulele is sick nasty) range? I'd like to get a nice solid koa body. I looked in the ukulele thread but it's archived now and I was wondering if there was anything more up to date. I'm in California, if that matters.

Hmmm, you're going to have to modify your search a tad, between the factors koa, solid, and $200-300. Your price is a little low for true solid koa, so unless you want to raise the price a couple hundred, you need to either:

- Get a cheap off-brand (*not* recommended, get a good player regardless of materials)
- Get solid wood, but a cheaper wood; note that Acacia has become a pretty popular alternative to Koa, being a related wood that's extremely plentiful and looks good
- Get laminate wood but with a solid top; to whatever (disputed) degree solid wood matters for instruments, most folks agree that it's the top that matters so if you don't want to spend extra, there are models with laminate back and sides but solid top
- Get koa laminate, from a good maker, and play that until if/when you can justify a higher budget down the road.


Solid koa from a decent import maker (Kala, Mele, Ohana, KoAloha, Pono) will run you like $700 or so, solid acacia from the same class can come as low as $379 for a Kala if you're just in love with it: http://www.theukulelesite.com/kala-ka-asac-t-solid-acacia-tenor.html

If you want to pay $279 instead, Kala make the KA-KTG of koa laminate, looks a really lovely axe. If you're being budget conscious, this would be my top off-cuff recommendation, and save the extra money for a larger upgrade down the road if uke just becomes your thing: http://www.theukulelesite.com/kala-ka-ktg-new-koa-tenor-slothead.html . TUS is out of this model, but you can shop around the various other dealers, but ensure you buy from someone offering "set up" (see below).




A couple standard uke caveats:
- buy from a uke-savvy dealer, someone who actually opens the crate from China and QCs the individual ukes, does "set up" (making any small 5-minute tweaks), etc. What you don't want is just to pick a seller who's $5 cheaper and just takes the ukes out of the crate and chucks them into a shipping box. Make sure that whoever you buy from advertises that they do set-up.
- if you get solid, read up on cases and humidity to make sure you take care of the solid wood
- speaking of "solid" that term has no legally binding definition, so if you see an unusually good deal on "solid", google the model name around to see if they mean "solid laminate" and are just being market-speaky. You can figure out pretty quick what's made of laminate and what's straight wood, though again laminate is by no means a death sentence or plastic sound, so especially at the <$300 level I'd focus much more on having a model you like, reputable brand, and QCed by a reliable dealer.
- don't buy a cheap no-name even if it looks awesome, odds are it's a wall-hanger. The established names aren't just some bougie branding success, a lot of those companies have worked really closely with the uke players community to refine their products since the Dark Days of the 1990s when ukes were just a cheap punchline. Kala in particular has come from being slightly-over-meh to being a serious hitter for good import ukes

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Familiar Foreigner posted:

So, some time back this thread helped me get a Taishogoto off ebay. Well, I did keep on with it and enjoyed it enough that I just ordered a much nicer Yamaha model second hand from Japan. I'll post pictures when it arrives in a couple weeks.

Awesome, were you the goon I walked through the settup over Skype, or a different one? What kind of music are you playing on your taishogoto?


Just got back to my place in DC, and immediately tuned up my beater Yamaha classical to DADGAD and been playing that. Getting back my cheapie English concertina and will use that to see if I want to try playing one for Irish pub sessions (Anglo is far more traditional but EC imitates fiddle or flute stylings well) and my friend who was babysitting my $4k Duet concertina I'm having a beer with and getting it back. Also getting my Indian kanjira drum back from a friend, will probably hold off on buying other drums for a bit and focus on that one since it's tiny and awesome with lots of bass for its size. At a recent family wedding I gave my 2yr old niece a Suzuki Airwave harmonica, clunky childproof plastic $12 thing that plays really well, and another friend I bought some for years ago said even her toddlers couldn't break them. I also re-connected with a 17yr old cousin I hadn't seen in a decade, and now he's a big theater kid and plays uke and other things, so I sent him a $100 package of small Meinl percussion (shakers, guiro, etc) and a Toca talking drum, so that should get him set up right to explore percussion with his artsy friends, and impress the ladies/gents (not sure which is his thing). I owe my other uncle huge for saving me thousands by storing my stuff at his NoVA house while I was overseas, so debating getting his daughter one of those adorable pocket French Horns (apparently it's actually a cornet/flugelhorn curved into FH shape but she should be able to puzzle it out) as a combination thanks and a graduation gift for her so she can hang out on the quad in college and be the weird-but-hot chick playing miniature brass along with all the freshman chump guitarists.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Planet X posted:

There's a guy near me in Frederick that does cool cigar box instruments, banjos, guitars, mandos, dulcimers. Am considering getting an old time 5 string banjo made with a cutaway neck.

