15 Apr 2013

Chordpro buddy

Some time ago I bought this program for MAC on the app store. I was looking for a program to edit my songs with chords and a way to transmit them to the iPad.

This is what the developer's say:

ChordPro Buddy is an easy to use and elegant song editor for the Apple Mac OS-X operating system. With it you will easy edit, format, transpose, play and print lyrics, chords and tabs. It is an ideal and elegant tool for guitar players or other musicians. The storage format is the widely used, very simple and easy understandible "ChordPro" text format.

And I think, it is worth the money. If you find songs with chords above on the internet just copy them and import them to ChordPro Buddy. It will automatically transform the chords to brackets whithin the song text. This will give you the benefit to transpose the songs later, if you open them on the iPad. 

But how do you transmit them? That's really easy. Just send them to dropbox. You should create a new folder in your dropbox, in which you store all of your songs. You can even create subfolders. 

On your iPad you should use the app "Songbook". This app can connect to your dropbox account. Everytime you open it it updates from your Dropbox account, so you're up to date with your songs. 


Here's a video tutorial

And here's the product page:
http://www.gfapps.com/chordprobuddy/

And this is a tutorial for SongBook ChordPro



I will write a post for this iPhone/iPad app later.

16 Jan 2013

New Lessons by Duncan Cameron


Duncan Cameron, I mentioned him before, has made two more lessons for players of the bouzouki.
His website: www.duncancameron.com

Picking for reels


Picking for Jigs


2 short lessons on rhythm

Jeff Ksiazek provides us with two short videos on how to backup Reels and Jigs. Nice work. I hope to see more videos in the near future.

Basic bouzouki picking pattern for Reels:


Jig strumming pattern:

25 Oct 2012

Chord Scale Generator

Chord Scale Generator is a program for MAC, Windows and Linux which helps you to find Chord Shapes and Scales on many fretted instruments. You can create alternative fingerings for more than 80 chords. You can translate between musical notation, tablatures and chord charts. It even provides a reverse chord finder. A demo version is available on the website. Also you can find screenshot and video-tutorials. Please comment, if you try it. Price is 21,95 €. Well, I would love to have it on my iPad so I can take it with me wherever I go.

http://www.pluck-n-play.com/en/index.html

Information for player in GDAE

Terry Bell created a website with lots of information for beginners who want to use GDAE tuning. Have a look, you'll find some useful things there.
http://www.angelfire.com/mi3/drumhilla/bouzouki_chords.html

16 May 2012


This year the "1st Paddy Keenan Uilleann Pipe Gathering" will take place during the Summer School. There will be lots of interesting Workshops (Uilleann Pipes, Flute, Fiddle, Tin Whistle, Gitarre, Bodhrán, Banjo, Mandoline, Concertina)Concerts and Sessions from August 5th until August 11th 2012 at the Naturfreundehaus in Elmstein.
Here is the promotional video:

2 Jan 2012

The Ruby Sessions

I don't know exactly what the Ruby Sessions are, but they can be found at facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/therubysessions


Here are some videos in which Donal Lunny plays his lovely bouzouki:


The Factory Girl - Philip King and Donal Lunny:




Donal Lunny - Tribute To Peadar O'Donnell


Maria Doyle Kennedy with Donal Lunny and Kieran Kennedy


This is the youtube-channel of the Ruby Sessions:

Donal Lunny - Solo on Guitar Shaped Bouzouki

This is a video of Donal playing a solo on a guitar shaped bouzouki. Recorded in Smock Alley Theatre, Temple Bar, Dublin.

1 Jan 2012

Fiddlefreak Folk Music Blog







Fiddlefreak is a blog on which you can find information about new recordings in the folk genre. Oftentimes with links to youtube videos or soundclips. A good way to inform about new music. You can find it here: http://fiddlefreak.com/

22 Nov 2011

Litha (2Duos)

Litha is the new name of the quartett formerly known as 2Duos. Aaron Jones, Claire Mann, Gudrun Walters and Jürgen Treyz just released their second CD, which they sold on their last tour in Germany.

My friend Peter known as barnacles posted a video from this tour on youtube. Have a look, it's fantastic!




More information:

http://www.myspace.com/2duos

http://www.2duos.de/


Herr Olof, Live in Ettlingen near Karlsruhe, 2011

Waltzes, Live Ettlingen 2011

29 Oct 2011

Dónal Lunny

I found some new videos by Dónal Lunny on youtube which are really worth looking at:

Cúnla - Trio Dónal Lunny, Pádraig Rynne, Sylvain Barou


Siobhán Ní Dhuibhir - Trio Dónal Lunny, Pádraig Rynne, Sylvain Barou



19 Oct 2011

Behind the haystack

This is one of my favourit jigs. I already posted several videos by Kyle25rs. This is his interpretation of this tune he learned from a video of Andy Irvine and Donal Lunny here on youtube. Infortunately I wasn't able to find it here. Maybe someone can post the link to it?


15 Oct 2011

Foxhunters and Bucks of Oranmore

Kyle Borley (Irish concert flute) and D'Arcy Stearns (Irish bouzouki), from Winnipeg, Canada. website: http://www.borleyandstearns.ca


Yellow Wattle and another Jig in G (Paidin O Raifeartaigh?)

Frances and Sean Conningham from Whistletutor.com playing two traditional Jigs on bouzouki and flute. Awesome!


Hammy Hamiltons / Unknown Slip Jig


Launching the Boat and Lad O'Beirne's


Maids of Mitchellstown/With Her Long Dark Hair Flowing Down Her Back


The Old Favorite and the Maid at the Well


2 Oct 2011

An Dorian

An Dorian are based in the southern part of Germany. They play a lively mix of trad tunes and songs. These videos were recorded at the Bobenheim Folkmeeting, September 2011. An Dorian are: Janna Kirchhof - voice, fiddle Christian Roch - whistle, voice Ulf Bangert - Irish bouzouki Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/andorianirishfolk The Lily of the west


Billy Taylor


Swallow's tail / Old Dudeen / Long drop (reels)