October 31, 2007 – 12:59 pm
I just thought I’d share some of my thoughts/musings on how different types of wood and their working properties come into play when making a bowed psaltery.
Dampening – This is a term that I hear thrown around a lot. It is usually used in a bad way: “you don’t want the wood to dampen any of the strings’ vibrations…” and so forth. I would define dampening, in regard to musical instrument woods, as the measure of a wood’s tendency to lose (or conversely, to retain) a musical vibration.
For the sake of example, a material that has a very low amount of dampening would be a tuning fork. You strike it, and it retains the vibrations and gives off a sustained ring. The opposite of this would be a rubber band. You strike it (or fling it!) and the energy is instantly transferred and absorbed by the rubber band.
So, is dampening a bad thing?
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October 29, 2007 – 4:13 pm
Just thought I’d post an update on one of the custom psalteries I’m working on:
This psaltery is one that I am building out of purpleheart sides and a quilted maple back. I’ve finished the frame and back, and I’ve laid out the components for the top.
If you take a closer look, it is still a ways off from being finished, but it already looks quite lovely. I’ve simply laid the rose and purpleheart ring on top of the soundboard, along with the bridge, to help visualize the finished product.
And Tim – if you are reading this – don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about yours either! I’ve picked out and processed enough woods for two instruments just in case, and have a few other things out of the way. Just nothing interesting enough to photograph yet!
October 26, 2007 – 4:44 pm
Here’s a random building tip:
The fit between the bridge and the soundboard on a bowed psaltery is important, and should be as snug as possible. Even though all the strings are pressing down on the bridge, if the bridge is in any way uneven, firm contact will not be made.
One technique that is commonly used on stringed instruments is shown below – and adapted to the bowed psaltery:
Basically, a sheet of sandpaper is clamped to the top of the psaltery, and the bridge is carefully stroked in one direction away from the clamps. You can flip the bridge over and see how much of it is being sanded. If the sandpaper is only making contact with the bridge in a few places, this means that things are still uneven. Once the sandpaper is sanding away material along the entire length of the bridge it is ready to be fitted to the psaltery.
October 23, 2007 – 2:03 pm
I’m proud to announce the beginning of a blog about bowed psalteries. I plan to use this area as an outlet to all of my ideas and thoughts on developing the bowed psaltery.
Basically, anything that might be too trivial or irrelevant for my official news and updates page will be listed here.
I hope to use this area to bounce around ideas and thoughts to incorporate into making a “perfect” bowed psaltery. (Whatever that may be to each person.)
To start things out, I just want to list a few things that I’ve be strongly considering to add to my options list:
- Alternative saddle materials: bone, eco-friendly ivory, and carbon fiber
- More string choices: silverplated-wound and nylon (the silver plated ones show a lot of potential in allowing a bowed psaltery to sound a full two octaves below a standard plain-steel string psaltery!)
- Cosmetic upgrades: more note marker choices, color-matching tops to match back/sides, some interesting tiered rose designs and binding patterns
I’ve got a lot more ideas to implement, I just need the time, and an “experimental” psaltery to test them all out on. 