Anyone mess with these things? Looks like a fun thing to hang on the wall and plunk around with from time to time.

Three words: fretless, nylon strings.

You'll thank me later.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Aside from generally checking the wood, I'd look to see if the top is sagging under all that weight. *Some* indentation of the top is afaik normal, so might need to read up a little. From what I hear, the maker was a pretty good one, and apparently was murdered at age 49.

Expect that you may need to nudge the bridges around, set up the action/intonation since probably nobody has in ages.

With all those strings, same with autoharps, in your shoes I'd try polishing the strings to remove corrosion so you can play it for a while before putting out $50+ on new strings, make sure you dig the axe first.


Hammered dulcimers are just like the Chapman stick with me: an instrument I find really cool but I hate the music that like 90% of people play on it. I've heard some really cool rattly/droney avant-garde stuff on HD, and enjoy Persian and Indian santoor, but so many folks playing HD in the West choose the absolute lamest "Ye Dance of Ye Shamrock Pixies" Celtic-lite junk, the same way all the Chapman players stick to either softcore porn soundtracks or the cheesiest of prog rock with painfully unstylish effects pedals.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Planet X posted:

I'll consider it, especially because fretless may bring the price down a bit, and im not looking to spend a whole lot.

Other reasons? "Fun"?

I believe *this* should answer your question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdNTnwCe2rU

But for reals, fretless is great since you can great sliding effects, plus microtonals if you're into that. The nylon is easy on the fingers and has this great mellow plunky tone; I will bet you that anyone you show it to will be surprised how a banjo can avoid that bright twangy ping that figures into it being a running joke. Your neck and soundboard will also hold up easier under nylon strings.

TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 16:01 on May 27, 2016

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Familiar Foreigner posted:

I got my new Taishogoto today and I'm really impressed with it so far, and it only took 3 days to ship from Tokyo to Atlanta! As promised, here are some pictures.



Also I most definitely had the wrong strings on the old one, so I ordered a proper set from Japan directly.

I'll admit that when I envisioned various instruments a random goon might fall for, taishogoto was not one I expected. Sure, I figured a couple goons with a ton of instruments would buy one to mess with a few times a year, but you seem beyond that point. I take it you're tracking down tabs for it, learning some of the repertoire and all? With its numeric system it's got to be one of the more straightforward ways to learn a Japanese genre.

By the way, I notice there have recently cropped up several hurdy-gurdy makers in cheap parts of Europe, making gurdies for like $700 or so. There's one dude in Siberia whose banner ads I get popping up in the margins of other sites, so he seems to be putting some effort into marketing. Anyone tracking that development, or been on the look out for an affordable HG? I don't know enough to recommend or no.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
That's a nice little HD and great price! And as a harpist you should have no trouble figuring HD out. Remind me, was it you that had a couple cool harp books of like Icelandic tunes and whatnot? Try some of those out on HD?


For me, again I'm keeping music expenses moderate for the moment so I don't do severe overkill coming back (just got my kanjira drum back, and have a clavichord and a lute awaiting me in Austin). But I want something cool for basic string jamming, maybe take to pub sessions (since my melodeon is a little loud for my skill level, and Duet concertina just can't keep pace with a session since the fingering layout is made for complex harmonies and not high-speed melody).

What I'm doing is pinging the Portuguese guitarra dealer I used to hang with in Porto, ask him to find me a good one in the €500 range (my prior one was great and just €275), do some settup work on it, pack it with any accessories and spares for DADGAD tuning and a hard case, and mail it to me in Austin. I think I can come out under €700 total and have an awesome open-tuned "cittern" that I can take to sessions, jam with friends, etc. More compact scale length than a bouzouki and more distinctive looking with the weird head and tuners. I also have vague, vague plans to someday work up a set of American Revolution songs with one other musician, and guitarra could be a great choice as the primary backing instrument since it resembles the English guitar of the era so wouldn't be at all anachronistic for political pub songs.



Been slowly taking my instruments out of storage in DC to prepare for the move to Austin; I don't have much stuff and I want to take care of my music gear so instead of a pod or movers I'm thinking to just rent a cargo van for a one-way and drive it down. Adds gas and cheap hotel costs, but otherwise really comparable and avoids me having to take a flight, plus I won't have to leave behind wine, cleaning supplies, and other stuff that's probably worth a couple hundred that I can't send with movers or on a plane.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Smoking Crow posted:

I'm from West Virginia, and my grandpa played the Appalachian dulcimer

Should I learn how to play dulcimer

There's really zero reason not to: it's an awesome instrument, easy to learn, inexpensive, and you personally have cultural reasons to learn.

AbrahamLincolnLog has current dibs on me finding xim an affordable dulcimer on ebay, but if xe already has one or isn't looking at the moment, I can help you sort out eBay options. Just let me know what price range you're looking at (broadly, "under $100" or "$100-200" is fine) and if you have any strong preference in body shapes, or no pref.

Here's a good clip of some old-school dulcimer playing, and this kind of thing would be extremely easy to learn even if you have zero music background: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJfOzoz0-xI

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Smoking Crow posted:

I'd prefer under $100 and wooden, if it's possible

Cool, here's my pull for today. I would just encourage any goon bidding to mention so and which item(s) in this thread so we don't have goons outbidding each other.

- This Green River is gorgeous, if it somehow goes under $100 shipped (not likely but possible) it'd be a steal: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Green-River-Dulcimer-with-Case-/182157424057?hash=item2a696db5b9:g:1lMAAOSwUfNXR8NZ If someone has more budget, this would be well worth it at $150 shipped even if the bids climb.

- This unlabeled one seems a decent cheapie, I'd go no higher than $80 shipped: http://www.ebay.com/itm/36-Unbrande...n8AAOSwqBJXU0U5

- This Dulcimer Factory ends today, no case, but shipping costs and bids are both low, $90 or under would be totally fair: http://www.ebay.com/itm/The-Dulcimer-Factory-Mountain-Dulcimer-/291778038599?hash=item43ef538b47:g:p9YAAOSwepZXTN18

Bear in mind with any of these you want to spend :5bux: on a set of new strings.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Smoking Crow posted:

I'm gonna try and get that Green River

That would be amazing. Used dulcimers sell for crazy cheap (and actually new customs aren't that pricey). A guitar as nice as that GR would be like $400 used. Definitely bid for it and update us. I can do further eBay pulls for any goons in a few days.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Smoking Crow posted:

I'm gonna try and get that Green River

Sold for $110; was that you?

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Smoking Crow posted:

No, $100 was as high as I was willing to go

No worries; are you going to bid on any of the other ones, or shall I do a fresh pull for you (and any other goons wanting one) on Monday?


Had a fun idea come to me: what if once I reach Austin I post some blog or whatever offering to loan out cheap weird instruments to people so long as they put down a deposit equivalent to its value, and get it all back when they return it the next month? Like I paid under $100 for a cheap concertina, let me hold $100 and you can play it for a month and bring it back for a full refund. Does that sound too annoying or worth a shot? I can do it small at first with just cheap stuff I already own, and if it goes well it'd give me an excuse to buy a few more weird/cheap things to loan out. Austin has a lot of musicians and not all of them have money, so I think a lot would be inclined to go play with weird stuff if they weren't risking money on a purchase.

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TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Welp, getting a check tomorrow so placing an order with Porto Guitarra to have one shipped over from Portugal. Gonna turn that little teardrop cittern to DADGAD and take it to Irish pub sessions. His base model can end up as low as $350 with US shipping, but I'm going one notch up and getting an action job and hard case. Gonna be sweet and is vaguely period-correct for reenacting songs of the American Revolution.

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