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WAFFLEHOUND
Apr 26, 2007

Evil Sagan posted:

I wisely avoided going with the ocarina because I knew I'd only use it for Zelda songs, and I knew everyone else would know that too. Don't you enablers convince me otherwise, I have enough of a reputation for being obsessed with video games as it is.

gently caress, I don't even like Legend of Zelda.

I mostly play Beatles songs.

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100 degrees Calcium
Jan 23, 2011



WAFFLEHOUND posted:

I mostly play Beatles songs.

Okay, that's pretty bad rear end.

I'm pretty impressed by what the ocarina can do, actually, especially since it looks so simple. I don't want to spread myself too thin, since learning to play a tin whistle will be my first foray into music, but I guess there's nothing wrong with rounding one-self out.

Behold! A Elk!
May 12, 2009
My main problem is overblowing I think. I haven't attempted to learn anything specific I mostly want to learn the notes and such so I can use it to add layers to my recordings. One of my big problems is that I can't really read music and it seems like tabs for recorder probably isn't a thing. Would Jethro Tull be translatable? or would I need a flute. Of course that would require a lot of skill.

WAFFLEHOUND
Apr 26, 2007

Evil Sagan posted:

Okay, that's pretty bad rear end.

I'm pretty impressed by what the ocarina can do, actually, especially since it looks so simple. I don't want to spread myself too thin, since learning to play a tin whistle will be my first foray into music, but I guess there's nothing wrong with rounding one-self out.

http://www.clayz.com/tabls.html Get one of these, terrible website aside they're awesome!

Zorblack
Oct 8, 2008

And with strange aeons, even death may eat a burrito with goons.
Lipstick Apathy

Evil Sagan posted:

I wisely avoided going with the ocarina because I knew I'd only use it for Zelda songs, and I knew everyone else would know that too. Don't you enablers convince me otherwise, I have enough of a reputation for being obsessed with video games as it is.

gently caress, I don't even like Legend of Zelda.

http://www.songbirdocarina.com/zelda-ocarinas?page=shop.product_details&flypage=flypage.tpl&product_id=34&category_id=13

doooooo ittttttt. I own this, and it is a goddamned musical work of art. See that shiny band? That's platinum. Notice the range: drat near 3 octaves. The sound quality is nice on it too. It comes with a little book of zelda songs, but also a description of how to play the chromatic scale, so you can play whatever you want. Do it, do it, do it.

WAFFLEHOUND
Apr 26, 2007
I've been underwhelmed by Songbird. v:shobon:v

Mradyfist
Sep 3, 2007

People that can eat people are the luckiest people in the world

Behold! A Elk! posted:

My main problem is overblowing I think. I haven't attempted to learn anything specific I mostly want to learn the notes and such so I can use it to add layers to my recordings. One of my big problems is that I can't really read music and it seems like tabs for recorder probably isn't a thing. Would Jethro Tull be translatable? or would I need a flute. Of course that would require a lot of skill.

Tull is going to be tough to play on a recorder, a lot of Ian Anderson's signature sound is his tonguing technique and the vocalization stuff he does on top of the flute, both of which would be difficult to reproduce on a fipple instrument (and especially recorder, where the lack of backpressure makes your dynamic control much less precise).

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Next instrument. We haven't yet done much on the many fascinating musical instruments of Madagascar.

Valiha



Most instruments in Madagascar are tied to either European colonial instruments, or to the instruments of various Indian Ocean seafarers, such as the Indonesians. The valiha seems to resemble a locally-made version of various Indo-Malaysian harps/zithers (kecap).

Fundamentally, the valiha is a metre-long bamboo tube with a bunch of strings around it running the long way, and a few slits/holes in the body to let the sound out. The early valiha were made by slitting the skin of the bamboo, lifting it up, and letting that serve as strings, quite like the Apache fiddle and cornstalk fiddle in the US. Modern ones are made from pieces of wire (often bike brake cable).



I've poked around a bit, and I don't see any place to easily buy one, though I have occasionally seen them in music stores, and once bought one for only $30 or so from one of those "buy handicrafts to support the Third World" kind of shops. Not that it was a pro model, but I reckon most valiha are rather primitive.

There is some discussion online of building valiha from sythetic tubing, which could be pretty easy. One guy suggested ABS plastic vice PVC, since PVC is too dense to be good for string instruments (though works great for winds).

There's a cool site in French (seen through GoogleTranslate) on building your own synthetic valiha, and I imagine someone with basic tools could probably knock one out in an afternoon for $20 or less (depending on how you source the components). As I understand it, the strings are all the same gauge and the pitch is just changed by sliding bridges, so you can just get a spool of wire or cord (I've known folks to use edge-trimmer cord for similar builds) and use that for all your strings. Note that the French plan is more for one you hang outside to be blown by the wind (like an "aeolian harp") but you can modify it by looking at standard valihas and adjusting.




- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zZpYlGuD7I A related instrument in Timor
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDzv7CDUWXo&feature=related Valiha and the Malagasy equivalent of a berimbau
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puExCMlGgf0 Apparently, a valiha backed up by techno tracks and odd music video

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTSCmSNPJ_s&feature=related Not music, but a short show-and-tell of Malagasy instruments

StealthStealth
Aug 28, 2007

dogs eatin' cake
I will be getting my alto recorder this weekend :woop: I played a soprano for quite a few years and am looking to get back into playing medieval and folk music (and yeah probably some video game music).

sub supau
Aug 28, 2007

So this might be a little out of left field, but does anyone have any idea how to play anything like the Lubuw, a mouth harp made by several Taiwanese Aboriginal tribes? It looks like this:


And plays like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XupF0Ep6XEQ

But nothing I do makes the stupid thing make noise.

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe
It looks pretty straightforward in the video; maybe yours is defective?

MrGreenShirt
Mar 14, 2005

Hell of a book. It's about bunnies!

Hold it like the guy in the video and sharply tug the string. Does it make a noise?

Y: There you go.

N: It's a piece of crap and should be placed on your mantelpiece as a curiosity from far-off lands.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
A few good-news updates for folks looking for affordable instruments:

- Uilleann (Irish) bagpipes: Seth Hamon of http://www.swedishbagpipes.com finally brought his cast-resin Irish bagpipe to market. He has practice sets (chanter, bag, bellows, but no drones) for $500, and they should be lighter and balanced more like a wooden set than the popular Daye starter pipes.

- Concertina: The Button Box in Massachusetts offers rentals of the Concertina Connection student-grade Anglo, English, and Duet concertinas for $25/mo plus postage. If you're a US goon and considering concertina, this is a great way to try out a $350 box for cheap, and way, way better than buying a $100 piece of crap off eBay. They might have rent-to-own or payment plan too, just shoot them an email.

- 1-row accordion/melodeon: there are a half-dozen Hohner HA-112/3/4 boxes on eBay at the moment, for quite reasonable prices. If you're wanting to play Irish accordion, and want to do it the old-school one-row way (vice the more common modern B/C or D/C# boxes), one of these in D is probably your best starter bet. They also have a few in G if you want to play tunes in G or Em. They have some of them labeled "Cajun" but Cajuns generally play C boxes, but the styling is similar.


Another instrument to share, and a really inexpensive DIY instrument that is quite unusual in the manner of play:

Overtone flute



Without getting too much into the physics and music theory, "overtones" are mathematical variants of the basic tone of an instrument, and by blowing a wind instrument harder you can get it to jump to an overtone (say, from D to A) without changing fingering or whatnot. That's how bugles are able to play multi-note bugle calls without any buttons or slide, the player is jumping between the inherent overtones of the instrument via breath pressure.

To describe the sound: similar feel to didgeridoo, but much more melodic and easier to play. If you've been interested in the weird sounds of didj, but want to carry more melody, or don't dig buzzing your lips into a tube, try one of these. The sound is rather haunting, and musically they're really educational since it's a constant utilization of the harmonic scale, so even if you don't have formal music training you get a real feel for the physics involved.

A wide scattering of cultures have made flutes based around this idea too. They're quite simple: get a tube, get it to make a note, now just blow it softer or harder to move the note around. No fingerholes or keys or other fancy stuff. If you simply must get fancy, you can use a finger to open and close the end slightly to get more in-between notes.



So far as getting one, I know in Sweden random crafstman sell them at festivals made of PVC for $10 or whatever. There are also various folks online selling different nationalities of these, with Nadishana (ever the hero of weird music) having quite a massive variety. Personally, I'd pay for an overtone flute because I have a job, poor crafting skills, and I'm lazy, but if you fail to meet any of these criteria, make your own. Actually, even I made my own recently by just sticking a spare Generation Bb tinwhistle head onto a piece of PVC; bam, overtone flute.

There are many plans online, some of which literally require just a length of PVC and a pocketknife, with sandpaper being a nice plus. Just google "overtone flute plans", or try subbing in some common terms for different nationalities thereof: koncovka, fujara, sälgflöjt, etc. I'll include at least one video instructional below.



- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXnAXsMyCFU How to make a koncovka in "3 minutes". And there are many more clips of similar style.
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mk2obS_jEpc That lunatic Nadishana and his PVC bass fujara.
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPJ8NotbjIA A rather sprightly Swedish tune.
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAJu5g5BMoU Jamming on the Slovakian koncovka

TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 23:49 on Oct 15, 2011

Econosaurus
Sep 22, 2008

Successfully predicted nine of the last five recessions

My friend just got me one of these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dombura

Anyone know how I can learn to play it?

Nuggan
Jul 17, 2006

Always rolling skulls.
Reading this thread over the past two days, I have found myself ordering a NAF and ocarina, and wanting to start collecting as many instruments as possible now and learning to play them. Its not very exotic, but I've decided that today I'm going to go out and buy a violin and teach myself how to play it.

