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Author
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Topic: Dig this: antique lap/zither
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Charlie McDonald
Member From: Lubbock, Texas, USA
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posted 20 July 2005 08:08 AM
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http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=7337777820&category=359&rd=1
I think it is saying 'electrify me.' |
Jay Fagerlie
Member From: Lotus, California, USA
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posted 20 July 2005 09:33 AM
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Hey Charlie,
That is a "Concert Zither"
I have one from about 1895....
Find a copy of "The Third Man Theme" by Anton Karas if you want to hear what it can do.
BTW, the guitar neck is played with the fingertips, ala Jeff Healy, in an overhand style.Jay |
George Keoki Lake
Member From: Edmonton, AB., Canada
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posted 20 July 2005 10:04 PM
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Actually, these are quite a versatile instrument and sound absolutely beautiful when played by someone who knows what he/she is doing. In some ways it sounds "almost" like an old Hawaiian acoustic guitar but more melodic.  |
Charlie McDonald
Member From: Lubbock, Texas, USA
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posted 21 July 2005 02:59 AM
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It occurs to me that if the sympathetic strings were tuned right, the whole thing would have an incredible presence. |
Roger Shackelton
Member From: Everett, Wa.
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posted 21 July 2005 03:29 AM
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This concert Zither is fretted with the fingers & thumb of the left hand and picked with a single metal thumb pick on the right hand. The upper set of strings are played with the four fingers of the right hand. Anton Karas came to fame in the late 1940s after playing the sound track for a movie called "The Third Man", hence the song,
"The Third Man Theme." The movie starred Joseph Cotton and Orson Wells and is set in post war Vienna. And to take Keoki's statement one step further, the sound of the Zither is
"Hauntingly Beautiful." I saw the Zither played live many times, while stationed in Germany from 1963 to 1967. Roger |
Stephen Dorocke
Member From: Portland, Oregon
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posted 21 July 2005 07:24 AM
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Any recordings by Ruth Welcome are great examples of expert Concert Zither playing. She does a beautiful version of "Fascination." |
Roy Thomson
Member From: Wolfville, Nova Scotia,Canada
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posted 21 July 2005 08:05 AM
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There was a Zither Musician in British Columbia, Canada by the name of Sebastian
and I have several tapes of his playing.
Absolutely beautiful sound,,,and a solo instrument at that. The strings above the
fretboard are not meant to be sympathetic
but rather are played with the four fingers as accompanyment and sometimes in harmony
to the thumb's melody line on the fretboard.Roy |
Charlie McDonald
Member From: Lubbock, Texas, USA
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posted 21 July 2005 09:51 AM
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I see. I naturally assumed you'd use it as a lap steel. That's what I'd do. That's a whole handful of fingers playing. |
Bill Creller
Member From: Saginaw, Michigan, USA
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posted 21 July 2005 02:28 PM
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Stephan, you are certainly right about Ruth Welcome. I have an LP around here somewhere of her, and the tune Facination is on it. The record cover states the her zither was electric, and was plugged directly into the console for this recording. She was the best player I had ever heard.
Cheers |
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