Conference cookie::notes$archive:cd_v1

    
    Thanks for posting this!  I've had on the 'back burner' a wish to
    hear more H.D. music ever since hearing someone - who was very good
    - play at [of all places] the Ski Show Theatre at Sea World.
      (is it Hammered Dulcimer, or Hammer Dulcimer ??)  - Chris

Pardon my ignorance but what is a "hammered Dulcimer?"

-Phil

    The Hammered Dulcimer is a string instrument that is played with
    2 padded hammers.  I just picked up Bruce Hornsby and the Range
    disc "the way it is", some of the songs have the dulcimer in them.
    The last track "The Red Plains" ends with a dulcimer.  Sounds similar
    to a piano, with a little more twang.  (hard to explain)
    
    Don

The hammered dulcimer (and the piano) are percussion instruments, not string
instruments.

The distinction comes in that string instruments must produce their sound by
plucking or rubbing the string, whereas percussion instruments produce their
sound by impact on something which resonates.

/john

    .4  Thanks for correcting me.  I meant to say an instrument with
    strings versus a string instrument.
    
    Don

	re: .*

	I believe it is either Hammer Dulcimer (ala Dalglish's liner 
	notes), or Hammered Dulcimer (ala Victory Garden credits).  Up
	till this album, the best analogy for me  was always:
		Guitar:Steel Guitar::Piano:Hammer[ed] Dulcimer
	Since listening to this album, I feel this is too limiting. 
	Dalglish gets such a variety of sounds from his instrument, that
	I can no longer compare it to just one instrument.

						     
							- JP

    The Fresh Aire Series of disk often have a hammer Dulcimer.
    
    
    Let's see if I have this correct...
    
    A piano is a percussion instrument, because the strings are struck
    with a hammer.
    
    A harpsichord is a string instrument, because the strings are plucked.
    
    Correct?
    
    
    						-Paul
    

	Pick up John McCutcheon's "Winter Solstice" on Rounder. It
	contains "seasonal" songs, including his best-known song,
	"Christmas in the Trenches".
	
	Mike

I have this Dalglish CD too.  It is NOT representative of most hammered
dulcimer music, which is generally in a folk or dance category.  Dalglish
is playing "New Age" style.

Also, most hammered dulcimers are not chromatic, having just 8 notes per
octave instead of 13.  My impression from the liner notes was that Dalglish's
is chromatic, and it sounds like it to me.

The hammers are not always padded.  What exactly the striking surface of the
hammer is made out of depends on what you want it to sound like. Some hammers
have two striking surfaces, and you can flip them over to change "voice".
Dalglish might be using other non-traditional objects to play his instrument.
Oh, sometime you pluck the strings with your fingernails.

It is not that unusual for a dulcimer player to build his own instrument.
Not real common, but it is done.  You can buy plans.

>Also, most hammered dulcimers are not chromatic, having just 8 notes per
>octave instead of 13.
    
    Gee, my piano only has 12 notes per octave.  Am I missing one?

    re.  .10
    	Yup, you missed the top note of the octave.  B to B is an octave.
    Ric

    Re/ .11:
    
    And I suppose a week is 8 days, as your logic would have it.

        Yeah, you know, "Eight days a week".
    
    ;-)

    -Steve

    re. .12
    	Nope, not 8 days per week (unless the extra day is on the weekend).
    The octave is actually the INTERVAL of 8 diatonic degrees between
    two tones, one of which has twice as many vibrations as the other.
    	
    Ric
    

    Not that it matters, but (a la Mike Barnicle):
    
    In equal temperment, the octave is split into 12 equal intervals,
    called semitones.
    The frequency ratio is the twelfth root of 2, so twelve of them
    "add" (actually multiply) to give the ratio of 2:1 for an octave.
    
    Whether you call an octave 12 or 13 notes is just a matter of chosing
    to include both endpoints, or just one.  In either case, the interval
    of an octave contains 12 semitones.
    
    The hammer dulcimer (not to be confused with the American folk
    dulcimer, which is plucked and has only about 3 strings) is of East
    European origin, and is considered to be a precursor of the piano.
    In otherwords, a piano is a hammer dulcimer with a separate hammer
    for each string, and a set of keys for actuating the hammers.

Every hammered dulcimer that I have heard was tuned on a pentatonic scale
rather than the 12-tone diatonic scale used in nearly all modern and classical
music.  The pentatonic scale is commonly used in folk instruments, such as
the hammered dulcimer or the bagpipe.  One result of using a pentatonic scale
is that a hammered dulcimer cannot play an arbitrary piano composition--some
of the notes just aren't there.

--PSW (end of non-CD diversion)

For non-CD purposes, this discussion has been moved to the folk
music notes file.   MTV::FOLK_MUSIC.