Well presented and explained. Mean temperament sounds really interesting. I have to add that equal temperament is more acceptable when you're used to listening to it. When you keep away from it for a while it sounds brutal. My experience after studying Indian classical music for several years.
Thank you. I think that just intonation is particularly interesting as it is the natural pitching that any maker of folk instruments, anywhere in the world, and at any point in history would have ended up. Only when instruments needed to modulate did the need for other temperaments arise.
Yes, I'm a fan of just intonation on mountain dulcimers. But that is because I play in noter drone style so perfect intervals are important. Many drone instruments from all parts of the globe are built in just intonation so the melody notes and drones blend perfectly. Also, it was easier in earlier times to build a folk instrument set to perfect intervals rather than the artificial construct of equal temperament.
@@birdrockdulcimers Also, I'd never heard of quarter comma Meantone, and, as I chord, and use alternate tunings and modes, that may be the one I'd most enjoy. Thank you for a very interesting and informative lesson! 🙏🏻
Great demo. I think I understand what is going on now. I have made Dulcimers in the past, but My musical knowledge was much less then. I moved onto making Dobros. With a steel bar for a fretting instrument, this relationship is some what moot for me. It however still illuminating.
Hi, I used to play dobro in a bluegrass band. I still have a Rob Ikes Wechter/Scheernorn, although it doesn't get played much at present. I know that most dobro players, me included, tune the b strings (3rd of the scale) a little flat of equal temperament to sweeten the tuning. This is effectively pushing the instrument into just intonation - and, as you say, the fret positions are just a guide. The exact pitch of individual notes are basically selected by the player (like on a violin) - so I expect that many of us play in just intonation without even realising we are doing so - particularly if we are mimicking a sung phrase.
I don’t play the Mountain Dulcimer but love the sound. I play the guitar though. Mostly flatpicking and backing Celtic dance tunes and songs but open to other genres. I live in Brussels, Belgium 🇧🇪 if anyone come around with such a lovely instrument feel free to contact me. Thanks uploader! Very interesting video. I am a big fan of Wendy Songe 😽 Regards
So they got these 3 temperaments.. does that mean they are tuned differently, or are they made differently? IS this a diatonic one or chromatic one? I saw some that are chromatic, and some are 6 string, and some guy plays jazz on it.. I am just getting more confused about it..
The dulcimers frets are set slightly differently for each temperament. You will only rarely find a new dulcimer in anything other than equal temperament. The three dulcimers are all diatonic but one has an extra fret - the 6+. Again this is standard on modern dulcimers - it is rare to find a new dulcimer that is purely diatonic without the 6+.
I don't have a video but I recorded a short music clip a while back on the meantone fretted McSpadden teardrop dulcimer that appears in this video. I've uploaded the sound clip to Soundcloud here: soundcloud.com/robin-clark-937720894/clocks-mean-tone-28-mar-15
Thank you--it sounds wonderful and I think dulcimer players would like this. A few years before he died, the late Nashville dulcimer professor David Schnaufer told me that the oldest "Tennessee music box" dulcimers in his collection were fretless and the wear of the fingers were in spots indicating pure intervals (maybe similar to the way Highland bagpipes have intervals that are tuned in just intonation). If you use Windows Movie Maker to add a photo or other image, you can turn an MP3 into a "video" that can be uploaded to UA-cam, and consequently found more easily.
My question is what type of intonation do violinists, and other string players, use as, of course, the player can adjust the intonation from note to note. Would string players be characterized as playing in a type of temperament?
They tend to adapt to other instruments to produce the most concordant sound. That means they tend towards just intonation intervals to other notes, when possible. Because it's hard to do by ear for scales, it's only approximate, of course. Similar things happen in choirs without accompanying instruments like in barbershop quartets.
Could you please tell me what is the first one, I repeated the beginning several times and I couldn't listen to the kind of temperamant! Many thanks in advance, and thank you so much for this really useful and important video.
Cyndi Lauper? Why would you pick someone like that? Of all the great dulcimer players from the mountains that played all their lives, and you pick a clown? Probably the last person, and last song I would want to listen to and learn from. I am thinking Allman Bros, and other virtuoso players and you say Cyndi Lauper..couldnt pick a more opposite example.