Yiggy
Sep 12, 2004

"Imagination is not enough. You have to have knowledge too, and an experience of the oddity of life."

Nuggan posted:

Its not very exotic, but I've decided that today I'm going to go out and buy a violin and teach myself how to play it.

First and foremost I want to congratulate and encourage you on your decision! Go forth and learn music.

That said, I'd also encourage you to break out of the "I must learn this myself" mentality, particularly with an instrument like violin where posture, grip, and how you're holding things can make a long term difference on your success. AT LEAST commit to taking a handful of lessons so that a teacher can help you nail those out, and then proceed to keep learning on your own pace once you're on a proper footing.

I say this as someone who used to think I could learn my own instrument of choice, all by myself (sitar). I was telling myself this because there just weren't a lot of teachers around, and because I was stubborn. At one point I decided I also wanted to teach myself another instrument (bansuri), and was much more confident in my ability to do so. On a lark, I took one lesson, and found out that despite spending lots of time studying pictures and books, I was holding the instrument wrong.

That gave me a kick in the butt, so after a few years thinking I was making good progress with sitar (and I was, straight through the beginning stuff, and then precipitously slowing down from there) I eventually came around to wanting a teacher. That first lesson, within the first few minutes, my teacher saw and diagnosed things I was doing wrong with my hands. After she corrected that, I was picking up speed again and now feel very comfortable on my path, to the point where I could continue really learning the thing by myself (though after two years of lessons, I don't really want to, its so much faster when you can learn from someone else's mistakes).

So if nothing else, take ONE lesson with a good teacher and see how it feels. Guidance is very useful. I admire the go it alone attitude, if you can keep harnessing and tapping into that kind of drive it'll serve you well, but don't discount how much a more experienced musician can show you, and how much time that'll save you. The time saved is worth the couple :20bux: you might spend.

Yiggy fucked around with this message at 18:24 on Jan 7, 2012

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe
Yeah, learning violin by yourself will leave you with a million bad habits down the line.

TurdBurgles
Sep 17, 2007

I AM WHITE AND PLAY NA FLUTE ON TRIBAL LANDS WITH NO GUILT.

Nuggan posted:

Reading this thread over the past two days, I have found myself ordering a NAF and ocarina, and wanting to start collecting as many instruments as possible now and learning to play them. Its not very exotic, but I've decided that today I'm going to go out and buy a violin and teach myself how to play it.

Congrats on buying a NAF! I love mine and had no issue learning basics on my own.There are some excellent forums mentioned in this thread that can help you with any issue you run across.

I did pick up a book (mostly to learn songs):
http://www.amazon.com/Native-Spirit-Song-Book-CD/dp/B00546N8BI/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1325959522&sr=8-4

It seems to be out of print, but I know the guys over at High Spirts Flutes are still in business. You could probably shoot them an email.

What key of NAF did you pick up?

Nuggan
Jul 17, 2006

Always rolling skulls.
Let me explain a bit that violin is not my first instrument, I've played piano since I could sit up, and I've made casual attempts at learning guitar. I played flute in school for a while and am pretty alright on a harmonica. I don't mean I'm going to stay locked up in my house with no human contact until I can play violin. I know a few people who can play and I've purchased and read some books on the subject in the past few days. I'll certainly have some help doing this, I just don't intend to take formal lessons.

Yiggy
Sep 12, 2004

"Imagination is not enough. You have to have knowledge too, and an experience of the oddity of life."
Sitar and bansuri weren't my first instruments either. But playing guitar and trombone beforehand were exactly 0% helpful in picking them up and learning how to hold and play the things properly as they all had different shapes and techniques involved. The friends are likely going to be better than the books for that sort of thing, but just keep in mind they're only going to be as useful as their willingness to watch you learn and that depending on their skill level, their bad habits will become your bad habits. Sometimes you get what you pay for.

Testro
May 2, 2009
I picked up a toy accordion and have mastered Row Row Row Your Boat (wahey) playing single notes with the right hand.

There are three air valves on the left hand side. How do I add those into my right hand playing?

withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe

Testro posted:

I picked up a toy accordion and have mastered Row Row Row Your Boat (wahey) playing single notes with the right hand.

There are three air valves on the left hand side. How do I add those into my right hand playing?

They are chords. The top one is the main chord and much of the time you can't go wrong if you hold that one down for the entire song. The middle is probably a five chord for decoration. Probably you can play that one on "life is but a" and then go back to the main chord on "dream". The bottom button is probably just an air vent which you should push if you ever have to squeeze or pull the instrument without any other buttons pushed.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

Econosaurus posted:

My friend just got me one of these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dombura

Anyone know how I can learn to play it?

Can you narrow it down a little bit? Dombura/dombra is a slightly vague term, and they can vary. If you have the kind I think you have, it's pretty much the same as a dutar, and I studied dutar a little bit in Tajikistan. Just two nylon strings on yours? Does yours have frets or no frets?

