guqin sighting in unlikely place

[calden]

Hey all:

I got a call today from my stringed instrument repairman buddy. Seems a college kid and his grandmother came in to his store with some strange instrument looking for a set of bridges. They called it a qin, but sounded like a zheng. Upon talking to this guy it turns out this is a qin, and his grandmother got it from her brother in the 1920's who was a missionary in China back then. Upon hearing my excitement at this, they offered to stop by my house on their way home.

I thus had the good fortune to meet Blake Walker, studying ethnomusicology, and his grandmother, Carolyn, and see this wonderful old qin! It was lacking feet and one of the string winding pegs on the bottom, but had the original strings. She's interested in cleaning it up and trying to play it a bit.

I gave her this forum as a huge, huge wonderful resource for all things qin-related, and urged her to not be shy in asking questions. After some basic repairs she'll be needing some strings. She has a great background as a symphony violinist and teaching violin and piano.

THey were thrilled to meet someone in our city who could find and play examples of guqin music, and were really interested when I whipped out the erhu.

What a great Christmas present!

Carlos

[Charlie Huang]

OMG! I want pictures, pronto!

They should give it to Jim Binkley in Portland or Stephen Dydo in New York as they have experience in qin making and can possibly replace the leg and fix it up to standard playing condition.

I'm so thrilled you had this lovely encounter!

[calden]

CCC:

Thanks for the reference to Jim Binkley. I'll give that to them as well. I had also given them Warren Chang's name in Seattle, where they will be visiting in a few weeks.

Carlos