Why don't you try being more polite? He was just trying to answer your question. Perhaps he wasn't aware of your person _opinions_ on Cyndi Lauper and the "virtuostic" Allman Brothers. You asked if you could play one with a band. He said yes and gave you an example. You can chill the hell out and be polite and thank him for the answer. You were the one here asking him questions because he knows about dulcimers and you don't, and you dare mock him for giving you an answer you don't like? Piss off.
You can absolutely play a just intonation (JI) dulcimer with an equal temperament (ET) band. Just be cognizant of your tuning limitations. If you play harmonies, they will sound a lot better than if you do unisons, but not everything will be perfect. I mean, the harmonies are never perfect in a strictly ET band, so you already have some leeway built in with the fact that your audience is used to hearing some imperfect harmonies anyway. Just stick to common keys like D, A, or G, and it should sound great. If you try to play in Ab, though, you will have to obviously tune in a way that keeps you as close as possible to the rest of the band.
Hi. A 1-5-5 tuning is one where the bass string is tuned to the root note of a scale and the middle and melody strings are tuned to the 5th note of the same scale. So DAA or CGG would both be examples of 1-5-5 tunings on mountain dulcimer.
Hi Jay, Thanks for your comment, and a Happy Christmas! I'm very interested in temperament on Appalachian mountain dulcimers and fretted zithers from Europe so I try and keep an eye on this comment trail. The fretted zithers I make to play myself are set in just intonation and I've developed a new instrument for playing the old dance tunes and ballads from where I live in Wales. In the Welsh language the instrument is called a 'Bocs Can Idris' with a ^ over the letter a. It means 'Idris' Song Box'. Idris was a prince who fought a battle against the Irish on the slopes of the mountain above our valley. The instrument has two fretboards tuned a 4th apart and 7 sympathetic drones as well as 5 main drones. I have played a number of concerts with the instrument and was in our village's 12th century church playing for a Christmas concert on Sunday. Using just intonation for the fret pattern makes the melody sound very smooth against that collection of drones and means that notes like the 3rd and 6th of the scale blend without the need for chord changes.
fretted 1/4 comma guitars exist (rare) but I think fretless would be difficult - assuming your guitars tuned in fourths they need to be fractionally sharp I guess - thing is although the good thing with fretless is it is free of temperament and can potentially do anything; equal temperament will tend to inform your playing similarly you'd need to be very well acquainted with meantone to duplicate meantone fretless. It's easier to play near just - avoiding meantones flat 5ths but concentrating on making the 3rds, 6ths and minor 7ths more pure and clean and beatless. The minor 7th will sound great about 1/4 fret space back from where a normal minor 7th would be if fretted. Minor 3rd play slightly sharp (about 15%) and major 3rd about the same amount flat if that helps; you can soon get a feel for more in tune 3rds and 7th
Well I'd say keeping the guitar in 4ths is good - equal temperament 4ths and 5ths are very near to just so there is little to no difference practise - it wouldn't be hard to tweak so the standard tunings just and learn to adjust playing for the just 3rds over relearning scales - it's more adjusting finger position on a few notes then - you got fret markers on your fretless?
john smith its a converted so... you can see different color where it had them... was thinking about tuning in thirds cos it makes the chromatic scale to be played in 4frets over 3strings, and every chord in 2 to 3 frets... maybe having the mayor third perfect would make it closer to meantone...
Perfect musical notes are not fixed in position but relative to the notes around them - so if you change key the perfect pitch of a given note may also change by a few cents. This is because of the physics of string (and air in wind instrument) vibration. Eg, If you half the length of a string you get an octave, If you take a 1/3rd off the length you get a perfect 5th, a 1/4 off the length gives a perfect 4th, if you take a 1/5th off the length you get a perfect 3rd etc etc. When you hear these perfect intervals against the root note of the scale they blend with the minimum amount of dissonance (the beats you hear when bringing a string into tune). Because of this, the perfect intervals are the easiest to find when singing or, indeed, setting the frets by ear on an instrument. A barber shop quartet will sing in these perfect intervals and early dulcimer makers would listen for the best blend of notes when setting their frets. However, you cannot modulate (change key) without re-tuning on an instrument with the frets set in just intonation because the gaps between the notes differ - for example from the root note to the second of the scale is 204 cents but from the second of the scale to the 3rd is only 182 cents. This limits the playability of a fretted instrument, particularly if you want to play chords with different root notes. Quarter comma meantone was an early attempt to 'temper' the problems of just intonation - it is based around having perfect 3rds and moving the other notes accordingly. Equal temperament is a later development. In equal temperament the notes are adjusted so that there is 100 cents between each semitone based on 1200 cents in an octave. So most notes are slightly adjusted from their true positions but it makes a fretted instrument or fixed note instrument like a piano very adaptable - and so equal temperament has become the modern 'norm'.
