Musician Talk

[JoB]

You need to sit him down and have The Catgut Talk, and reassure him (a) it's not really catgut, and (b) if it is, it's no one he knows.

And c) if there's any catgut, it's the strings; the bow uses horse hair, if anything.

(On a more serious note, I'ld guess that the cat "blames" the bow because that's the part moving the most, and in sync with the music caterwa screec audio experience to boot, of course.)

[Hrollo]

"Catgut" is short for "cattle gut" anyway. Cats were never used in the making of violins. They have been used in the making of shamisens, though not to make the strings, but rather the thin resonating membrane of the instrument.

[Juniper]

(On a more serious note, I'ld guess that the cat "blames" the bow because that's the part moving the most, and in sync with the music caterwa screec audio experience to boot, of course.)

Yeah I've thought about that, I was wondering why it's just him though who has to make such a fuss about me playing the violin and not any of the other cats. I think it's just because as much as I love him he's a pretty whiny cat and has to make a fuss about everything  he's one of those cats who will get mad if you're sleeping when he wants attention because "why are you sleeping instead of petting me !? Unacceptable !" or maybe just like people some noises are pleasant or acceptable to one cat but totally intolerable to another.

"Catgut" is short for "cattle gut" anyway. Cats were never used in the making of violins. They have been used in the making of shamisens, though not to make the strings, but rather the thin resonating membrane of the instrument.

Yeahhh I made sure to look that up as soon as I started taking violin lessons and heard about catgut strings to make sure they weren't using actual kitty guts. That's interesting that cat parts have been used in another instrument though. Kind of like how the talons of birds of prey used to be used in the making of harpsichords (or more infamously how piano keys used to be made out of actual ivory) But then that makes me wonder, what drove people to just, take a cow's intestines and go "hmm yes, I'm going to string this over a wooden box and run some hairs from a horse's tail over it, I bet it'll make a neat sound." then again, people used to use animal parts more back before modern inventions and would actually use the whole animal instead of letting it go to waste, and I'm guessing they were more familiar with what parts could do what.

Edit: I also had gut strings for a hot second once. I went back to nylon though. Gut strings are really good for baroque music, but they don't have enough power behind them for my personal taste.

[Hrollo]

Well, animal guts, along with plant matter, were an early source of material fiber for hand spinning, to create threads and ropes. And there aren't that many material that are sturdy enough to support the tension on a string instrument; before metal and nylon strings were avalaible, most instrument strings have been made either of cattle gut or of silk.

[Róisín]

Yep, cattle gut, sheep gut, silk or metal. Used to be bronze, silver or various alloys, now more likely steel or fine woven wire. I have played one of those raindrums with gut strings stretched taut between the two drumheads, and one with alternate groups of gut and what looked like fishing line strings, which were meant to produce sounds like light and heavy rain, with thunder from the drumheads.

[DB (f.k.a. DaveBro)]

Norway has a distinctive double-strung violin called the Hardanger Fiddle.  The joke goes that with a regular fiddle you play on "catgut", but on the hardingfele, you play on the whole cat.

The late Joe Bethancourt, on The Naked Banjo, starts off on a gut-strung, fretless, 4-string banjo, brilliantly playing his way through the instrument's evolution on a succession of period instruments and songs. So good, you might forget it's educational. 
He uses a silver-strung mail order guitar on Who Fears the Devil, singing songs from Manley Wade Wellman's stories of Silver John.
<shameless plug>
http://www.whitetreeaz.com/
</shameless plug>

He also made an SCA Filk album with Leslie Fish, Serious Steel, among many other interests and accomplishments.

[Róisín]

Oooh! Didn't know Wellman's stuff had been set to music.

[DB (f.k.a. DaveBro)]

Oooh! Didn't know Wellman's stuff had bee set to music.

If it's not available from Joe's website, I think Random Factors (http://www.random-factors.com/ sorry, under renovation) sells his recordings as well as Leslie Fish. 

Also, you can still get Wellman's Silver John collection, legally IIRC, from the NESFA Press (http://www.nesfa.org/press/ New England Science Fiction Association), along with other titles.  Author David Drake seems to be MWW's literary executor, so this in collaboration with him.

Click links at your own risk.  Not responsible for any financial losses or overloads of bliss.   

[Juniper]

I've been a fan of the Hardanger fiddle since I found out that's what the cool dramatic strong solo from the piece Rohan Fanfare from the Lord of the Rings film score was played on.

[Róisín]

DaveBro, thanks! I shall risk it!

[urbicande]

Does anyone else have animals who are very responsive to you playing your instrument ? I have a cat who's about 15

My ex's dog is very responsive to someone playing an instrument in her house.  Usually, he responds by barking loudly at them until they stop.

[Iceea]

My ex's dog is very responsive to someone playing an instrument in her house.  Usually, he responds by barking loudly at them until they stop.

I have a John Fahey CD where midway through one of the pieces his dog starts barking, he stops tells the the dog to be quiet, which it does, he then just picks up the piece and keeps playing. Talk about home recording

[cati]

I'm perhaps disproportionately infatuated with the hardingfele (one summer I made a habit of popping into a museum near my office just to stare at theirs, even behind glass with no one playing or anything) but they're so pretty and sound amazing and I also just enjoy reading about the different tunings, their names and when you're meant to use them and stuff (as a conventional violinist, multi-tunable violins feel like a Big Deal, lol.) So many strings, so overwhemingly beautiful, etc.

[urbicande]

I'm perhaps disproportionately infatuated with the hardingfele (one summer I made a habit of popping into a museum near my office just to stare at theirs, even behind glass with no one playing or anything) but they're so pretty and sound amazing and I also just enjoy reading about the different tunings, their names and when you're meant to use them and stuff (as a conventional violinist, multi-tunable violins feel like a Big Deal, lol.) So many strings, so overwhemingly beautiful, etc.

This reminds me that I have a sälgflöjt that I got last year in Sweden that I need to pick up and try ti play again.

[Juniper]

Anyone else have a wishlist going of dream instruments they want to pick up ? I have two that I've really had my eye on for a quite a few years now, my favorite being the hammered dulcimer:

They're just so old and whimsical sounding, I love it plus I find them to be pretty visually pleasing too. The only issue is from what I hear they're a huge pain to tune.

Then there's the celesta:

So it pretty much has the same format as a piano, the only difference is that the hammers inside it strike a metal bar instead of a string like they do with piano, giving it that lovely chiming sound. It's been infamously used by same of my favorite composers like Tchaikovsky and Bartók in some of their pieces.