For reference for other readers, here's a dude's blog post showing him with a long Uygur dutar:



Tajik (well, I think technically Pamiri) dutar strings were tuned with the high string a fourth above the low string. In actuality, they're one string that's doubled back on itself, but since it's wrapped/knotted at the bottom they function as two strings, but looking at the online pics the more Soviet-ized ones can be two strings with modern tuning pegs. A glance around Google also confirms that at least some other dombras are tuned with the two strings a fourth apart, so you probably can't go too wrong doing that.


So far as "learning" it; to actually formally learn it you'd pretty much have to find a Central Asian musician, and unless you live in a few specific cities (NYC, for example), those are a bit thin on the ground. On the bright side, since it's "only" two strings that might make it a little easier to pick out what players are doing on video clips and recordings. That said, people can play some amazingly complicated and fast things on those two strings.

If you want to learn actual Kazakh/Uzbek/Tajik/Kyrgyz music on such a creature, you need to either find a teacher, or imitate recordings as best as you can figure out, self-teaching by ear. The main thing that would be hard to learn in isolation is some of the strumming techniques for the poly-rhythms. That said, they're extremely fun instruments to mess with, so I'd set your bar at "sounding cool" vice "sounding authentic" and just learn to play dombra through your whiteboy perspective.

As a parallel, here's a Swedish dude playing trad Swede music on the Turkish baglama and sounding great:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXdsU1J3rfo&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL


My recommendation: tune the high string to a comfortable playing pitch, and then tune the low one to a fourth below that. If yours is a design where it uses a single doubled-back string, note the low string will be a bit floppy since it's the same gauge as the higher string yet set to a lower note. Tuned up, now just strum it a bit, work up a rhythm, and then start fingering the high string to play a melody while using the low string as a constant drone. As you build skill, you can occasionally drop down to play a note or two on the low string (and I think Turks sometimes use their thumb to change the low string briefly), but largely the low string does more drone/harmonic work.

Do those things, and you'll probably sound pretty cool so long as you do some interesting rhythms and experiment melodically. If you can pick out the melodies to some Central Asian tunes and do your own interpretations of those, that's always fun too. There are a goodly number of dombra/dombura/dutar/dutor/etc. clips on YouTube to imitate, and even Turkish baglama clips though not the same can probably give you some cool ideas. Bonus points if you can note the spelling of the instrument in whichever foreign languages and use that as a search term, as for such clips there are often great pieces without any English (or Latin script) keywords.

Long/short, unless you have a specific fixation on learning a specific Central Asian tradition (started dating an Uzbek girl and need to impress her traditional nomad parents?), just play it and have fun.


Let this chill little dude inspire you:

TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 21:06 on Jan 8, 2012

Testro
May 2, 2009

withak posted:

They are chords. The top one is the main chord and much of the time you can't go wrong if you hold that one down for the entire song. The middle is probably a five chord for decoration. Probably you can play that one on "life is but a" and then go back to the main chord on "dream". The bottom button is probably just an air vent which you should push if you ever have to squeeze or pull the instrument without any other buttons pushed.
Brilliant; thank you!

I can see me digging out a lot of my old sheet music and annotating it whilst I learn. Alouette sounds pretty good on it!

Nuggan
Jul 17, 2006

Always rolling skulls.

Angra Mainyu posted:

What key of NAF did you pick up?

Its Am. I wanted to get a drone flute too, but all the ones I've seen were a bit more than I was willing to spend on one right now, especially after just buying a violin.

Yiggy posted:

Sitar and bansuri weren't my first instruments either. But playing guitar and trombone beforehand were exactly 0% helpful in picking them up and learning how to hold and play the things properly as they all had different shapes and techniques involved.

I don't really agree with the whole "its a completely different instrument, so knowing other instruments wont help!!!" opinion that a lot of people have. Because of my previous musical experience I can read sheet music, understand music theory, know how stringed instruments work, and can hear if the notes I'm playing are right or wrong and know which way to move my fingers to fix them. Obviously, none of this teaches me technical skills for the instrument, but to say that previously played instruments in no way help new instruments is a bit ridiculous.

I've been having a blast for the 3 days I've been fiddling around with my new violin so far. I've not yet been in front of any of my other friends that play to have them look how I'm holding the instrument and bow, but judging from the books I've got and "how-to" videos I've seen I'm doing it alright. I've managed to not make it do that horrible shrieking noise at all, and I'm getting an alright sound from it. I've got a number of exercises I'm practicing, and I can play simple recognizable melodies as well without much trouble. My NAF hasn't arrived yet, but I'm looking forward to a weekend of jamming on that while sitting around with my hookah as soon as it gets here.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
Picked up a new instrument recently, and though it's closely related to a more normal instrument, it's an interesting take on it:

Harp guitar



The history of these is long and complicated with all kinds of guitar/lute instruments incorporating similar ideas but not necessarily historically related. What it came down to was the desire to get some extra low strings onto the instrument, and/or some extra high strings that wouldn't necessarily be plucked, but would vibrate sympathetically, that is pick up the musical vibrations from the main strings and echo them.