Technically yes. But practically it would be difficult as each string in standard tuning would require its own fret placement - and if you moved tunings to something else like DADGAD the frets would be out. On a dulcimer it is different as with the older styled of playing only the melody string is fretted, the middle and bass strings are played as open drones and never fretted, so the frets need only be set for the melody string - hence just intonation and quarter comma meantone work. In modern styles of dulcimer playing all the strings are fretted in chord shapes, so equal temperament has become the norm. You can play chords on a dulcimer in quarter comma meantone and it works well but the open strings are tuned to the root and 5th of the scale so the variance is not as great as it would be on a guitar in standard tuning.
i wish you would have demonstrated how dorian does not work in the JI fretting... or where there are bad chords... is there another video which includes some real playing, rather than merely demonstrating?
Miko Sloper - when I have a bit of time I'll post some more about temperament on dulcimers in different modes. I find myself playing old Lenoard Glen dulcimers most often as he used a just intonated set up but with the 6th in its sharper position, like the varient on Indian scales.
Hi Chris, The problem is that in DAA the D string scale starts at the nut and the A string scale starts at the 3rd fret. In just intonation the second of the scale is 204 cents from the root note of the scale but the 6th is 182 cents from the 5th note of the scale. On this dulcimer the fret positions are set for the A melody string - the root note 'd' being at the 3rd fret. So if you fret the bass D string as part of a chord then the 1st fret, 5th fret and 8th fret will be quite a way out - you would need to pull the D string to sharpen it if you use those frets. Harmony pairs played on the two A strings against the open D string work beautifully.
Yes, it's quite a lot to get your ears around! The easiest way to think of it is that there are natural musical intervals where the sound waves fit together perfectly (just intonation). But on instruments with fixed note pitches (such as piano) that can modulate (change key) these natural intervals don't work all the time. So musicians have had to come up with ways of slightly altering the natural pitches so that all notes harmonise as well as possible. Equal temperament and quarter comma meantone are compromises to allow playing flexibility across keys with the least amount of dissonance.
I actually learned a lot from this video, and from the comments. I am only just starting to figure out how music works; I had no idea that pitch is a relative thing, and that modern "octaves" are different from natural octaves, and that halving a string gives an octave, etc. Fascinating. My dulcimer was supposedly made by Frank Proffitt in the 1960s, so I'm guessing it's an old fashioned just intonation instrument? I was wondering why it sounded different from some of the ones I hear people playing.
Most dulcimers are equal temperament? But I though the whole point of their uneven string placement was for Just Intonation. The world today, even instrument makers are just so stuck on equal temperament. People that make instruments like these should know better.
Not at all! The uneven fret placement on dulcimers is because traditional Appalachian music is not fully chromatic. While today there are chromatic dulcimers, traditionally they are only fretted for 7-9 of 12 notes per octave. The dulcimers in this video (based on visual fret position) might be tuned to the scale D E F# G A B C C# D. That means that D#, F, G# and A# are unavailable. This is okay, because traditional melodies generally do not require all 12 notes, and dulcimer is in practice not a chordal instrument in the same way that a guitar is. A dulcimer is more like melody + 2-3 supporting drone notes. The difference between equal temperament and just intonation is subtle, visually speaking .We are talking about a difference of a few millimeters in terms of fret placement. From a distance, an equal tempered and JI dulcimer look basically the same. What's important to keep in mind that neither JI nor equal temperament were historical standards that dulcimer makers/players adhered to. The Appalachian dulcimer is from its origins a 'homemade' instrument. People placed the frets wherever they felt were right. If there was any sense of temperament (ie something other than JI) it was a result of practical compromise, not mathematical calculation.
