The Joys of Performing!

[Dick Glasgow]

How often has this happened to you?

We were playing a concert in an Arts Centre in Belfast the other night in front of 90 folk & I'd just given a short speel about the history of the Hammered Dulcimer in Co. Antrim, including my lame joke about how I call one of my favourite sets of Hammers my Golf Clubs because they are made of , yes, you guessed it .... Tiger Wood, so of course I call them my Tiger Woods! .... Boom Boom!

Anyway, to my horror, half way through the first tune of the set, one of the hammer heads split in two & the piece that came off narrowly missed my eye.
Luckily I had the presence of mind to keep playing { something } with my left hand, while I fumbled for another hammer & carried on.

It could have been worse I suppose - the Dulcimer could have fallen over ... or exploded!

It reminds me of the time I was playing a Jews Harp solo at a Folk Club in Scotland, when the reed broke! One second there was the usual crazy boingy boingy noise, the next a crack ......... & silence!
Of course everyone thought it was very funny!

A Flute playing friend of mine was playing at the same club one night, when the bottom section of his wooden Irish Flute just fell off!

So tell me, what's the worst thing that's happened to you while you have been performing in front of an audience?

Cheers
Dick

[Nikita]

well, I had once or twice hammers breaking during the concert (hackbrett hammers are quite thin, and if they go under the strings, they break easily...), so I had to stop, find another hammer and start again. Seems to happen just during my solo piece... but the audience was very understanding !
the worst I had - just missed the heart attack ! we were playing for a wedding, the first waltz for the betrothen, and the bride was so drunk she actually fell on the hackbrett... but with the luck of drunkards, she broke only the stand (well she was young and twiggy-like... had she been on the Roseanne Barr style, I might have needed a new instrument !). the hackbrett wasn't even out of tune, so, after a while, we could go on with the music, putting the hackbrett on a table.

[dulcimike]

I have nothing so hair-raising as you two. So far, the worst that's happened to my instrument while performing had to do with the dampers. Ptarm has maybe only seem a picture of my dulcimer with dampers, as it's too large to check as baggage on a flight across the pond, but it's a little larger than the one I bring over with me, and has some hefty dampers on each side of the instrument. There is a continuous Kevlar string that connects both the dampers and loops underneath the dulcimer where a clip from the pedal connects.

So, I was playing away on an Old-Time reel when the time came to put on the dampers. I played one time through the A part with Dampers on and it makes a nice effect and catches people's attention, as well. So, I was playing standing up, and when I pressed - maybe stomped is a better word - on the pedal, the pedal string, not being tightened properly, came loose and the pedal went to the floor and the strings rang happily as if I'd done nothing.

The next time that sort of thing happened, it was the Kevlar string that actually broke, having become frayed over time and weakened. It couldn't have had anything to do with that heavy foot of mine.

One other thing I remember is when I left my hammers at home - the problems of having two dulcimers. Thankfully, I wasn't far from home, and Brandy was with me and could go get them. I began playing with two pens, using the metal clips as the striking surface until the hammers arrived.

Anyway, that's as bad as it's been for me.

Any other things have to do with brain failures, or static build-up which pushed my hammers to the wrong notes.

[Dick Glasgow]

Aye Rick, that reminds me of the time I arrived at a school to give a talk & I found I'd left my hammers at home, so I used two forks from the kitchen, hitting the strings with the flat handle ends. It worked OK, well let's say better than no hammers, but I wouldn't be keen to repeat the experience.

Cheers
Dick

[dulcimike]

Nope, not something I want to do more than absolutely necessary, myself. But it's nice to know you can do it if needed.

[Nikita]

maybe it's one advantadge of the HD on the HB you can use about anything as hammers... ;D ;D ;D
well I always have spare hammers in the instrument case... and in case ;D ;D !!
I tried once with knitting needles, strange and awkward, but can work when you have nothing else... fingers can work too, but you'd need a very small and intimate audience...
David Kettlewell said in his thesis (if I remember well...) he once forgot his hammers, and played with toothbrushes...

[loosebritches]

Hello from the awesome Rocky Mountains of Idaho (that's U.S.A to all of you across the deep blue sea)
I like this topic. Performing has always been a horror for me. About 3 days before a show I'd start freaking out and take to bed. pull the covers over my head. exhibit flu like symptoms. and wonder why oh why did I ever agree to do this and swear to never do it again. Like a zombie I'd walk on stage. My arms turned to wood. Every ounce of saliva left my mouth and lodged in my hands. I couldn't relax until I'd finished at least 2 songs. Then it was FUN!

One time I was sitting there singing away when the microphone started tipping downward. Down. down. down it went and poor pitiful me tried to follow it down with my mouth. By the time it reached my crotch I was done for and sang without it. When the song was over I stupidly said to the audience "I wonder what it picked up down there?" I cringe at the thought even today. But I was young and inexperienced. If that happened today I would think nothing of stopping in mid song., fix the darn microphone and then start the song over all the while joking with the audience. But back then it was a nightmare to me and after my set I hid on the back steps of the theatre and cried.

Too many times my pick would fly right out of my fingers while I strummed , which was always a bummer.,., so I started putting that double sided tape on the picks. It is sticky on both sides and makes the pick less likely to fly away.

The story of the drunken bride falling on the hackbrett is very funny. It reminds me that the only time I ever felt completely at ease was at a harmonica festival way up in the mountains in Yellow Pine, Idaho.
And guess why?. because the audience was a wild bunch of merry makers and so many of them were drunk as skunks. I could do no wrong. I could have screetched like a mad monkey and they would have cheered.
~bj~