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Archive - Indiana - Mountain dulcimer tablature arrangement in the 1-3-5 tuning
Indiana
1917
Words: Ballard
MacDonald
Music: James F. Hanley
Arr: Connie Allen
The
composer of Indiana, James Hanley, is equally
well known for his later tune, Second Hand Rose,
while lyricist Ballard MacDonald had many songs to his
credit, including Beautiful Ohio. These two
artists apparently cooperated on Indiana in order
to try to capitalize on the popularity of a song written
20 years earlier by Paul Dresser, entitled On the
Banks of the Wabash, Far Away. In the lyrics we see
references in both tunes to the “new-mown hay and
candle-light seen through the sycamores” of Indiana. The
melody line of this tune even borrows a refrain from the
earlier tune.
Unlike
Wabash, a slow love ballad, Indiana was
written for dancing, and its spirited tempo fits nicely
on the dulcimer, together with several lovely color
chords made possible by the 1-3-5 tuning.
The
arranger of this month’s selection is Connie Allen, a
well-known dulcimer personage, living in San Diego, CA.
Connie is one of those players who rise to the challenge
when hearing, “you can’t play THAT on the dulcimer”. She
built her first instrument in the 60’s and played
privately until the 90’s, at which time she was
exploring various tunings, in search of chromatic
melodies. Then Rob Brereton presented a 1-3-5 workshop
locally, demonstrating what that tuning could do. Connie
was hooked, and after several weeks of practice her
fingers became accustomed to the new chord shapes in
Rob’s arrangement of Blue Skies.
She finds
arranging in 1-3-5 tunings very satisfying, enabling her
to play torch songs, Dixieland tunes and “swinging sing-alongs”.
One of her dulcimers is tuned permanently to F-A-C and
the other to C-E-G. Lately, Connie has added a separate
fourth string, with the tuning usually being C-F-A-C.
This gives a fuller sound and makes it possible to
alternate bass and chord-melody, in the style of
Elizabeth Cotton.
Connie
feels that Indiana is a natural choice for this
tuning. She learned it from her playing partner, Bill,
who plays chord support using an old-style, five-string
banjo; he even plays it in her favorite key, F! By
adding the dulcimer melody and vocal harmony, the
combination became a rollicking arrangement that may be
heard on their 2003 CD release The Waves We Left
Behind.
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