MY OWN Music Related Articles	OTHERS' Music Related Articles
Links to Other Musical Sites	Some Genealogical information
How to Play Bagpipes - Amazing Grace	Links to Miscellaneous Sites

.....CLICK HERE FOR INFO ABOUT AN EXPANDED, CD VERSION OF MY WEBPAGE CONTAINING NEARLY 800 PHOTOS, 57 SOUND SAMPLES & SEVERAL SHORT VIDEOS,THAT WON'T FIT ON MY ONLINE WEBPAGE. $10.00 POSTPAID (If outside of US & Canada, click here). PAYMENT NOW ACCEPTED WITH "PAYPAL"

ACE CRAFTSMAN DAVID KRONBERG HAS MADE AVAILABLE BLUEPRINTS/PLANS FOR CONSTRUCTING THREE DIFFERENT STYLES OF VERY HIGH-CLASS HURDY GURDIES. CLICK HERE FOR INFORMATION ABOUT OBTAINING DAVE'S PLANS

NEW: CLICK HERE for a short YouTube video showing several of my instruments being played

NEW STUFF (past year or two): Fiddle-Gurdy; northern Michigan Kora;
zucchini "clarinet"; helium-tank "Tambiro"; LP-tank mini-Tambiro; 2-1/2 octave
conduit Xylophone; Kid's conduit Xylophone; big Tambiro from a new 20lb LP tank;
Hang-Drum/PVC tube hybrid; Stringed hang drum like instrument; Propane-tank HANK DRUM;
5-string "Uke-jo"; Home-made Esraj; Simple Key-Change Chart
GOURD BANJO; Ake-Bono Scale PVC instrument inspired by the HALO & HANG drum
CELLO-BANJO; 3 instruments in one (banjo, bazoukey & tenor guitar) conversion
Hank drum pitched & scaled same as a Halo; Easy tenor to 5-string banjo conversion;
Using "Audacity" to facilitate tune learning; Simple fretless banjo from snare-drum
Make nice stereo photos without a stereo camera; 3-string Banjo made from a tennis racquet
-------- SEE CONSTRUCTION ARTICLES BELOW

PLEASE CHECK OUT THE NEW CD "COOKIES AND CAKE"
BY FRIEND ELEANOR KING
CLICK HERE to hear a short piece from Eleanor's CD
CLICK HERE for more information about this CD

BAGPIPE:
• How to make Highland pipes from PVC pipe
• Construct pipe bags from naugahyde/vinyl
• Simple bellows for smallpipes & Uillean bagpipes
• Build a bagpipe practice goose from a wine-box bladder
• Make an extremely quiet chanter for pipe practice, from a tinwhistle
• Build a simple, foolproof check-valve for Highland pipes
• Build this Bagpipe Case with room for everything
• The only bagpipe tune I ever wrote - 'Richard Longstaffe of Ormond'
  
  BANJO:
• NEW - Simple 3-string banjo made from a tennis racquet
• NEW - Yet another simple, very inexpensive banjo -- this one fretless
• NEW - 3 instruments in one - Banjo, Bazoukey & Tenor Guitar - conversion
• NEW (5/19/2009) How to make a 5 string CELLO-BANJO
• NEW (3/8/2009) How to make a 5 string GOURD BANJO
• Make a 3 string fretless banjo from a cookie tin
• NEW - Ukulele to 5-string "Uke-jo" (uke/banjo) quick conversion
• Build a simple 5-string fretless banjo in a weekend
• Fiddle & banjo written music for the old-time tune "Gilsaw"
• I find it FAR easier to "claw-hammer" a banjo using nylon strings instead of steel
• NEW: SOME HARD-EARNED ADVICE ON LEARNING HOW TO PLAY AN INSTRUMENT
  
  BASS:
• Make a real, 4-string upright bass using an upright washtub
• Acoustic, fretless bass made from an old guitar body. 40" string-length
• Acoustic, fretted bass made from an old guitar in a couple hours. Very easy.
• Oversized acoustic bass - construction simplified by kerfing the sides. See picture below
• Build this acoustic or electric "Doodle-bass" (4 string, 40" string-length) for a few dollars
• Sound sample of the "Doodle-bass"
• Turn the Doodle-Bass into a great sounding Electric Upright Bass for a few dollars
• A simple way to make a very low cost, fully adjustable electric bass guitar bridge
• Build a Bass Kalimba - a String Bass Alternative
• Chart showing 2-note chord pairs for bass
• Charts for easily converting standard bass notation into bass tablature
• Bass clef to bass fingerboard relationship chart (15 frets)
• Bass clef to bass fingerboard relationship chart (22 frets)
• How to set up an upright bass
• Make & install upright bass bridge adjusters (for installing commercial adjusters too)
• Build this low-cost, sturdy Upright Bass playing stand
• Make a simple wash-tub bass
• I very much like my Chinese-made Cremona SB-1 Upright Bass - A short review
• My comments about Chris Badynee's excellent cardboard bass
  
