Re: [HG-new] Digest for hurdygurdy@googlegroups.com - 6 Messages in 2 Topics

[Winters, James]

Hello, and testing to see if this works, to post in. I do have a few
museum pictures of lira. Also there is one man in New York. I could
describe more. Natalie is in Canada and wrote once to me. She used to
be in Virginia. I have two copies of her book. Her PhD is in folklore
from that region as far as I know, or that is what she teaches for
sure. I wanted to say that this is a great topic in my opinion.
The sociological part of the hurdy gurdy seems to me to be so very
interesting. Poland's history is there, a little too, along with the
Ukraine. I was in Poland once but only to play jazz. Poland is as we
know much more Catholic and the Ukraine more Orthodox. I don't want to
go on too much and I'm not an expert, oh no, only feel interested in
slightly technical writings about the Lirnyk (the people). What this
is about is the Byzantine lira, hence the Orthodox mind set, it seems.
Yet, Polish lira players also existed or where they sighted not blind?
I'd love to read more. I would love if someone has access and
rerecorded the sound on a wax roll to digital such as for a simple
youtube. How happy those very humble people might feel if they could
have even known of modern interest. Life is strange indeed.

[myron postolan]

I don't want to get side tracked by religious debate but there were two main religious  beliefs/churches in Ukraine - and still is.
Orthodox (which itself is split into 3 categories), and Greek Catholics which are similar to Roman Catholics but with special dispensations from Rome eg. priests are allowed to be married if they were so before they took their final vows.

Lirnyky played outside/near to churches( and market/ bazars) because that's where the people cum potential income was - regardless of denomination hence the spiritual,religious and moral content of their repertoire.

On the question of wax/cylindrical recordings of lirnyky please read the following - go down the page to an incredible artcle by William Noll   ;

 http://www.loc.gov/folklife/news/Spring93.txt

Hope this might be of interest to many HG enthusiasts.

Keep the wheel turning
Perebendya

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[Winters, James]

Nice post, nice to read. thanks
Ukrainian Orthodox I was thinking.
I knew only of Greek Orthodox but not of Greek Catholics.
Nice to read your thoughts
Very nice link above and I recommend it to anyone.
Maybe this is become "musical historians"
This is a small quote from that link, so it is nice.
.......... .............. .............. .............
"The first group of cylinders to be duplicated will be those
containing the music of the blind minstrels whose musical repertory
contained some of the most important national symbols in Ukrainian
culture. They sang the epics known today as dumy, of the exploits
of the Cossacks, as well as of village life, and provided the
village with examples of an upright and moral life. They also
carried a unique religious repertory, especially the psal'my, based
on religious, non-liturgical texts, primarily of village origin..."

.................
> myron postolan <maz...@gmail.com> Oct 18 12:46PM +0300 ^

[Arle Lommel]

Hi all, this is off topic, but maybe someone here can help me with a stringing question.

I am retrofitting a cobza (Romanian lute) that needs some work to repair a considerable amount of wear and some bad "improvements" made to it in the past (e.g., replacing tapered pegs with cheap guitar tuners). I would like to replace the current, narrow range tuning with mandola tuning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandola), which is essentially viola tuning. I would also like to use octave tuning since the instrument is set up with chorus tuning.

The scale length is 448 mm, but due to a lute-style peg head, strings must be at least 500 mm.

Any suggestion for how I would determine the appropriate strings? There are a lot of variables I don't know, like tension, that make it difficult to use a string gauge calculator.

-Arle

[Kazimierz Verkmastare]

Cobza could be as well built as any other lute, or not.  This is a short-scale instrument, so I will have to assume it is closer to the fretless Oud than to the fretted lute - most instruments that follow the regular string tension rules of the fretted lute have scales of 550mm or longer, some up to 800mm.  It often happens that you break a lute before you break a string, so erring on the light side is good, especially when bringing back an older instrument of uncertain pedigree.

 

Tension starting at the first course of most lutes is around 3.6 Kg, although I have seen string sets which based the 1st course at 4.2-4.3 Kg that seems a little high for my comfort on an older instrument (there are several makers that are building for higher tension nylon or carbon strings nowdays, but those are new instruments).  But since you have a shorter instrument you will experience higher tensions on each gauge of strings than you would on the long necked instruments, so somewhere in the range of 3.9-4.0 Kg for the first course doesn't seem too dangerous, and would still feel pretty good for playing with fingertips and not plucking with nails.

