Simplest Folk Chord Addition for 21-Chorders
Click to go to the CreekDontRise.com(tm) home page
Simplest Folk Chord Addition for 21-Chorders


Note: This page is an archive, retained for the convenience of anyone who has bookmarked it in the past. The updated, corrected, and expanded version is now our "Simplest Folk Chord Addition for 21-Chorders" article at HarpersGuild.com



Please Read: How to Help Our Site at No Cost to You - Some of our articles contain recommendations for products we like and vendors we personally trust. Some of those vendors may pay us a very small commission if you click on a link and buy their products. This costs you nothing at all and helps offset the costs of what we do. So if we point you to something you decide to buy later, please make certain you come back through our site and click on the link directly. Thanks.

This Site is a Cookie-Free Zone - Except for discussion forums that you have to expressly register for, none of our pages use cookies of any kind. Some of the vendors we link to do, but that won't affect you unless you click on a link to their pages. Your continued use of this page indicates that you agree to our policy. For details, click here.

Simplest Folk Chord Addition for 21-Chorders

If you're already quite used to playing on the standard OS 21-chord configuration, this suggestion allows you to keep the same chord bar relationships while losing useless chords and gaining chords you need.

On the other hand, if you're relatively new to 21-chorders, you might want to jump right to the Bryan Bowers/Americana set up. The conversion is more complicated, but the resulting 'harp is easier to play in the long run.

This is the easiest conversion of all, especially if you have a 21-chord Oscar Schmidt. (If you have a 21-chord Chromaharp, don't despair; the conversion is still possible, as we discuss further down.)

Reconfiguring a 21-key Oscar Schmidt autoharp with OS-supplied E, Bm, and F#m chord bars.  Click to see a one-page printable. The good news is that if you are used to the standard key layout, and you just want to add E, Bm, and F#m to your 21-button Oscar Schmidt autoharp at the expense of the Eb, Ab, and Bb7 chords, you can simply order the new chord bars that Oscar Schmidt made to support the Americana without changing the basic chord relationships.

Note: In my example to the right, I am sacrificing the Eb to add the folk-friendly chords. The Americana actually sacrifices the Cm. This is all your choice, really, as all of these are just suggestions. In fact, I don't think I would do this again without converting to Bryan Bowers/America settings. But if you are really used to conventional 21-chorders, and don't want to relearn your favorite songs, the instructions below will give you the easiest conversion.

As the drawing to the right shows, you can carefully remove the chord bar cover then remove the Eb, F7, and Ab chord bars (leave the Bb7 where it is for now). Then scootch the chord bars for all three rows up so that the rows start with Bb, C7, and Bb7 respectively.

Put the new E chord bar at the right end of the top row.

Put the F7 chord bar at the right end of the middle row. No, the F7 chord bar won't be any more useful there than it was at the other end of the row, but this way, the root chord buttons (Bb, F, C, G, D, and A) will have the same relative position to the seventh chords C7, G7, D7, A7, E7, and B7 that they did before.

Put the Bm chord bar at the right end of the bottom row.

Doublecheck your work so far. When you're certain that you haven't got anything too far out of whack, remove the Bb7 chord bar, and move the bottom row over. This will entail "jumping over" bars for the other chords, but if you're careful, you won't have any problems.

Finally, your updated Oscar Schmidt 21-chorder should have the key layout shown below.

The result of using 'store-bought' E, Bm, and F#m chord bars to add folk-friendly chords to a 21-chord OS autoharp.  Click for bigger drawing.

Note: The distance between strings on autoharps wavers a little, since they have to rebuild their jigs ever so often, so you will want to check your new chord bars to make certain the gaps in the felt are really exactly where they need to be. One alert reader also told me that he noticed that the factory cord bars muted some strings that should have been muted. Mostly the cuts in the felts were just slightly "off," causing a string that should have been ringing to be muffled. But on his autoharp, the bass notes for Dm and Em weren't cut out at all. I've encountered this on one of my 15-chorders, too. So, before you fasten everything back together, you might want to check out all of the chords to make certain they are playing the notes they should be.

Now you can play guitar-friendly songs like "City of New Orleans" in guitar-friendly keys like D to your heart's content.

But maybe that F7 bugs you. It's a chord you can't really use in most of the songs you play, and it's taking up room that could be used for something more useful, like F#7. Well you have three chord bars you're not using now. What about ordering some felt and recutting the F7 chord bar to an F#7? We show you where the gaps in the felt go in a chart below. Mark where the old felt came to on both ends before you pull it off, because it needs to be the same overall length it was before. Now you can play songs in A and E that you couldn't play before. You can stop right there if you want.