  BOWED PSALTERY:
• Make a bowed psaltery
  
  DIDJERIDU:
• Ready-made didjeridu sold at K-Mart for 97 cents
  
  FIDDLE:
• Convert a regular fiddle into a Hardanger fiddle
• NEW - Fiddle-Gurdy -- a VERY easily built hurdy gurdy that fingers like a fiddle
• How to make a fiddle very quiet - for late night diddling
  
  GUITAR (& GUITAR CONVERSIONS):
• NEW - 3 instruments in one - Banjo, Bazoukey & Tenor Guitar - conversion
• a Fretless Guitar in an hour
• How to make a Hurdy Gurdy from a guitar
• Kerfing the sides of a guitar-family instrument greatly simplifies construction
• Acoustic, fretless bass made from an old guitar body. 40" string-length
• Acoustic, fretted bass made from an old guitar in a couple hours. Very easy.
• How to convert a Guitar into an Octave-Mandolin
  
  HAMMERED DULCIMER:
• Build a conduit-tubing dulcimer (includes a jpg photo)
• How to build a simple 12-course Hammered Dulcimer
  
  HANG DRUM (INSTRUMENTS THAT PLAY SIMILAR TO A HANG DRUM):
• NEW - Blue-Man Group type PVC instrument inspired by the hang drum"
• NEW - PVC tube, Ake-Bono scaled instrument inspired by the HALO & HANG drum"
• Making a stringed instrument inspired by the hang drum"
• HANK DRUM (inspired by the hang drum) made from a propane tank
• Making a Hank drum with same scale & pitch as PantheonSteel's Halo
  
  TAMBIROS -- VERY NEAT INSTRUMENTS MADE FROM VARIOUS
  HELIUM & PROPANE TANKS:
• Make Tambiro safely from an unused 20 lb LP tank
• Make a tambiro - from an empty helium or freon tank
• How I made a smaller-version of the above tambiro from an small camping-type propane cylinder LP
  
  HURDY GURDY:
• How to build a hurdy gurdy for under $20
• Sound sample of the $20 Hurdy Gurdy
• How to add a 2nd melody string to the $20 Hurdy Gurdy
• Fiddle-Gurdy -- a VERY easily built hurdy gurdy that fingers like a fiddle
• How to make a Hurdy Gurdy from a guitar
• Spanish language version of my Hurdy Gurdy making instructions
  
  INDIAN INSTRUMENTS:
• Home-made Esraj --- instrument from India
• Make a near zero-cost Indian Tamboura. Sound sample & photos included
  
  KALIMBA/MBIRA
• Build a "KORIMBA" (a Kalimba that plays like a KORA)
• Build a Bass Kalimba - a String Bass Alternative
• Bobby-pin Kalimba
• 2-octave kalimba made from lawn-rake tines
• Popsicle-stick kalimba, by Dorothy May
  
  KORA:
• How I built a Northern Michigan KORA. Construction article
• Make a "Harp-Kora" -- a simple 2-sided harp that plays like a KORA
• Build a "KORIMBA" (a Kalimba that plays like a KORA)
• Build a cookie-tin KORA
  
  MANDOLIN (OCTAVE):
• NEW - 3 instruments in one - Banjo, Bazoukey & Tenor Guitar - conversion
• How to convert a Guitar into an Octave-Mandolin
  
  MUSICAL SAW:
• Musical Saw - how to find one & play it (inexpensively)
  
  MUSICAL STRINGS:
• Renew the sound of wound, metal strings by boiling them
• Make wound music strings
• K-Mart/Wal-Mart sells 400' of e-string for $2.99
  
  NON-MUSICAL INVENTIONS & IDEAS:
• NEW: HOW TO MAKE HIGH-QUALITY 3D PHOTOGRAPHS WITHOUT A STEREO CAMERA
• NEW: Simple do-it-yourself test for Sleep-Apnea
• Second handle added to a shovel makes it almost fun to dig
• Cat-box stink?? Try this
• Make cell-phone calls with no subscription or prepaid plan
• Beanbag Horseshoes - a fun game
• Make a pressman's hat
  
  ODD NOISEMAKERS AND IDEAS:
• A very temporary "clarinet" made from the stalk of a zucchini plant
• NEW - Ukulele to 5-string "Uke-jo" (uke/banjo) quick conversion
• Build a "whirligig"
• Two "Involuntary Twangamadiddles"
• NEW - A very simple and effective type of nut
• NEW - A very simple Key-Changing Chart
• NEW - Using "Audacity" (free program) to facilitate tune learning
  
  ORIGINAL MUSIC:
• The only bagpipe tune I ever wrote - 'Richard Longstaffe of Ormond'
• A slip-jig (9/8 jig) my brother and I wrote years ago
  
  PENNYWHISTLES, FLUTES & FIFES:
• Instant dollar-store echo/reverb for your tinwhistle (with sound sample)
• Make a "flex-fife" from 3/4"D x 1/8" wall clear, flexible tubing for about $1
• How to make a low D tinwhistle
• Add a drone to your tinwhistle
• Turn a tinwhistle into a "no-hole, bugle-scaled" whistle
  
  XYLOPHONES:
• 2-1/2 octave conduit-tubing xylophone"
• Very simple Kid's "xylophone"

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How to play "Amazing Grace" on the Bagpipe - note for note

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MUSIC RELATED ARTICLES (other folk's articles & ideas)

PLEASE NOTE: IT HAS BECOME INCREASINGLY HARD TO KEEP UP-TO-DATE
WITH EVER-CHANGING LINK ADDRESSES. PLEASE FORGIVE ME IF SOME LINKS HERE
DO NOT WORK. AS I HAVE TIME I'LL TRY TO FIX THEM: 

• To see Paul Marshall's excellent musical innovations
• To see Jim Doble's excellent BIG-tank, thick-metal tongue-drums! They are beautiful
• Lindsay Davidson's excellent, free, online bagpipe playing instructions. Fine site in general!
• "BOGDON BOX BASS" - A really good sounding upright cardboard (!) bass --- sold as a kit for $50!
• "BOGDON BOX BASS" - A really good sounding upright cardboard (!) bass --- sold as a kit for $50!
• Oddmusic.com - a really excellent "different" musical instrument website
• Yuichi Onoue's innovative Kaisatsuko
• A very neat free-standing Aeolian Harp
• Bill Koch's handsome oblong-tub 4-string bass
• Folkurban Music -- Great site of very innovative instruments
• Eric Reiswig's excellent Scottish Smallpipe (& other instruments) building plans
• Kim Fulton-Bennett's pennywhistle making instructions
• Dan Bruner's Musician/Experimental Builders Page
• Complete on-line book detailing Steel-Drum making
• Make a PVC flute - Mark Shepard's instructions & webpage
• Nice PVC flute-making links

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LINKS TO SOME OTHER MUSICAL SITES:

• Webpage of friend Sam King - ace musician, songwriter & otherwise multitalented individual
• Web page of KORA player Mamadou Diabate
• Jeff Sadler's vintage instrument website
• Tor Clausen's neat musical furniture
• "Roots of American Fiddle Music" - 320 old 78 RPM fiddle tunes on a single CD
• Keith Davis' webpage - U.P. maker of fine violins etc.
• David Gilden's excellent Kora/Cora webpage
• Richard Robinson's Tunebook
• Hurdy Gurdy homepage
• Old-Time Music links
• Musicians and Instrument Makers Forum
• Ceolas - Celtic music archive
• Guitar tablature link
• The "Bagpipe Web"
• The Hardanger-fiddle home-page
• Elderly Instrument Co. homepage
• Fiddle & banjo written music for the old-time tune "Gilsaw"

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A FEW GENEALOGICAL LINKS:

• LDS's Pedigree Resource File. My (searchable) family tree is now on this system
• Ancestry World Tree. My (searchable) family tree is now on this system too
• Old Family Photos (on my wife's side and mine). I have lots more.
• Good central/eastern Europe town/village locator
• Cyndi's List of Genealogical sites
• GEDCOM file of my entire genealogical data. Note: Will be updated shortly as I have much new information to add
• Havlena family in Zahrobi, Bohemia - short family tree

  

• Aerial photo of Zahrobi, Bohemia. Havlena houses are numbered)
• Sketch I made of house #24, Zahrobi, Bohemia, where my Gt Grandpa, Josef Havlena was born in 1851
• Fahndrich family in Allfeld, Germany - short family tree

  

• Descendants of my 5th Great Grandfather Mathias Becker, from Peterswald, Rhineland Pralz, Germany
• Chart: Ancestors of Dennis Havlena (me)

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MISCELLANEOUS LINKS:

• Friend Sam King's webpage
• Mapquest -- worldwide map generator

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Dennis Havlena - W8MI (formerly W8UR, KL7GRQ, WA8DDI)
The URL of this webpage is:
http://www.DennisHavlena.com

Please note: Things have gotten extremely busy
around here. I apologize that I may not be able to
answer e-mail in a timely fashion.
If you e-mail me, please mention musical instruments
prominently in the subject line -- I get tons of spam daily.

Copyright 2010 Dennis Havlena