This idea was popular as far back as the Renaissance, with instruments like the theorbo lute:



Note that on a lot of these instrument, either there's nowhere to fret the low strings, or even if they are over the fingerboard it'd be a terrible reach. So generally they aren't tuned in fourths apart, as would be common on a lute or guitar, but in single steps descending down, so you can play full parts of a scale on them.

These went in and out of style up to the modern era, where the "harp guitar" variant got big in the US at the start of the 20th century. Best as I know, it fell out of favor until the 1970s-1980s or so, and has made at least a small comeback in both acoustic and electric versions in all kinds of cool and freaky shapes:





A conceptually-related instrument is the 10-string guitar, which can be played harp-guitar like (the four extra strings giving you four single steps down). However, the inventor of the "modern 10-string guitar", Narciso Yepes, designed it with no intent that the player pluck the extra strings, but that instead they simply sympathetically resonate. With the specific Yepes tuning, no matter what note you play at least one string on the guitar will resonate sympathetic to it. I've tried it out, and it does add a kind of cool echoing/resonant effect throughout the instrument, as intended.



Similar idea on the modern Scandinavian "alto guitar", which is between an Yepes 10-string and the old theorbo.




So far as buying these critters: as you can imagine, they're not easy to build and have a pretty small market, so generally pricey. For actual arm-out true "harp guitars" you're looking at at least $1500-2000 for entry-level new ones. The one exception I'm aware of is Wishnevsky, previously mentioned in this thread, who will build you a "crude but serviceable" such guitar for around $700, and they're apparently considered not a bad, if weird, option. Electrics are presumably easier to make (maybe even for an experienced hobbyist), so the Tim Donahue electric harp guitar pictured above is like $1600.

The 10-string guitar and similar are thankfully a bit more affordable, due largely to a few companies like Bartolex who've offshored the luthiery but kept up high quality control. They have 7, 8, and 10 string guitars, as well as alto guitars, starting from $1000ish or so. They also have some cool "slant fret" models that have a few mechanical advantages and look swoopy. In Europe a company called Thomann offers their "Tenayo" model 10-string for €624; my impression is it's not as good as the Bartolex, but for Eurogoons it might be notably cheaper than a Bartolex.




- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vzZuLBXIa0 Narciso Yepes kicks some Bach on a 10-string classical guitar
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cvar4ZsqsEo Andy McKee is apparently the viral superstar of harp guitar, with 8 million hits for this vid
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGF0kMwb-lA Tim Donahue playing the above-pictured fretless electric harp guitar, his own design. I don't really care for this style of music, but the musicianship is skillful.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres
This Kickstarter expires 29 February

This is a one-off custom instrument, vice the usual weird instruments we've been covering, but cool in concept and might help a few goons consider other instruments playing the Middle Eastern scales.

This dude with a PhD in Turkish music is running a Kickstarter fundraiser to build a "Nautilauta", his original design, and start putting out an album. It's more or less a bozouki with a fretting system based on a spiraling out, in order to allow all the microtones needed for Arabic/Persian/etc. music



His fundraiser runs out at the end of February, so if you want to chip in some cash in exchange for a copy of his future CD, he's 2/3 of the way to covering his funding for the project. I'm thinking of chipping in a little more to get the plans for the instrument and license to build one; next time I work a big and profitable project I might look into commissioning some weird instrument using this fretting system.

If you want to chip in (and quick), here's the link: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/610528987/the-nautilauta

bigfoot again
Apr 24, 2007

TTFA, talk to me about the Harpuke. Are they any use?

Nuggan
Jul 17, 2006

Always rolling skulls.
Ah, I didnt notice new instruments had been posted. I love this thread, it needs to live.

The harp guitar looks really cool, if a bit weird.

So far, I've loved my violin and the NAF that I bought. I'm curious as to how everyone else that bought instruments because of this thread are doing with them.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

BIGFOOT PEE BED posted:

TTFA, talk to me about the Harpuke. Are they any use?

Not to dodge the question, but it's an awfully subjective call. I certainly wouldn't argue with someone who just had no interest in one, but if you watch enough videos of folks playing them and are just entranced, sure they're a cool variant.

Akin to the harp guitar, the extra strings can provide both "sympathetic resonance" (acoustic feedback/reverb), and also give you a few more notes going down. Though I have noticed that, compared to harp guitars, there are a few folks who string the extra harp strings further apart than single steps, like tuning them to an open chord.

If you're looking to learn about harp ukes, this article from HarpGuitars.net is about as comprehensive as you're going to get. They have a lot of great pics as well of various vintage and modern harp ukes. However, a lot of those are one-off customs, or made by defunct shops. Out of the various harp ukes noted, the only practical/cool ones (which for me should have at minimum three harp strings) are De Faoite (David White) and Pete Howlett.



