Re: [scots-l] Tiny monster

2001-04-04 Thread Ian Adkins 

Naw, they're guid fer ye!  Here, hae anither wan!


==
IAN J. L. ADKINS - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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- Original Message -
From: PerssoN [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Tuesday, April 03, 2001 7:04 PM
Subject: Re: [scots-l] Tiny monster


 Please stop sending your mails to me !!


 - Original Message -
 From: "Jack Campin" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 Sent: Monday, April 02, 2001 1:51 PM
 Subject: Re: [scots-l] Tiny monster


   My current exercise in instrument abuse is playing Scottish tunes
   on the Black Sea fiddle or "kemence"
   So it won't be long before Blackfriars have a few of these in stock,
   then?
 
  Wouldn't be a bad idea - they're good value for the money, extremely
  well made and nice tone (the strings and bow you get with them are
  invariably shit, though).  I got mine in Istanbul years ago, but only
  just got round to doing anything with it.  Problem is that if even a
  Turkish instrument shop can't set them up correctly, how likely is
  Blackfriars to sell them in playable condition?
 
 
   I have just resisted buying a 'bombarde' from Scayles for 24.95.
   Pakistani made, oboe reed and neat little conical bore pipe turned
   from something resembling rosewood in one case, with a couple of
   keys and the rest finger holes. For the money it looked excellent
   value, but they could not tell me what temperament or indeed what
   sort of scale it played.
 
  I suspect this is nearer to a zurna than a bombarde, i.e. the design
  ethos is that having the fingerholes in the right places is for wimps;
  you half-hole, shade-finger or lip down to get the right pitch.
 
  It shouldn't have an oboe reed - a pipe chanter reed is more like it.
  You don't hold the reed between your lips.
 
 
   They suggest it 'sounds like a snake charmer'
 
  Charm is not quite the word.  They probably use them to clear cobras
  from cricket stadiums before test matches.
 
 
   might be just up your street, Jack, they have two in the little window
   to the right of the entrance with the low whistles, tin whistles and
   stuff.
 
  I've seen them.  I can't play high-pressure wind instruments at the
  moment, waiting (...and waiting...) on some plastic surgery to fix
  that.  A couple of short tunes on a clarinet or practice chanter is
  about my limit for now, otherwise I'm stuck with flute-family things.
 
 
   Any idea if these bombardes have any applications?
 
  If you have moles in your garden, point it down one of their holes
  and they won't stop running till they hit Australia.  Or have your
  dentist point it into your mouth to descale your teeth.
 
  The one instrument in this family I do fancy is that Catalan keyed
  tenor shawm thing.  I've played an ordinary tenor shawm and it's fun
  but a bastard to play beyond the diatonic scale.
 
  === http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/jack/
===
 
 
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Re: [scots-l] Tiny monster

2001-03-31 Thread Jack Campin 

 For anyone still surviving my attempts to play instruments which
 have relevance to anything at all, lend an ear to this one - the
 Greek baglama. It is best described as a soup ladle which accidentally
 got strings.

The word and the instrument are Turkish, though the Turkish word (it
means "tied", referring to the frets) usually applies to a larger size.
The Turkish word for what you've got is "cura saz", the first word
pronounced like "Jura"; it also means a small shrill-voiced hawk.  So
perhaps a set comprising "The Earl of Jura" and "The Hawk that Swoops
on High" might be appropriate.

(BTW, when did Jura ever have an earl?  What is that tune about?)


 This is a little sort of primitive piece I've called 'Out of the Bag'
 and played on the baglama with a tabor-style drum beat accompaniment.

The pun doesn't work with the Turkish pronunciation - BAAlama.


 It's great for dispersing excess Shetland fiddlers!

My current exercise in instrument abuse is playing Scottish tunes
on the Black Sea fiddle or "kemence" - long thin soundbox, tuned in
fourths D-g-c, flattish bridge so you can't play the middle string
without sounding an outer one, hand-tensioned bow so you can relax
it and triple-stop at any time, played suspended vertically by the
left hand (traditionally, players are also dance callers, and dance
themselves, or at least leap about among the dancers, while playing
it).  It's good for dreich ballad tunes, and pipe tunes aren't too
hard (transposed A - D) if they don't use the low G.  Should sound
dead mediaeval along with a wire harp.  It isn't in fact mediaeval:
no kemence is known from before about 1880 and its earlier history
is obscure, it may have been invented by the Adzhar people of the
Caucasus, based on Turkmen and Italian models.  I don't propose to
inflict an MP3 on the world in the near future.

=== http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/jack/ ===


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