But speaking of A and E, some of your favorite songs in those keys require C#m, which you still don't have. But you still have three unused chord bars. Reconfigure one of those for C#m using the gaps from the chart below, pull out the Cm, skootch the minor chords over one more time, and put the C#m on the right end of the bottom row.

Chord bar configurations for adding E, Bm, F#m, F#7, and C#m to a 21-chord autoharp.  Click to download the spreadsheet.The illustration to the right shows the way you would cut the felts for all of these add-on chords. If you just order new felts and do it yourself, that will save you money over buying the prefelted bars.

If you click on the picture to the right, you'll get a spreadsheet that you can download and print. If you keep your printer from shrinking the printout, each of the little squares should be 1/4" high. Check against one of the chord bars you removed, to make certain the printout is "in scale."

If you're just refelting, and not using "store-bought" E, Bm, and F#m chord bars, use the instruction sheet for the Chromaharp 21 (below).

What about Chromaharp 21s? If you have a Chromaharp 21, you can't order pre-felted chord bars for your conversion. Neither can you slide the chord name buttons around on the chord bars like you can on an OS21. But if you are good with sacrificing Polka-friendly chords for the sake of adding Folk-friendly chords, that can be done.

The string spacing on the Chromaharp is just a bit narrower than the string spacing on the Oscar Schmidt. So my spreadsheets may be a little "off." You'll need to actually hold the bar over the string to be entirely sure where to cut.

But lots of folks have ordered the felt for these and reconfigured the Ab, Eb, Bb7, F7 and Cm chord bars for E, Bm, F#m, F#7 and C#m. Yes, you lose the ability to play in Bb, but you gain the ability to play more songs in A. If you want to see an "instruction sheet" for doing all five chord bars at once, click here.

Note: Please keep in mind that these are only suggestions, and if you decide later you shouldn't have made these adjustments, we're not responsible for changing it back. Nor are we responsible if you toast your Chromaharp because you lose all the springs or something.

Note: - The following sections will be fleshed out with photos and details as I get time to do the reconfiguration(s) I am contemplating. In the meantime, please refer to the links above, especially Wendy Grossman's account for more tips and details.

Ordering Stuff You Need

At the very least, I would need new felt. Several vendors offer this off and on, including Elderly Music, Daigleharp.com, and Autoharpstore.com. (Sorry, nobody seems to keep it in stock all the time.).

By the way, 15-chorders tend to use 1/4"x1/4" felts. 21-chorders use narrower felts, such as 3/16" X 7/32". Make certain you order the right felt for your 'harp.

I would hold off on replacing strings until I heard the thing cleaned up and tuned up. For most of the 1900s, autoharps were strung with what was basically piano wire. And most of it has held up great. Most of the newer harps seem to still have good strings as well.

Whether I needed springs or anything else wouldn't necessarily be obvious until I got into things.

Disassembling the Autoharp

According to Wendy Grossman, Murphy's Law of Folk Music #102 is "Never take apart a concertina or an autoharp on a shag rug." There are a mess of little springs that will disappear in a hurry if you aren't careful. Now, if your autoharp is very old, they may need replaced anyway. So you can use that excuse when you have to order more. Wendy recommends applying a tiny dab of superglue to the base of each spring, so they don't wander away while you're working.

If you make a point of not losing the springs, disassembly is pretty easy. Remove the screws that hold down the cover at each end and very carefully remove the chord bars one at a time.

Note: If you are disassembling a 21-chorder, write the name of the chord on the side of the chord bar in magic marker. The chord bar buttons are not permanently attached, and it's too easy to separate the buttons and the chord bars, no mattor how careful you try to be.

Removing the Felts

If you have a very old autoharp, they may be coming off by themselves. You may be able to cut them off using a very sharp knife. Either way, you might find it helpful to use GooGone or mineral spirits or the like to get the rest of the glue/goo off the bars.

If you have any bars that will get the felt back exactly where it was, save yourself some hassle by marking the gaps before you remove the felt. Then, to replace the felt on those bars, you can simply cut the felt segments and stick them on.

Replacing the Felts

Folks do this a few different ways. If you print the spreadsheet above full-sized, it may conform physically to the actual sizes you'll need for your autoharp (tell the printer driver not to shrink the page). If the short side of the little blocks on the page lines up exactly with your string width, you may be able to cut the felt strips with a pair of sissors and just stick them on. If not, you might consider sticking the whole felt strip on and then using a razor blade, Xacto knife, or widget to cut the gaps. Most folks don't cut the gaps out completely - they cut a diagonal divot where the gap should be leaving a row of little V shapes in the felt.

