Harder Than It Looks

I am currently working on learning the chords and singing along to "The Parting Glass" which is a wonderful closer at the end of a night of making music. It's a lovely tune, and I'm getting better bit by bit. Mind you, if my autoharp hadn't gone all un-tunable on me I might not be doing this right now, I'd still be working on my repetoire on the more familiar instrument. String changing is a long weekend project, and since I just had to pay to repair a flat tire on my lovely little PT cruiser, I'm lacking the funds for the new strings anyway. So out comes the mountain dulcimer, on it's fancy new stand, which is just lovely, from Ray Lynn Woods. I actually bought the book before the dulcimer arrived last Spring, as I figured Slow Airs would be just my speed starting out.

As you know, I started with the Dulcimer School, and my subscription to that is about to end now that I have a few of the basics down. So I picked up the book and went through it again and found, what I thought, was a good song to start with. Each verse ends with the toast "good night and joy be with you all" and it looks as if I might actually be able to learn this one before the next music party. My fingertips are toughening up once again, and I'm practicing more now too. Now that the cool Autumn temperatures are coming in, I'm really looking forward to making music in my little cottage with my friends. I will be honest with you, I was thrilled with the beautiful cover art on this book as well, it is by the very talented Rachel Arbuckle. My thirst for music, history, song, and instructional notes is thoroughly quenched, and it even comes with a CD to give you an idea of how some of the songs go. This will give me hours of pleasure this winter, and I'm taking a staycation when October switches to November. You may or may not see me blogging about my progress here, depending on my mood. That will be ME time that I sorely need.

So the title of this entry is it's harder than it looks, because Neal makes it look so easy as he plays on a beautiful Folkcraft teardrop dulcimer, a couple of laments.

Beautiful, I have hours and hours of practice ahead of me, but it's music like this that makes me so glad I took up the Mountain Dulcimer.

Listening to the Spring Sampler

I got a little over-excited about taking up the Dulcimer. Other players understand what it's like to catch the bug, but my family is still a little wary about it. They don't know quite what to think or how long I will keep up my enthusiasm. With no dulcimer in my hands as of yet, I get by with what I can, by doing things like subscribing to the Dulcimer Players News. It came with a free CD too. Imagine that! A quarterly publication with great articles, dulcimer TAB, and a CD for only $30.00 a year? Well, of course I just had to subscribe right away. Then I got the latest issue right away as well. Sweet!

There are a full 11 songs on the sampler, and it includes hammered dulcimer tunes as well. I love the sound of a hammered dulcimer, I just don't think I'll ever learn to play one. I have plenty of work to do with the Autoharp and the Kantele...and soon the mountain dulcimer. Soon.

Sigh. Not soon enough to suit me, I grow a bit impatient with all this waiting. So the 2011 Spring Sampler CD is in the rotation on the stereo, along with Garden of Mysteries by Ruth Barrett which has two instrumentals with her on the dulcimer. The third and final CD that I use to keep me company while I wait for my new baby to arrive is The Wind that Shakes the Barley by Loreena McKennitt. Before I even realized I was going to take up the mountain dulcimer, I had started picking up CD's for inspiration. That last CD was one of those, because she goes back to her roots and sings a bunch of traditional Celtic songs. The music is lovely, but there are hardly any notes and no lyrics in the package, and I discovered that's one of the things that I love most about Loreena McKennitt's work. Her stories about the songs would transport me and help me share her perspective even as I find my own. Not on this one, I'm on my own.

I've also read two books to pass the time, my sister loaned them to me, along with a third. I think that's how I'll spend the rest of this evening as well. Reading and listening to music. I don't watch TV at all anymore. Why put up with the advertising when I can fill my heart with music and my mind with stories? With folk music the two combine as one, and I don't need anything else but others to share them with.

SF&F Con Creates Music...And Musicians

It's all Becca's fault. If she hadn't pulled out that Autoharp from the case on that fateful June evening and played it right there in front of me and the whole world, I never would have known how much I wanted one of my own. So now I've gone and ordered this one from Ebay:


So now it's my latest obsession, along with all things related to folk/irish music. It even comes with it's own gig bag to keep it safe and sound.


Speaking of sound, I plan to visit Homestead Pickin' Parlor to pick up a tuner and see about taking classes with Karen Mueller, because she actually did write the book on Celtic Autoharp. I may never watch TV again, I'll be busy tuning my Autoharp. And yes, Becca, it has 21 bars and the fine tuning. It was a good deal on Ebay, brand new, free shipping and even had the soft-case with it. I'm all kinds of excited to dive right in and learn how to play well enough to sing, and then well enough to play with the Autoharp as my main instrument.

BTW-I sing well without an instrument, but accapella sounds lonely in a music circle. The thing about Autoharps is that they are not respected by folks around here much. They probably heard more than one that was horribly out of tune and decided they weren't cool. Also, all you have to do to get a chord is push a button. That's a big plus for me as a vocalist, because it will be much easier to learn material without having the difficulty of learning guitar.

Life is meant for living, and I'm tired of sitting outside the music circle when my voice is longing to soar. I love the sound of the 'harp anyway, always have, and I plan to learn to play it well enough to earn a little respect with it as well.

Celtic & Ren Faire Music

One of my favorite things to do is listen to live music, with my favorite being folk and celtic music. I am longing to get out and do some singing you see, which can be kind of difficult without an instrument to sing along to. I tried taking up the guitar a couple of times, the first time in high school with a six string, the second time in my late twenties with a twelve string. I loved the sound of the twelve string, but my tiny fingers had problems with holding down two strings and a time. But all those strings sure were yummy!

Fast forward to last Saturday night, when my husband and I went to see Riverfolk play at the Riverview Cafe & Wine Bar. When I saw Becca pull out an Autoharp memories of my childhood flooded back to me. You see my grade school had an Autoharp and they let me take it home to play with. I sat for hours strumming away on it, and I remember that I was loathe to return it to school after the weekend. A quick search on Autoharp and it yeilded some fabulous YouTube videos.

Next weekend is CONvergence, can you beleive it? Riverfolk is scheduled to play Friday Night in the Harmonic Convergence Room, and I'm certainly going to make an effort to go hear them play again.