THE KITCHEN SESSIONS !

[Robin T]

Robin, I love the kitchen sessions-- this is my kind of music!
Hope you're dog tired after the session tonight! Please let us know how it goes when you get the chance.

[Lisa -S.H.]

Great going! Yes, playing music with friends in front of a cozy stove or fire is about as good as it gets.

By the way, when I first saw that photo with the stove I thought- WOW THAT'S SOME BIG DULCIMER!.... but then I realized it was a little tenor guitar there.

[Robin the Busker]

It's 0120am and we are home from the session. I played for about 4 hours
I'm sold on dddd. It is a really easy tuning to use and it cuts through beautifully. I sat with two fiddlers and we created a little melody section. There were a couple of guitars, banjo, tenor guitar/mandolin, harp and bass. I was really pleased at how tight the playing was tonight. With a small group like that you can really work together well. And it always helps when the audience is appreciative.

You'd have loved it Robin T - we played loads of those great old time tunes that just bounce along .

Robin

[Robin T]

4 hours? Wow! It takes real endurance to strum & note fiddle tunes for that long. Wish I could've been there!

I'm not surprised that you like Galax tuning, Robin. It's a curious thing to me that more players don't use Galax (or Bagpipe) tuning.

I'm with Jill-- you put out a cd and I'm buying it!

Robin T

[Lisa -S.H.]

I'm sold on dddd.

Robin, you are using all thin gauge strings, like your melody string, right? no thick or wound strings? All same octave, same note?
Are you playing ionian mode in D by using the 6 1/2 fret while in that mixolydian mode tuning with the tonic on the open string?

[TenorChris]

Hello everybody! Hope nobody minds a Tenor guitarist joining you - I'm a true friend of the lovely Dulcimer. You may have guessed I'm the Tenorist on the Kitchen Sessions. I thought I ought to contribute my twopennyworth. I too am delighted by the combination of these two instruments, they really get "evocative" when they're going properly. Some of the tunes seem to hark back to their British roots - Shady Grove particularly was sounding very medieaval. Great stuff.
The galax tuning is also great, we could hear Robin very well tonight and we're a rowdy bunch of pluckers when we get going!
So thank you, Dulcimer folk, and keep on keeping on, I know we will.

[Robin the Busker]

I'm sold on dddd.

Robin, you are using all thin gauge strings, like your melody string, right? no thick or wound strings? All same octave, same note?
Are you playing ionian mode in D by using the 6 1/2 fret while in that mixolydian mode tuning with the tonic on the open string?

Hi Lisa,

Yes - that is it exactly.

I have 4 x thin plain gauge strings all tuned to "d" in the same octave. I think that I have 2 x 0.013 (melody pair) and 2 x 0.012 (drone pair) on my Walnut Creek (27.5 VSL) at present plus I use a possum board that I built and a Dunlop nylon .73 pick (I think that I could do with a larger size pick, it is the next area to experiment with). The 4 strings are set equidistant and I use my noter across the first two strings leaving strings 3 and 4 as drones. From what I can work out, this is the system that Galax players like Phyllis Gaskins use. I have not yet found a feather to use - and I would like to try that strumming method out - but I know many modern Galax players have switched to a pick, so I think that I just need to find the right one for me.

For key of D fiddle tunes I play ionian in that mixolidian tuning using the 6+. Although I must say that many tunes acutally don't use that note.

For G I play ionian with the root at fret 3 across the two d,d drones.

For A (dorian/aeolian/mixolidian and ionian) I use a reverse capo at the first fret on the drones and the 6+ if required. Plus I use the "angled noter" technique to snatch the 7th of the scale in A ionian (say for a tune like Buffalow Gals) as only the mixolidian notes are avaialable with this tuning. The reverse capo worked well - it was very quick to fit and required no more than the tuning check adjust that I do after each tune anyway. For some ionian/mixolidian tunes in A, it is simpler just to just fit a full capo at the first fret (say for Cripple Creek) because you can then do a pull-off for the root note rather than jumping the noter down to it - it is just faster.

Th basic tuning of dddd remains the same throughout - I'm just using a half or full capo at the first fret (no higher) to access key of A tunes. With this system I seem to have pretty much every standard fiddle tune covered in the key that they are normally played at sessions.

I can just drop the 2nd string from d to A to give ddAd (bass to trebble) and still play all the DAd chord melody tunes I know. It is quite simple to mute the third string (the inner drone) while fretting the 4th string if the open d does not fit the chord you want to play. I played that version of "Soldiers Joy" that I posted earlier this week using this tuning. Last night I used this tuning for "Land of my Fathers" and it works fine for those quieter melodic pieces. Also, if you kick off "Land of my Fathers in a Welsh pub then the whole place falls silent so the loss of volume compared with the punch of noter/drone is not an issue

Like Robin T, I'm not sure why more players don't use this very versatile dddd tuning system with eqidistant spacing - virtually every MD has the bridge and nut cut for it - I had to make no modifications to my Walnut Creek. I can now certainly understand why it has a reputation as a "session" tuning for use when playing with other instruments.

The strangest thing is that I have just not noticed that the bass strings are not there? I think that the MD must naturally generate under-tones as well as over-tones?

Robin

[Robin the Busker]

Hello everybody! Hope nobody minds a Tenor guitarist joining you - I'm a true friend of the lovely Dulcimer. You may have guessed I'm the Tenorist on the Kitchen Sessions. I thought I ought to contribute my twopennyworth. I too am delighted by the combination of these two instruments, they really get "evocative" when they're going properly. Some of the tunes seem to hark back to their British roots - Shady Grove particularly was sounding very medieaval. Great stuff.
The galax tuning is also great, we could hear Robin very well tonight and we're a rowdy bunch of pluckers when we get going!
So thank you, Dulcimer folk, and keep on keeping on, I know we will.

Hi Chris!

Great session last night

I was getting "Have you supercharged that dulcimer!" looks from Nick the Banjo all evening

Hey - it looks like we will have to work up some tunes on MD and tenor guitar - it could be a fun project How about a busking session in Aberystwyth town centre before Christmas? That way we could perhaps earn enough loose change for a coffee and sticky bun while we practice

Robin

[TenorChris]

Hi Robin,
Yes, poor old Nick with you on one side and my ladder-braced Tenor shouting at him from the other I bet he could hardly hear himself
Definitely up for working-up some tunes and a bit of a busk if we can find a warm spot! Maybe we should think about the CD too!?

[KenH]

Rbin Busker said "The strangest thing is that I have just not noticed that the bass strings are not there? I think that the MD must naturally generate under-tones as well as over-tones?"


My theory is that it's the wound bass that contributes to a lot of the 'bass-ness' of dulcimer sound.

I have a vintage 3 string which has nut & bridge built for non-wound bass strings. I have a plain 14 for the bass, and plain 11s for the mid and melody. Yes the instrument is a bit narrower and shallower, which by reducing interior volume reduces the bass-ness, but I suspect the lack of a wound bass is also contributing to the lack of dominant bass sound. Next time I replace the bass string on my Hambas dulcimer, I think I'll use an unwound string to see what difference that makes.

[Robin T]

Just jumping in with a welcome for TenorChris! Any friend of Robin the Busker's is a friend of EverythingDulcimer.

Robin T

[Marshall Thompson]

That was great. Thanks for sharing .