h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It's the holidays! I'm off to Greece tomorrow for two weeks. We're going to the island of Syros, where Mrs G will brush up on her conversation Greek while I learn to play the bouzouki. I've booked five lessons with the local taverna player, who is free in the mornings. He has a spare bouzouki so I don't even have the hassle of bringing a long-necked instrument with me.

In fact I don't possess a bouzouki, although I know someone I could borrow one off if I needed to. If I become good at it, I will buy a decent one. If not, I'll just use my bouzouki techniques on the guitar (which has the same tuning pattern as the Greek bouzouki).

I suspect that we'll be a long way from the nearest wifi - the apartments we're staying in have wired internet, but there's no mention of wifi. This means I would have to lug a laptop along, which I don't want to do, so I'll be blissfully away from it all.

It's 27° (80°F) in Syros at the moment (at 11am). That's as hot as the hottest summer we ever get in Ireland. I'm bringing my factor 50 and my wide-brimmed hat.

Have a nice relaxing time!


lil xx

ooo.... the bouzouki is kinda cool, I've a friend who's got just about every stringed instrument going (plus brass)... I find it so tricky though, goign to it, from the guitar; maybe its a differnt tuning to the Greek one?

have a great holiday.... hope you can cope with the heat, my temp aversion rules out most forign holidays just keep applying the factor 50

I could write an entry on the different bouzouki tunings. I probably will once I get back. There's Irish vs Greek, and within each of these there are two different tunings, one favouring rapid playing of tunes and the other going more for drones and power chords.

Oo... If you writ that, I'll have to print it off for my friend (he's allergic to the internet)... He had a discussion with William, here the other day... about differnt tunings... all that stuff about differnt intervils and pre-Bach tunings etc... It went so* over my head I'm not really a musition.... I'm a guitarist...

have a great time!

Those who learn to read first hate heterodox tunings. Those who learn to busk first love them.

Every necked string instrument (at least the most important ones, violin, viol, guitar, lute) has been through a period of scordatura, as it is known. Putting it in Italian makes it academically acceptable. But it just means 'tuning', no more, no less.

Entry on Scordatura?