And too add to what he said, these days most dulcimer players want to play with other musicians, like guitar players. Guitars are equal temperament. These days so are banjos. It isn't like luthiers don't know better. They simply want to sell instruments that WILL sell. I'm sure you can understand that!
You're out of tune. Just intonation is based on natural acoustics and acoustic resonance. Equal temperament is based on mathematics and has nothing to do with acoustics. Check your ears.
keeelane actually, all tuning systems have a lot to do with mathematics. Just intonation is based on having perfect ratios between the semitones and the bass (tonic) of the scale. For example, a fifth in will temperament has a frequency 3/2 times the bass.
Well presented and explained. Mean temperament sounds really interesting. I have to add that equal temperament is more acceptable when you're used to listening to it. When you keep away from it for a while it sounds brutal. My experience after studying Indian classical music for several years.
Unintentional ASMR Video of the Year award goes to ....
what she is saying is that she can completely relax just by hearing the sound of your voice in this video.
A clear demonstration of an important topic, one we don't usually hear or think about but which is fundamental. Thank you!
Thank you. I think that just intonation is particularly interesting as it is the natural pitching that any maker of folk instruments, anywhere in the world, and at any point in history would have ended up. Only when instruments needed to modulate did the need for other temperaments arise.
Thank you John, uncle Ed would have been pleased, I am inspired, I believe I have some spare wood laying around.
What a great insight. Thanks.
That’s so cool! I also have a Homer Ledford dulcimer, I never realized he likely set the frets by ear.
Just intonation sound lovely!
Yes, I'm a fan of just intonation on mountain dulcimers. But that is because I play in noter drone style so perfect intervals are important. Many drone instruments from all parts of the globe are built in just intonation so the melody notes and drones blend perfectly. Also, it was easier in earlier times to build a folk instrument set to perfect intervals rather than the artificial construct of equal temperament.
@@birdrockdulcimers Thanks. We will have to make lullabies in that!
Fascinating. The Just intonation hurt my ears. And my soul. Ouch.
@@birdrockdulcimers Also, I'd never heard of quarter comma Meantone, and, as I chord, and use alternate tunings and modes, that may be the one I'd most enjoy.
Thank you for a very interesting and informative lesson! 🙏🏻
@@moonharp "hurt my ears and soul" lmao, cant help with that
a really helpful video
Wow,Bach ist the Undertaker 💀💕for Pythagoran Tuning,5 Years Alcatraz🐒😂👍😂😆😆😆🐖💖
How many Costs for a Dulcimer???you build self?I am a Keyboarder and repair Electro. Keyboards...
Great demo. I think I understand what is going on now. I have made Dulcimers in the past, but My musical knowledge was much less then. I moved onto making Dobros. With a steel bar for a fretting instrument, this relationship is some what moot for me. It however still illuminating.
Hi, I used to play dobro in a bluegrass band. I still have a Rob Ikes Wechter/Scheernorn, although it doesn't get played much at present. I know that most dobro players, me included, tune the b strings (3rd of the scale) a little flat of equal temperament to sweeten the tuning. This is effectively pushing the instrument into just intonation - and, as you say, the fret positions are just a guide. The exact pitch of individual notes are basically selected by the player (like on a violin) - so I expect that many of us play in just intonation without even realising we are doing so - particularly if we are mimicking a sung phrase.
I don’t play the Mountain Dulcimer but love the sound.
I play the guitar though. Mostly flatpicking and backing Celtic dance tunes and songs but open to other genres.
I live in Brussels, Belgium 🇧🇪 if anyone come around with such a lovely instrument feel free to contact me.
Thanks uploader!
Very interesting video.
I am a big fan of Wendy Songe 😽
Regards
So they got these 3 temperaments.. does that mean they are tuned differently, or are they made differently? IS this a diatonic one or chromatic one? I saw some that are chromatic, and some are 6 string, and some guy plays jazz on it.. I am just getting more confused about it..
The dulcimers frets are set slightly differently for each temperament. You will only rarely find a new dulcimer in anything other than equal temperament. The three dulcimers are all diatonic but one has an extra fret - the 6+. Again this is standard on modern dulcimers - it is rare to find a new dulcimer that is purely diatonic without the 6+.