Wendy made her spreadsheet so it lined up exactly with her strings. (If that link doesn't work try this one. She also made a line every quarter of an inch on the underside of each bar (making sure those lines straddled the strings when the bar was set back in place). Then she used the spreadsheet to figure out exactly how long to make each segment of felt.

Rassembling

Test each felt bar individually to make certain it is aligning the way it needs to, then replace them in the sequence you desire. I like putting them so that the circle of fifths is on one row as much as possible. BbFCGDAE for instance. That way it's easier for me to keep track of the basic chords without having to look at the thing all the time. But, like everything in this article, your mileage may vary.

Conclusion

Once again, I wrote this article before attacking the projects described in it, but I wanted to publish the results of my research as soon as possible, because I've already been getting questions about it. Hopefully, I'll be better informed eventually and provide photos and details, and - most likely - corrections to what I'm publishing today.

In the meantime, please contact us with any questions at all - reader questions are the main thing that drivers our research, so we're always happy to hear from you.

Best of luck!


Paul Race playing a banjo. Click to go to Paul's music home page.Whatever else you get out of our pages, I hope you enjoy your music and figure out how to make enjoyable music for those around you as well.

And please stay in touch!

- Paul Click to see Paul's music home page Click to contact Paul through this page. Click to see Paul's music page on Facebook Click to see Paul's music blog page Click to hear Paul's music on SoundCloud. Click to sign up for this discussion forum. Click to learn about our Momma Don't Low Newsletter. Click to see Paul's YouTube Channel. Click to see Paul's Twitter Page

http://CreekDontRise.com
http://SchoolOfTheRock.com
http://classictrainsongs.com



























































All materials, illustrations, and content on this web page are copyrighted (c) 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 by Paul D. Race. All rights reserved.
Creek Dont' Rise(tm) is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising
program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

For questions, comments, suggestions, trouble reports, etc. about this page or this site, please contact us.


Visit our other pages:
- Music -
Heartland-inspired music, history, and acoustic instrument tips.
Best-loved railroad songs and the stories behind them.
Learn important guitar chords quickly, to jump start your ability to play along on any song. With a few tools and an hour or two of work, you can make your guitar, banjo, or mandolin much more responsive.  Instruments with movable bridges can have better-than-new intonation as well. Resources for learning Folk Music and instruments quickly Check out our article on finding good used guitars.
Carols of many countries, including music, lyrics, and the story behind the songs. X and Y-generation Christians take Contemporary Christian music, including worship, for granted, but the first generation of Contemporary Christian musicians faced strong, and often bitter resistance. Different kinds of music call for different kinds of banjos.  Just trying to steer you in the right direction. New, used, or vintage - tips for whatever your needs and preferences. Wax recordings from the early 1900s, mostly collected by George Nelson.  Download them all for a 'period' album. Explains the various kinds of acoustic guitar and what to look for in each.
Look to Riverboat Music buyers' guide for descriptions of musical instruments by people who play musical instruments. Learn 5-string banjo at your own speed, with many examples and user-friendly explanations. Explains the various kinds of banjos and what each is good for. Learn more about our newsletter for roots-based and acoustic music. Folks with Bb or Eb instruments can contribute to worship services, but the WAY they do depends on the way the worship leader approaches the music. A page devoted to some of Paul's own music endeavors.
- Trains and Hobbies -
Free building projects for your vintage railroad or Christmas village.
Visit Lionel Trains. Click to see Thomas Kinkaded-inspired Holiday Trains and Villages. Big Christmas Train Primer: Choosing and using model trains with holiday themes Building temporary and permanent railroads with big model trains Click to see HO scale trains with your favorite team's colors.
- Christmas Memories and Collectibles -
Visit the FamilyChristmasOnline site. Visit Howard Lamey's glitterhouse gallery, with free project plans, graphics, and instructions. Click to return to the Old Christmas Tree Lights Table of Contents Page Click to sign up for Maria Cudequest's craft and collectibles blog.
Click to visit Fred's Noel-Kat store.
Visit the largest and most complete cardboard Christmas 'Putz' house resource on the Internet.
- Family Activities and Crafts -
Click to see reviews of our favorite family-friendly Christmas movies. Free, Family-Friendly Christmas Stories Decorate your tree the old-fashioned way with these kid-friendly projects. Free plans and instructions for starting a hobby building vintage-style cardboard Christmas houses. Click to find free, family-friendly Christmas poems and - in some cases - their stories. Traditional Home-Made Ornaments