The above is a De Faoite "taropatch" (doubled-strings uke), and I dimly think I looked into this model a couple years back, and want to say it was something like US$1400 or so? Howlett, on the other hand, entered into a collaboration with Anuenue Ukuleles, though I'm not clear if that means he mass-produced some ukes himself or whether he licensed the design or what. But in any case a scattering of Howlett model harp ukes came out; apparently a lot of them went to Japan, and only a dozen or so to the US. Howlett posted on UkuleleUnderground last month saying a few dozen more would come out this summer. I think they retailed about $1200 in the US. There's a substantial number of posts about the Anuenue harp uke on UU, so worth reading if this variant interests you.


quote:

So far, I've loved my violin and the NAF that I bought. I'm curious as to how everyone else that bought instruments because of this thread are doing with them.

Ah, so the violin thing is working out for you then; it's a tricky instrument to self-teach, and can sound ghastly for the first little bit until your bowing technique smooths out.

I've been pleasantly surprised at the number of people taking up Native American flute in this thread; it is a very intuitive and mellow instrument, so it's good to see folks willing to take that unusual step.

TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 06:23 on Mar 2, 2012

BigHustle
Oct 19, 2005

Fast and Bulbous

Nuggan posted:

So far, I've loved my violin and the NAF that I bought. I'm curious as to how everyone else that bought instruments because of this thread are doing with them.

I'm going to be completely honest here and say that I haven't made much progress in learning anything specific. I may not be able to play the harp like John Popper, but when I grab a harmonica and honk out "Heart of Gold" you know what I'm playing.

Over the course of the thread I caught a bad case of Gear Acquisition Syndrome and now own an autoharp, Q-Chord (a synth/electronic autoharp), two washboards, a set of Hohner Piedmont Blues harmonicas, a set of kuai-ban clappers, and a Theremin.

Thanks to this thread and the volunteer music writing gig I picked up I can say that my appreciation for music has grown by leaps and bounds in the last year. Two years ago you couldn't have gotten me to go to a bluegrass show or listen to anything that could be considered jazz and today I try and track down that stuff so I can catch up on what I've missed over the years.

bigfoot again
Apr 24, 2007

TapTheForwardAssist posted:



Desire successfully curtailed. Still cool though. Thanks!

The Letter A
Nov 8, 2002

Nuggan posted:

So far, I've loved my violin and the NAF that I bought. I'm curious as to how everyone else that bought instruments because of this thread are doing with them.
I've bought so many instruments because of this thread. After a few years of musical experimentation, I have two tenor ukes, a soprano and a UBass, a 5-string bass guitar, a violin, a tinwhistle (Here's my horrible attempt at playing along with a fast track from Flook after about a week of tinwhistle ownership; forgive the facebook message sounds), two harmonicas (in C and Bb) and I borrowed a real transverse flute from my mom that she wasn't using anymore.

So far I really am enjoying learning flute. As a trumpet player since the fourth grade, I found the flute strangely similar to trumpet--I guess that's because it's also a wind instrument. I've been getting books from Music Minus One, which is a fantastic resource for anyone in this thread. They're like $15 or so and they include a CD with the piano or orchestra backing to very common contest solo pieces. Here's an embarrassing video of me playing along with the Hindemith track. Sorry about the terrible angle but I filmed the video from my MBP which was chillin on my bed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R89cRFWdtAw

I've been taking violin lessons every week, too. I tried to learn it myself but I became a little scared of developing terrible habits. I've been really enjoying my lessons though. I have to say, violin is probably the hardest instrument I've ever attempted to learn, and I have attempted to learn a lot of instruments. I guess since I'm sharing all this stuff with you guys I might as well post the other video I took. Excuse the lack of vibrato--I haven't gotten to that yet in my lessons. But this song has SHIFTING in it!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0l2nV7mBBQ

oh god that's horrible

Red Alert 2 Yuris Revenge
May 8, 2006

"My brain is amazing! It's full of wrinkles, and... Uh... Wait... What am I trying to say?"
I'm really really considering trying out a concertina, and that rental service posted earlier seems like it might be an awesome way to do it somewhat cheaply. However, if anyone knows how to play one, how hard is it for someone with little musical experience? I played guitar for a few years, so I still remember a tiny bit about reading music and such.

I like a lot of the classical stuff I've heard, and that is what I would try to work towards playing, but it seems like you can do a lot of piratey sounding stuff too which is just an added bonus.

Electric Lady
Mar 21, 2010

To be victorious
you must find glory
in the little things
This topic convinced me to pick up a Feadog pennywhistle in D, which came in the mail today. I've been playing with it on and off throughout the day and it's definitely tough to adapt to! While the D fingering isn't difficult, I'm used to singing bass and playing trumpet, so the amount of breath I usually use is much greater than that which is necessary for the whistle. I'm finding myself overblowing often and making godawful shrieks.

