Talk:Nyckelharpa
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According to [1], there were early versions that didn't have sympathetic strings. Isomorphic 00:23, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
I have problems in understanding the term "drone strings". Shouldnt that be the same as resonant strings? / Habj 02:00, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
- A drone string is one that plays only a single note, like a bagpipe drone. I think you still have to pluck/bow/whatever the string in order to make it sound. Sympathetic strings are never plucked or bowed (I'm not sure if they're ever fretted to resonate with different notes.) Isomorphic 07:07, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
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[edit] Name change
English uses foreign words all the time if they refer to something that's part of a foreign culture. Nobody thinks a kimono should be called a "long robe" in English, or a potlatch should be called a "ceremonial feast". So similarly, in English we call this instrument a nyckelharpa, at least in my experience. Isomorphic 00:43, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
- Also, "Swedish keyed fiddle" and "Nordic keyed fiddle" get a couple hundred hits each on Google. "Nyckelharpa" gets a couple hundred thousand hits. The proper title here is clear. Isomorphic 00:46, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Plural
To answer "Why impose an English plural on a Swedish word?", i.e. nyckelharpas v. nyckelharpor:
- Consistency, as all plurals in the article were previously "nyckelharpas", now it has both forms.
- Clarity as the article is in English, not Swedish and it may not be clear that a plural is intended with the ending -or, as opposed to, say, someone who plays the instrument. I'd imagine from the context one may guess that the instrument is meant and that the player doesn't have sympathetic strings but why muddy it?
- A quick web search shows considerably more hits for "nyckelharpas" as opposed to "nyckelharpor", apart from non-English language sites. For instance, amongst other Swedish web sites so doing, the English version of www.nyckelharpa.com uses the form "nyckelharpas", not "nyckelharpor".
- There are numerous examples of words in English derived from other languages whose plural in their own tongue would end other than in -s (e.g. -a, -ae, -en, -er, -i, -um). Some of these may retain their non -s ending if well known in English (e.g. media, data, cognoscenti, paparazzi) but "nyckelharpa" even in the singular would be regarded as obscure by the vast majority of English speakers, let alone in its Swedish plural form. As a musical comparison, I don't think the advocacy of "Flügelhörnern" rather than "fluglehorns" would garner much support.
Mutt Lunker 00:19, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
- OK, you see what I just did to the article. Sure beats going through the article sprinkling italics all around. __Just plain Bill 00:43, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes, good solution. Changed the word order just to clarify that the translation applies to the singular. Mutt Lunker 12:17, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Infobox
Discussion of the infobox that just showed up is at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Musical Instruments. __Just plain Bill (talk) 23:05, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Unreferenced
- I have removed the following "At the moment more and more nyckelharpa player are moving to this "Didier François technique"." [citation needed]
