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  2. Video: The Poisonous Polonaise (Polonoise No. 19, Wittenberger Apothekenhandschrift, Deutschland)

    More music from Emilyn, John and me!

    https://youtu.be/p3_6zcVobEE

    This one is a beautiful polonaise found in the Wittenberger Apothekenhandschrift, a hand written dance manuscript found in the Giftschrank (poisonous substance cabinet) in an old pharmacy in Wittenberge, Germany.

    Sheet music for this piece, and many other amazing northern German traditional music, can be found in volumes 1-3 of Neues aus Alten Büchern (new things from old books) published by Tramudea e.V., and also on tanzmusikarchiv.de and the TradTanzMusik youtube channel.

    Recorded in Toronto, Canada on 2017-05-12

    Barnaby Walters: Hurdy Gurdy https://gurdy.is
    Emilyn Stam: 5 String Fiddle
    John David Williams: Accordion

  5. New music on a new instrument for you!

    Churfürst zu Sachsen, König von Polen Solo Mountain Dulcimer

    Originally a song from the north-eastern German Kralsches Geigenspielbuch, I play this tune as a waltz. The interpretation is inspired by the version printed in Neues aus alten Büchern 2, which I highly recommend as a source of central european dance music! “Churfürst” refers to a member of the electoral college of the Holy Roman Empire, whose job it was elect the pope. “König von Polen” refers to him also being the king of Poland.

    The dulcimer is my newly finished european walnut + reclaimed cedar + ebony hourglass model of my own design complete with floating bridge, inlaid chromatic fretboard and reversed GCgg tuning. It’s the same size as a regular DAdd dulcimer but with a shorter scale length due to the bridge being further up the instrument.

    The recording was made using two C1000S microphones and the internal passive pickup, run through an AKAI EIE Pro.

  7. ✅ got up early
    ✅ prepared for camping, musicing and dancing
    ✅ watered plants
    ✅ fed pigs
    ✅ ate breakfast
    ✅ proofread potential Nature article, including the example phrase “the supernatural soup manifested itself in a bowl”
    ✅ rolled tyres around
    ✅ showed mill-mate how to operate the pump
    ✅ organised more food

    can we pleeeasse go to klangrauschtreffen now

  11. Today a lorryload of cob and sand turned up outside the mill:

    After some sieving, this will become the inner surface of our walls, form mortar to hold brickwork together, and improve soil quality in the garden.

  12. PIGS!

    FLUFFY PIGS!

    pigspigspigspigspigs

    unfollow/unfriend me now, the next two weeks are just going to be cute pig photos

    And a mouse which tried to move into this soon-to-be-filled-with-tree hole:

  13. A morning of post-travel sleep left me with enough energy to help secure the last of the twelve fruit trees at the mill, and make little name signs for all the varieties.

    Thanks to the new door and my dehumidifier, the workshop is finally down to 54% air humidity, suitable for instrument building. We also had many good discussions with some lovely visitors about them potentially moving here, and the future of the project. Tomorrow some pigs will arrive to help us plough the garden, and while I was away a pair of barn owls moved into one of the dead poplar trunks by the gate. Generally everything’s looking up…

  17. Video: Jelängerjelieber — Solo Hurdy Gurdy

    Jelängerjelieber played on solo gurdy as a wickler/slängpolska for an epic eight minutes (it feels like much less on the other side of the instrument!) — so grab the nearest person and wickl some time away :)

    This lovely tune is Matthias Branschke’s Säckpipa version of what was originally a Sorbish song from the Kralsches Geigenspielbuch called “Fa ßym ta jena hubena ßryota”, and was given a new name by the Verein zur Förderung traditioneller Musik des deutschsprachigen Raums (who need a new name themselves, phew), and published in 2015 in “Neues aus alten Büchern 2” — full of nice tunes and highly recommended.

    Sheet music for this tune is available here

    The instrument is a 2nd generation Vio gurdy from me, recorded with an AKG C1000S and the internal pickup.

  18. Die Tanzsammlung Dahlhoff is now available to download in PDF format, one file per book, from the internet archive:

    Tanzsammlung Dahlhoff

    If you want full-resolution, archive quality TIFF files then the best place to get them from is still the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin site, but if you just want access to complete, usable, small-ish filesize PDFs then this is, as far as I know, the easiest place to find them. Viel Spaß damit!