I'm taking the advice presented early in the topic, working through the low ends of the scale slowly, so I don't develop any bad habits. I'm curious if there's anything else I need to keep in mind for steady playing, like fingering technique, posturing, etc.

TapTheForwardAssist
Apr 9, 2007

Pretty Little Lyres

quote:

Over the course of the thread I caught a bad case of Gear Acquisition Syndrome and now own a... Q-Chord (a synth/electronic autoharp)



This thread could really use a Q-chord post; you up for it? The Q-chord (previously known as the Omnichord) was as he notes an electronic autoharp, but over time Suzuki has kind of dropped that mention of its origin since "autoharp" doesn't really resonate with the kids like it used to. Looking at YouTube, most of the clips are by some pretty unhip people, but then again it's also been used on a variety of indie albums, so an instrument in two worlds.

BigHustle: my main question, does it feel like a pretty quality instrument for the price? I'd initially thought of it more as a novelty instrument, but looking at it more it seems it has some serious potential. Good buy for the money ($225 on Amazon, often used on eBay or CL)? Would you, overall recommend it for music-novice goons interested in electronic instruments? A better first choice than, say, a keytar, or a Kaossilator?

If you can rig up a post for this thread that'd be awesome. Though you have your work cut out for you choosing the best Omnichord/Q-Chord YouTube clips, as there is a lot of weird, weird stuff on this instrument.

EDIT: okay, The Conchords do pretty well with it.



quote:

[IRT tinwhistle] I'm taking the advice presented early in the topic, working through the low ends of the scale slowly, so I don't develop any bad habits. I'm curious if there's anything else I need to keep in mind for steady playing, like fingering technique, posturing, etc.

Mainly what you're doing: focus on getting sustained, clear tone. So far as fingering techniques, a lot of it is going to depend on what style of music you're looking to play, since the "ornamentation", all the little stylistic bits outside the very literal melody, depend on what tradition you're playing in. As noted, 95% of the instructional/example materials online for tinwhistle are in the Irish tradition, so even if that's not your ultimate goal it's still the easiest way to learn a lot of stylistic techniques like rolls, trills, crans, etc.

If breath pressure and fingering are among your issues, I'd recommend just really patiently going through scales at a slow pace, and also get in some practice in jumping between the harmonics. That is, finger a note and blow it smoothly at its lowest octave, and then jump to its next octave, and then breathe just a bit harder to jump it a fifth. That way you can get a feel for what pressure you need to play at each octave cleanly

quote:

oh god that's horrible

Meh, basically everyone sounds like utter rear end when they're learning violin. It's just a instrument which takes a certain amount of technique to sound decent, so there's a substantial learning curve. Sounds great once you get smooth bowing down. As a couple of other goons have mentioned, violin is an instrument where you should really consider at least some professional instruction early on to get you through those initial hurdles.


Contest Winner posted:

I'm really really considering trying out a concertina, and that rental service posted earlier seems like it might be an awesome way to do it somewhat cheaply. However, if anyone knows how to play one, how hard is it for someone with little musical experience? I played guitar for a few years, so I still remember a tiny bit about reading music and such.

I like a lot of the classical stuff I've heard, and that is what I would try to work towards playing, but it seems like you can do a lot of piratey sounding stuff too which is just an added bonus.

Concertina is actually a pretty good first instrument. Unlike the above tinwhistle and violin, there's not much tricky initial technique. You push a button and move the bellows, and you get clean sound, so though a noob might hit wrong notes or have poor rhythm, at least it doesn't sound bad. Concertinas are pretty portable, don't require much maintenance, and starter ones are pretty affordable. Overall a good instrument to start on.

I was puzzling out which type of concertina you should try, but then I noticed you mentioned Classical music, so you positively want to get an English concertina. Anglo concertinas are good for a lot of kinds of folk music and are harmonically and rhythmically really intuitive. Duet concertinas are easy to harmonise on, and in my opinion make great singer-songwriter instruments. But only the English combines fluid sound with a fully chromatic scale, and readily available at a reasonable price. The English-system concertina was actually specifically designed for Classical music in the Victorian era, so it's your default choice. An English has a range pretty much like a violin, so once you get basic techniques down and can read music, you can probably just rock out buying violin sheet music, though I've also seen folks online playing concertina off of classical guitar sheet music.



English also does folk music quite well; it doesn't have the inherent bounciness of an Anglo, though you can introduce that by deliberately changing bellows directions though you don't physically have to.

If you want to play classical at all, you really want to learn how to read music. Which is not at all hard for the English, just takes some basic practice. There's a good book free online by Frank E. Butler that teaches a lot of the basics (link to a page with a variety of old concertina materials), so though a bit dry it gives you a general idea. I'd also strongly recommend joining the Concertina Forums (concertina.net/forums) and introducing yourself, asking for some starter advice for the styles of music you want to play, etc.

