Chiff and Fipple Forums

Two things that help me:
Making sure I breathe through my mouth (helps keep mouth dry)
Drinking tea before playing (tends to dry my mouth)

Breathing entirely through the mouth and not the nose helps as does avoiding foods, especially sweet things for 15 -20 minutes before playing. I like to drink a cup of black coffee, or better yet black tea 30 minutes before playing - it seems to dry my mouth.

It's also known as Paddy's Return and is on the Comhaltas site (http://comhaltas.ie/music/detail/paddys_return/) as such.

I sit by myself and let people fill in the chairs next to me. Then it's their fault for sitting next to a rhythmically challenged player.

Squidgirl identified a problem back in June of 07 which is thing is one of my main challenges to playing better. She said: "I noticed that there's too much kind of accidental "sliding" between notes, where, as you said, my fingers aren't "snappy" enough in their shifts."...

I find that when the last thing I've put in my mouth was coffee or tea, I generate a lot less saliva.

There are quite a few websites which have tunes played fast or slow (or both). A quick list of ones that I have found useful to play against: http://toraigh.com/slowsessions/ http://comhaltas.ie/shop/detail/foinn_seisiun_cd_volume_1/ http://comhaltas.ie/shop/detail/foinn_seisiun_book_volume_2/ http:...

I like to use a metronome, especially when learning a new song because it forces me to keep better time and more importantly it forces me to pay attention to what's happening around me and still play accurately (or try to :boggle: ) More importantly I like to play with good recordings because it giv...

Thanks!

I'm trying to convert an ABC file from the key of D to the key of G. Seems like it should be easy for a program to do. I have ABC Navigator but can't seem to find a way to do it. (I don't find that program intuitive for my level of inexperience). Any suggestions?

Bob

A handy free program (game) to help learn the name of the notes on the clef is NoteCard found at http/familygames.com/ I agree however that it's more important to correlate the dots on the page with the fingers on the whistle but knowing the names of the notes helps in communication with others, wri...

But beware the hammered dulcimer. Tuning it has been called a never ending journey. Not so with a flute

I'm not sure whether she's still teaching and whether 100 miles is too far but Alex Usher gave some excellent worshops at an autoharp (and dulcimer) festival that I attend. I've heard from others that she's a great teacher. Here's the info from a (perhaps outdated) list of autoharp teachers: Alex Us...

Soapy water, Jet Dry, or Dupanol treatments of the windway all work pretty well for me but one thing that has never failed is drink tea (or swirl tea in my mouth and spit it out) about 15 minutes before I play. It dries my mouth enough that I don't have enough saliva to cause a problem. Fortunately ...

You can copy and paste a ABC tune into http://www.concertina.net/tunes_convert.html
and you can get a midi and sheet music. It won't work with ABC files on your computer, though, unless you can open them to copy them.