Re: Looking for a cimbalom

[Seth Austen <klezmusic...>]

on 6/10/01 7:04 AM, Miriam Grunberger at miriamgrunberger (at) yahoo(dot)com 
wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> I'm a hammered dulcimer playing looking to purchase a
> cimbalom (preferably a 3-1/2 octave range so I can
> transport it easily). My 'real' love is klezmer is
> which why I want a cimbalom.
> 
> I've seen practically every website I could find on
> the subject, but for some reason or another, the ones
> I've seen won't work for some reason or another. I'm
> still hoping to find a contact I've not yet come
> across.
> 
> Can anyone made any recommendations?

Hi Miriam,

My partner Beverly is a hammered dulcimer player turned tsimbler, I also
play it a bit. Beverly has an instrument made by Josef Jankowski (Buffalo,
NY). These are really nice instruments, constructed the way his father made
them in his shop in Poland in the 1920s. The down side of the instrument is
that it only has a 2 octave + 2 notes range and is kind of big to transport.
The up side is that it has a beautiful sound, very well suited for klezmer
and other eastern European music. We also recently got hold of a santur made
many years ago by West Virginia hammered dulcimer builder Sam Rizzetta. It
has a nice sound as well, is a bit more portable than the Jankowski and has
a 4+ octave range. It achieves the larger range by not having any
duplication of notes throughout the tuning scheme, this makes for some weird
corner turns sometimes, which isn't a problem on the other instrument.
Neither of these instruments uses a traditional cimbalom-like tuning, which
is OK with us, but everyone has their preferences of what they like.

Feel free to write me, I've also forwarded your message to Beverly, who you
are free to contact offlist. There are a couple of other fantastic tsimblers
on this list, and I'm sure that you'll be hearing from them as well, if you
haven't already.

Seth

-- 
Seth Austen

http://www.sethausten.com
emails: seth (at) sethausten(dot)com
klezmusic (at) earthlink(dot)net


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