So far as the instrument goes, renting a concertina from The Button Box (Massachusetts) is a good option, or else just buying a Jack or Jackie concertina for $389 from Concertina Connection. The two have the same fingering system and scale, just the Jack is an octave lower (Jackie is a treble English concertina, Jack a baritone). Do not, do not, do not buy a no-name concertina off eBay; it'll be utter shite. If you can't google the brand of a concertina and get a bunch of forum posts talking about how great they are, don't touch it. Concertina Connection has pretty much cornered the starter market through actual quality control, so they're your main bet.


To sum up: yes a concertina is a great instrument even for noobs. Yes, it does classical well, and for that you want an English concertina. Renting one or buying a CC Jack/Jackie would be the best way to go. I mainly advise you go watch a bunch of YouTube clips of Classical (and whatever other styles you like) concertina, compare treble vs. baritone English to see which pitch speaks to you more, and join Concertina Forum to get final advice as you move towards a rental/purchase.

I'll leave you with my favorite classical concertinist: Juliette Daum.

felgs
Dec 31, 2008

Cats cure all ills. Post more of them.

This thread is wonderful! It's definitely piqued my interest in a few things--like Irish flute and the like; I've always wanted to learn more about it.

That said, I had not seen much other than page 3 on the lap (celtic) harp. I just started learning/practicing it pretty recently (while I was unemployed in February, needed something to do with the time between job interviews!). That said, does anyone have any recommendations on practice material with it, or online resources for it? Especially stuff written for both hands.

BigHustle
Oct 19, 2005

Fast and Bulbous

TapTheForwardAssist posted:

This thread could really use a Q-chord post; you up for it? The Q-chord (previously known as the Omnichord) was as he notes an electronic autoharp, but over time Suzuki has kind of dropped that mention of its origin since "autoharp" doesn't really resonate with the kids like it used to. Looking at YouTube, most of the clips are by some pretty unhip people, but then again it's also been used on a variety of indie albums, so an instrument in two worlds.

I can do an in-depth post, sure. Give me a day or so to put my research goggles on and throw something together.

quote:

BigHustle: my main question, does it feel like a pretty quality instrument for the price? I'd initially thought of it more as a novelty instrument, but looking at it more it seems it has some serious potential. Good buy for the money ($225 on Amazon, often used on eBay or CL)? Would you, overall recommend it for music-novice goons interested in electronic instruments? A better first choice than, say, a keytar, or a Kaossilator?

Well, it isn't going to sound like a Roland AXSynth, but it isn't $1200 either. I wouldn't compare it with the Kaossilator, mainly because they are really two different animals. You can make farting robot sounds with the Kaossilator where you can't with the QChord. If that is your determining factor, then I'd go with the Kaossilator.

For a total musical novice it's a godsend. You can turn it on, press a few buttons and live the Wesley Willis rock and roll dream, complete with backing band. The auto-chord function is great for getting the basics down and it can do major, minor, 7th, major 7th, minor 7th, augmented, or diminished chords for any key. The strumplate is kind of a pain in the rear end since it requires a fairly heavy hand to register that it's being used, but you can also bang on it like a toddler and never get an off note.

It's nice to be able to pull it out, surf to a site like Chordie and be able to play a song using the chord progressions and not have to worry about having to learn a new chord or fingering. I mostly use it to write basic chord progressions and put down accompaniment for vocals. This thing has helped me become the karaoke king.

For more advanced musicians it may be frustrating for use other than basic chording. It also locks you into a limited number of voices for auto-chord and the strumplate, so if you want to go your own way or have unrestricted freedom, you'd be better off getting a synth. You can also use it as a MIDI controller, but I've read online that the MIDI functions aren't standard so there's a bit of bullshit you have to go through to get it done.

Overall, I'd say that it's a decent buy for anyone looking for a relatively inexpensive instrument that won't require a ton of practice time or army of manuals to coax good sound from as long as you can accept and tolerate it's limitations.

Red Alert 2 Yuris Revenge
May 8, 2006

"My brain is amazing! It's full of wrinkles, and... Uh... Wait... What am I trying to say?"

TapTheForwardAssist posted:

Great stuff

Thanks for this, it is fantastic. What you've said pretty much echoes a lot of my own research, I had been listening to stuff online and I'm leaning towards the baritone, and I was looking at the Jack from Concertina Connection. I'll have to look into the finaces to see which way is best for me. Juilette Daum was actually my first exposure to this instrument and her stuff is fantastic. I will have to join that forum though, good advice.

Also I meant to say before that the effort you put into your posts is astounding, excellent stuff.

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withak
Jan 15, 2003


Fun Shoe
My girlfriend got me a Chieftain low D whistle for a late, late christmas present and it is pretty awesome. It is basically a very thick-walled aluminum pipe so it is also probably useful for self defense.

I have also been eyeing one of those cheaper hayden concertinas for longer than is healthy. :-/

withak fucked around with this message at 08:08 on Mar 4, 2012

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