 

I am not an expert, but I have been taught to start at the base string of the first course, reduce the tension by 10% for the base of the second course, and reduce it again by 10% for each course to the 5th, then 10% again for all courses below that.  The octaves should be somewhere around the tension of the lowest base string, adjusted a bit for preference.

 

In other words, the 1st course starting at 4.0 Kg, the second at 3.6 Kg, the third thru fifth at 3.24 Kg, the 6th (common 11 string lute) 2.9 Kg.   The octaves should be around 2.9 Kg or thereabouts.  The lowest bass strings might have to be a bit higher tension if you choose a loaded or extra high twist gut because they will tend to have a wider cycle and buzz against the octaves if they are too slack, you probably won't know until you string it up.

 

So knowing the tension, length and the note you are trying to attain, you can find a diameter that will give you at least 20% safety margin below the breaking point.  You can actually go as low as half the breaking tension for any given length and get useful sound on a lute, but if you want it to be bright and responsive, keep the string for each length thinner rather than thicker.

 

I have never hit one right on the head first time out, but I have gotten enough information out of putting a few strings on key places on the instrument and then seeing how they felt to get close to optimum on the second pass.

 

There are several stringmakers and lute builders / merchants who have so much experience they can shoot an unknown instrument pretty well first time out, and they are willing to do so.  But usually the formula above will produce a playable, if not optimal, instrument when you don't have any specific information.

 

Hope it helps

 

Chris

[vonh...@aol.com]

A copy of "Historic Lute Construction" by Robert Lundberg (ISBN 0-9626447-4-9) might help. I understand he was the foremost authority on lute construction during the end of his life. He seems to prefer both nylon and gut and uses both Pyramid and La Bella strings.

 

Chris, if you don't yet have a copy of the book you NEED it. Trust me.

 

Scott

> Hi all, this is off topic, but maybe someone here can help me with

> a stringing question.

>

> I am retrofitting a cobza (Romanian lute) that needs some work to

> repair a considerable amount of wear and some bad "improvements"

> made to it in the past (e.g., replacing tapered pegs with cheap

> guitar tuners). I would like to replace the current, narrow range

> tuning with mandola tuning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandola),

> which is essentially viola tuning. I would also like to use octave

> tuning since the instrument is set up with chorus tuning.

>

> The scale length is 448 mm, but due to a lute-style peg head,

> strings must be at least 500 mm.

>

> Any suggestion for how I would determine the appropriate strings?

> There are a lot of variables I don't know, like tension, that make

> it difficult to use a string gauge calculator.

>

> -Arle

[vonh...@aol.com]

And if you need an over complicated version of a string selector here it is http://www.donaldsauter.com/string-calculation.htm

 

I'm not a math type guy so I could figure this out with a lot of help and several pencils. Good luck.

 

Scott

[Leonard Williams]

Arle--
I took the liberty of forwarding your help request to the Lute List
to which I subscribe. There are a couple of folks with Eastern European
experience who might be of assistance (I hope!).

Regards,
Leonard Williams

[George Leverett-Altarwind Hurdy Gurdies]

Hi All:
There's a recording project going on up in Vancouver, B.C.; the producer is
looking for a hurdy gurdy player to experiment on a few tracks in the
studio.

He described the act as "Ancient Metal, a lot of Celtic overtones, symphonic
stuff but with heavy guitars here and there as well". The two tracks I've
heard are pretty terrific, both creatively and in terms of production value.

If you're a player in that neck of the woods and interested in a studio gig,
please contact me offlist for more info.
Thanks,
George Leverett

[Gašper Kvartič]

Dude! That sounds nice!

Although I can't really help (I'm from Slovenia, L0L), I will be glad if any further notifications on the subject will be posted. I'm interested in folk, folk rock and folk metal, so this really caught my eye.

Also, if any of you has any more information about this kind of things, please let me know (any bands with the HG, cool songs ...)

Thanks!

[Jeffery mayott]

anybody have box hurdygurdy for sale ? let me know

> Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2010 14:20:32 -0400
> Subject: Re: [HG-new] Digest for hurdy...@googlegroups.com - 6 Messages in 2 Topics
> From: hurdy...@gmail.com
> To: hurdy...@googlegroups.com

[Felicia Dale]

If I had my electric/acoustic gurdy I'd give it a try... Soon!!!

Felicia.

On Oct 21, 2010, at 6:21 PM, George Leverett-Altarwind Hurdy Gurdies
wrote: