help! my bodhran is ill!

[ERIN NHAMINERVA]

> 
>     Stop using the water bath on the inside of the head to 'restretch' 
> the skin.  What I suspect from your list of symptoms is that you're 
> inadvertently removing the natural oils from the 'dead' spot in the 
> center of the head by wetting/drying cycles.  If you must use water to 
> adjust the head, use a mister-- and the absolute minimum necessary to 
> loosen up the head.

   I've found water to be a very useful tool to control the 
pitch/tautness of my drumhead. I've found that different heads are tuned 
to different environments. The one I use at RPFN is perfect in San 
Francisco. That makes it dangerously tight in Novato in the summer. At 
Northern, I water it every hour or so to keep it from getting tight to 
the point of damage. When I went to Idaho this summer, I had to water it 
every 15 minutes or so and store it with water in it to keep it from 
pulling tacks/warping. Needless to say, I saddle soaped it often and 
rubbed lanolin into both sides of the head several times a week. It's 
perfectly happy back in its home climate after all that. 

>     Use your non-beater hand on the skin inside the back of the drum to 
> adjust tension, rather than any water at all. You'll find that you can 
> get some pretty awesome 'scale' effects by adjusting the head's 'note' 
> this way.

   You sure can. However, you need enough slack in the head to play 
around with to do this.

> the more humid parts, remember that your skin head will suck up that 
> extra moisture. Try to take up the slack with your non-laying hand as 
> much as you can, instead of resorting to the water bath treatment. That 
> should be medicine of last resort, rather than standard operating 
> procedure.

   I've used water as SOP for years- you just have to remember that you 
have to keep the oil and saddle soap coming as well. Water is a useful 
tool, especially when you're not in the climate the drum is accustomed to 
(much like the player- you drink a lot more at Southern than Northern ;-)


                                               The Black Rose