Is there a video where you can play a piece using the meantone-tuned dulcimer?
I don't have a video but I recorded a short music clip a while back on the meantone fretted McSpadden teardrop dulcimer that appears in this video. I've uploaded the sound clip to Soundcloud here: soundcloud.com/robin-clark-937720894/clocks-mean-tone-28-mar-15
Thank you--it sounds wonderful and I think dulcimer players would like this. A few years before he died, the late Nashville dulcimer professor David Schnaufer told me that the oldest "Tennessee music box" dulcimers in his collection were fretless and the wear of the fingers were in spots indicating pure intervals (maybe similar to the way Highland bagpipes have intervals that are tuned in just intonation).
If you use Windows Movie Maker to add a photo or other image, you can turn an MP3 into a "video" that can be uploaded to UA-cam, and consequently found more easily.
My question is what type of intonation do violinists, and other string players, use as, of course, the player can adjust the intonation from note to note. Would string players be characterized as playing in a type of temperament?
They tend to adapt to other instruments to produce the most concordant sound. That means they tend towards just intonation intervals to other notes, when possible. Because it's hard to do by ear for scales, it's only approximate, of course. Similar things happen in choirs without accompanying instruments like in barbershop quartets.
Could you please tell me what is the first one, I repeated the beginning several times and I couldn't listen to the kind of temperamant! Many thanks in advance, and thank you so much for this really useful and important video.
Or mean temperament for short. What Mozart is written for.
Can you play any of these along with guitars, like in a band? I was thinking of how to do that..kind of like an Allman Bros. type band..
Yes - Take a look at Cyndi Lauper doing True Colours live.
Cyndi Lauper? Why would you pick someone like that? Of all the great dulcimer players from the mountains that played all their lives, and you pick a clown? Probably the last person, and last song I would want to listen to and learn from. I am thinking Allman Bros, and other virtuoso players and you say Cyndi Lauper..couldnt pick a more opposite example.
Why don't you try being more polite? He was just trying to answer your question. Perhaps he wasn't aware of your person _opinions_ on Cyndi Lauper and the "virtuostic" Allman Brothers. You asked if you could play one with a band. He said yes and gave you an example. You can chill the hell out and be polite and thank him for the answer. You were the one here asking him questions because he knows about dulcimers and you don't, and you dare mock him for giving you an answer you don't like? Piss off.
You can absolutely play a just intonation (JI) dulcimer with an equal temperament (ET) band. Just be cognizant of your tuning limitations. If you play harmonies, they will sound a lot better than if you do unisons, but not everything will be perfect. I mean, the harmonies are never perfect in a strictly ET band, so you already have some leeway built in with the fact that your audience is used to hearing some imperfect harmonies anyway. Just stick to common keys like D, A, or G, and it should sound great. If you try to play in Ab, though, you will have to obviously tune in a way that keeps you as close as possible to the rest of the band.
Thank you for a very interesting explanation. I didn't understand what you meant by playing 155 however, can you please explain?
Hi. A 1-5-5 tuning is one where the bass string is tuned to the root note of a scale and the middle and melody strings are tuned to the 5th note of the same scale. So DAA or CGG would both be examples of 1-5-5 tunings on mountain dulcimer.
Aaaaaah thank you@@birdrockdulcimers :)
I can't believe you commented on a video you posted in 2016! Kudos and thanks for this very informative video!
Hi Jay, Thanks for your comment, and a Happy Christmas! I'm very interested in temperament on Appalachian mountain dulcimers and fretted zithers from Europe so I try and keep an eye on this comment trail. The fretted zithers I make to play myself are set in just intonation and I've developed a new instrument for playing the old dance tunes and ballads from where I live in Wales. In the Welsh language the instrument is called a 'Bocs Can Idris' with a ^ over the letter a. It means 'Idris' Song Box'. Idris was a prince who fought a battle against the Irish on the slopes of the mountain above our valley. The instrument has two fretboards tuned a 4th apart and 7 sympathetic drones as well as 5 main drones. I have played a number of concerts with the instrument and was in our village's 12th century church playing for a Christmas concert on Sunday. Using just intonation for the fret pattern makes the melody sound very smooth against that collection of drones and means that notes like the 3rd and 6th of the scale blend without the need for chord changes.
very educational
if i wanted to tune my guitar for meantone... what should i do?
gingercore69 You don't.
fretted 1/4 comma guitars exist (rare) but I think fretless would be difficult - assuming your guitars tuned in fourths they need to be fractionally sharp I guess - thing is although the good thing with fretless is it is free of temperament and can potentially do anything; equal temperament will tend to inform your playing similarly you'd need to be very well acquainted with meantone to duplicate meantone fretless. It's easier to play near just - avoiding meantones flat 5ths but concentrating on making the 3rds, 6ths and minor 7ths more pure and clean and beatless. The minor 7th will sound great about 1/4 fret space back from where a normal minor 7th would be if fretted. Minor 3rd play slightly sharp (about 15%) and major 3rd about the same amount flat if that helps; you can soon get a feel for more in tune 3rds and 7th
john smith cool, i could tune in thirds, so it would be easier to play arround... altho i would have to learn all scales and chords again
Well I'd say keeping the guitar in 4ths is good - equal temperament 4ths and 5ths are very near to just so there is little to no difference practise - it wouldn't be hard to tweak so the standard tunings just and learn to adjust playing for the just 3rds over relearning scales - it's more adjusting finger position on a few notes then - you got fret markers on your fretless?
john smith its a converted so... you can see different color where it had them... was thinking about tuning in thirds cos it makes the chromatic scale to be played in 4frets over 3strings, and every chord in 2 to 3 frets... maybe having the mayor third perfect would make it closer to meantone...
2:18 That's exactly where I want to be. What you talking about?
P.S. Quarter-comma temperament sounds great
Perfect musical notes are not fixed in position but relative to the notes around them - so if you change key the perfect pitch of a given note may also change by a few cents. This is because of the physics of string (and air in wind instrument) vibration. Eg, If you half the length of a string you get an octave, If you take a 1/3rd off the length you get a perfect 5th, a 1/4 off the length gives a perfect 4th, if you take a 1/5th off the length you get a perfect 3rd etc etc. When you hear these perfect intervals against the root note of the scale they blend with the minimum amount of dissonance (the beats you hear when bringing a string into tune). Because of this, the perfect intervals are the easiest to find when singing or, indeed, setting the frets by ear on an instrument. A barber shop quartet will sing in these perfect intervals and early dulcimer makers would listen for the best blend of notes when setting their frets. However, you cannot modulate (change key) without re-tuning on an instrument with the frets set in just intonation because the gaps between the notes differ - for example from the root note to the second of the scale is 204 cents but from the second of the scale to the 3rd is only 182 cents. This limits the playability of a fretted instrument, particularly if you want to play chords with different root notes. Quarter comma meantone was an early attempt to 'temper' the problems of just intonation - it is based around having perfect 3rds and moving the other notes accordingly. Equal temperament is a later development. In equal temperament the notes are adjusted so that there is 100 cents between each semitone based on 1200 cents in an octave. So most notes are slightly adjusted from their true positions but it makes a fretted instrument or fixed note instrument like a piano very adaptable - and so equal temperament has become the modern 'norm'.
birdrockdulcimers Would it be possible to re-fret a guitar to quarter-comma meantone anyways?
Technically yes. But practically it would be difficult as each string in standard tuning would require its own fret placement - and if you moved tunings to something else like DADGAD the frets would be out. On a dulcimer it is different as with the older styled of playing only the melody string is fretted, the middle and bass strings are played as open drones and never fretted, so the frets need only be set for the melody string - hence just intonation and quarter comma meantone work. In modern styles of dulcimer playing all the strings are fretted in chord shapes, so equal temperament has become the norm. You can play chords on a dulcimer in quarter comma meantone and it works well but the open strings are tuned to the root and 5th of the scale so the variance is not as great as it would be on a guitar in standard tuning.
@@matthewramroop 31 tone equal temperament is very close, but it comes at a cost of playability, especially of the higher registers of the guitar.
@@birdrockdulcimers outstanding summary.
i wish you would have demonstrated how dorian does not work in the JI fretting... or where there are bad chords...
is there another video which includes some real playing, rather than merely demonstrating?
Miko Sloper - when I have a bit of time I'll post some more about temperament on dulcimers in different modes. I find myself playing old Lenoard Glen dulcimers most often as he used a just intonated set up but with the 6th in its sharper position, like the varient on Indian scales.
Which chords and notes sound bad in just intonation?
Hi Chris, The problem is that in DAA the D string scale starts at the nut and the A string scale starts at the 3rd fret. In just intonation the second of the scale is 204 cents from the root note of the scale but the 6th is 182 cents from the 5th note of the scale. On this dulcimer the fret positions are set for the A melody string - the root note 'd' being at the 3rd fret. So if you fret the bass D string as part of a chord then the 1st fret, 5th fret and 8th fret will be quite a way out - you would need to pull the D string to sharpen it if you use those frets. Harmony pairs played on the two A strings against the open D string work beautifully.
Just intonation sounds so pure and lovely, but then when you start comparing intervals my head starts to hurt.
Yes, it's quite a lot to get your ears around! The easiest way to think of it is that there are natural musical intervals where the sound waves fit together perfectly (just intonation). But on instruments with fixed note pitches (such as piano) that can modulate (change key) these natural intervals don't work all the time. So musicians have had to come up with ways of slightly altering the natural pitches so that all notes harmonise as well as possible. Equal temperament and quarter comma meantone are compromises to allow playing flexibility across keys with the least amount of dissonance.
I actually learned a lot from this video, and from the comments. I am only just starting to figure out how music works; I had no idea that pitch is a relative thing, and that modern "octaves" are different from natural octaves, and that halving a string gives an octave, etc. Fascinating. My dulcimer was supposedly made by Frank Proffitt in the 1960s, so I'm guessing it's an old fashioned just intonation instrument? I was wondering why it sounded different from some of the ones I hear people playing.
4:40 "here is a ______ dulcimer"? I can't understand what you said there at all. Is that the name of the builder or a type of dulcimer?
justforever96 Homer Ledford dulcimer. Thats the name of the builder.
13 people think dulcimers are stupid. "Guitar and synth are where it's at."
Most dulcimers are equal temperament? But I though the whole point of their uneven string placement was for Just Intonation.
The world today, even instrument makers are just so stuck on equal temperament. People that make instruments like these should know better.
Not at all! The uneven fret placement on dulcimers is because traditional Appalachian music is not fully chromatic. While today there are chromatic dulcimers, traditionally they are only fretted for 7-9 of 12 notes per octave.
The dulcimers in this video (based on visual fret position) might be tuned to the scale D E F# G A B C C# D. That means that D#, F, G# and A# are unavailable. This is okay, because traditional melodies generally do not require all 12 notes, and dulcimer is in practice not a chordal instrument in the same way that a guitar is. A dulcimer is more like melody + 2-3 supporting drone notes.
The difference between equal temperament and just intonation is subtle, visually speaking .We are talking about a difference of a few millimeters in terms of fret placement. From a distance, an equal tempered and JI dulcimer look basically the same.
What's important to keep in mind that neither JI nor equal temperament were historical standards that dulcimer makers/players adhered to. The Appalachian dulcimer is from its origins a 'homemade' instrument. People placed the frets wherever they felt were right. If there was any sense of temperament (ie something other than JI) it was a result of practical compromise, not mathematical calculation.
And too add to what he said, these days most dulcimer players want to play with other musicians, like guitar players. Guitars are equal temperament. These days so are banjos.
It isn't like luthiers don't know better. They simply want to sell instruments that WILL sell. I'm sure you can understand that!
Was this recorded on a wax 78 rpm original and then duplicated 100 times? I don't know what the hell you are talking about anyway so goodbye.
Everything other than equal temperament is out of tune. Sounds horrible.
You're out of tune
You're out of tune. Just intonation is based on natural acoustics and acoustic resonance. Equal temperament is based on mathematics and has nothing to do with acoustics. Check your ears.
keeelane actually, all tuning systems have a lot to do with mathematics. Just intonation is based on having perfect ratios between the semitones and the bass (tonic) of the scale. For example, a fifth in will temperament has a frequency 3/2 times the bass.