Dusty Strings Hammered Dulcimer Owner's Manual - Page 14
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Matching pitches.
matching pitches. You hear a note from your standard and tighten or loosen a string
to match it.
is can be quite simple, and it can also be frustrating.
ment has a lot to do with it, both physically and psychologically. Tuning alone in a
quiet room is certainly easier than tuning on stage in a noisy tavern.
Many people fear tuning, and others think themselves incapable of it. Both of
these beliefs are usually unfounded. Nearly everyone can learn to match pitches.
Sometimes it takes a great deal of practice, but it is defi nitely a skill that can be
learned rather than an inherited gift. One thought to keep in mind: in addition to
tuning in order to practice, practice tuning.
When attempting to match pitches, you should be able to hear the standard
note while changing and sounding your string. Keep blowing the pitch pipe while
tuning — it is much easier than trying to remember the note. Once you hear the
standard note, there are only three possible conditions that exist: 1) your string is
fl at (too loose), 2) your string is sharp (too tight), or 3) your string is in tune (just
right).
e object of ear training is to learn to tell the diff erence between these three
conditions.
With your standard note droning in the background, change the pitch of your
string. Tighten it to make it obviously sharp, then slowly loosen it and listen as the
pitch gets lower, goes into unison with the standard, then drops into the obviously
fl at range. Reverse the processs, and try other notes. Learn to tell the qualitative
diff erence between sharp and fl at. Learn to recognize the two notes coming together
into unison. Some fi nd it easier to hear two notes coming together when they start
fl at and raise the string up to pitch. Get feedback from others. Pretty soon, you'll
get the hang of it.
As you experiment, you may hear a curious kind of pulsation, or "wow-wow-
wow", occurring as the notes get closer together. You can learn to use this phenom-
enon to aid your tuning.
closer to the same pitch, and will fi nally stop altogether when they're in unison.
A musical interval is the distance between any two notes.
Middle C and the next higher C is an octave.
match. If your standard note is one octave lower than the note you want, you can
still tune in just about the same manner as if it were the same (unison) note. Other
intervals, particularly the one between Do and Sol on a major scale, are also easy to
hear, and with practice you can use these intervals to speed up the process of tun-
ing.
Tuning Sequence. Now for the actual tuning. If you are using a pitch pipe,
the most direct method of tuning is to match all of the notes on the dulcimer that
are available on the pipe. Once you have gone through the single octave of notes on
the pipe, your knowledge of the tuning scheme will allow you to tune the remain-
ing notes. For instance, by tuning the G on the right of the treble bridge you have
also tuned the D on the left side. So now you can use this D to tune the D you
need at the upper right of the treble bridge. Similarly, you can get the next note, E,
by matching it to the E on the left side of the treble. You may have to use octave
intervals to get some notes. In fact, once you can hear octave intervals well, you can
simply use the pitch pipe to tune all of the notes on the instrument.
e whole discussion of tuning really comes down to
e "beats" will slow down as the two notes get closer and
e interval between
is is an easy interval to hear and
e environ-
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