Joe Craven

I ran into Joe Craven at the World Music Festival in Grass Valley this weekend. We had a really fun conversation about obscure/interesting musical instruments, lot's of talented people and the joy of music festivals. If you get the chance at any event in the future, be sure to check out Joe's performance, you won't be disappointed.

If you didn't catch the World Fest this year, I hope to see you there next year!

Hank Drums from alternative tanks

Here's a great documentary video on a issues and concerns with building a Hank Drum from alternative tanks with Hank builder Forsyte Stahlen. Forsyte explores some of his recent experiments in building Hank Drums.

Hicks Sticks Didgeridoos now back in business!

Ben Hicks is back at it, making beautiful didgeridoos out of Aspen and other hardwoods. Ben took a break from the business for a year or so to regroup, and it looks like he's came back with renewed passion and building some beautiful instruments. I was fortunate to purchase a Hick Stick Didigeridoo in D (it's almost as tall as I am) a few years back, and I love it. I was sad to see Ben stop making 'em, but I am glad to see that he's back at it.

I was walking through a grove of Aspen, near Tahoe, over the fourth of July weekend, and I couldn't help but see where Ben gets his inspiration from the very shape of the trees themselves. Aspen has a wonderful, natural rugged quality to them.

Check out his website for complete inventory of what's currently in inventory, the few that are pictured have some wonderful inlay in them : http://www.hickssticks.com/didgeridoos-aspen-hardwood.html

Oh, yeah and tell him that you heard about it from FoundMusic!

Play the Hang Electronically!

Can't afford to buy a Hang? Well our friends over at the Hangfan.co.uk have put together a really fun, virtual Hang that you can play right now, from your desktop. They call it the "e-hang" and it uses sampled tones from an hang combined with an online interface to your keyboard to enable you to play the virtual Hang with your keyboard. The sound samples are pretty good, and the keyboard mapping is intuitive. The only thing that takes a little getting used to is the slight delay with you hit a keyboard. I have a pretty fast internet connection, so I don't know if slower connections will impact the interface

Check it out: http://www.hangfan.co.uk/ehang.html