Wow, beautifully made! It’s worth doing what Ken has suggested and if intonation is good (which I am sure it is having been built by a good luthier), this should be a great investment.
If the word Dulcimer means sweet sounding instrument, then maybe the instrument is called a dulcimer for its sound and not the number of strings or how it is fretted. There are a few cases of pre-revival chromatic instruments and many Virginia dulcimers had four equidistant strings. There is also the case that, what we refer to as Scheitholts were called dulcimers as early as 1758 and in Ohio these fretted zithers were still being called dulcimers in the 19th century. And then of course we have the hammered dulcimer…now if you want to make a distinction between the Kentucky or Virginia or even the Pre-revival as opposed to post revival or even between traditional and modern dulcimers, then that is definitely legitimate. But for me the dulcimer is a dulcimer because of its sweet sound. I love the sound of the instrument and that’s why I play it. I play guitar, banjo, Irish harp, a little mandolin and a few others, I play diatonic and semi-chromatic, but don’t enjoy fully chromatic dulcimers and that is because the limited scale forces me to be more creative and I love trying to get everything I can from a limited scale. As was mentioned by Ken you can used the Virginia tuning and get to a lot of places on that scale..it’s just plain fun. But it’s all dulcimer to me…just listen to that sound.
Maddie and NateBuilds Toys,
it’s taken years to find the strings that I like best and suits my playing, but when I did I shopped around and bought them five and ten sets at a time. Strumelia, I also found trying to change the strings on a large number of instruments at once is overwhelming. So I do one or two instruments a week until they are all done. Guitar strings wear way quicker than dulcimer strings due to the high tension. For me that could take a year.
Susie,
haha, yes, I have owned so many instruments in my lifetime but what fun it has been.
My Keith Young is a great player too! I also have five Ukuleles that are a lot of fun. My banjos are a five string and a four string that I’ve strung up with nylgut strings. I play it the most in Chicago tuning, just like a big ukulele.
I’ve always had too many dulcimers, it’s now a lifestyle! I’m living the dulcimer life. Besides owning 35+ historical dulcimers, I own 3 Blue Lions, a McCafferty, John Stockard, Bella Dulcimer, 3 Folkcraft, Clemmer Banjammer, Keith Young, Ron Gibson, 2 Ron Ewings and a host of guitars, harps, grandpa’s Sax, psaltry, plus many more. It can’t be helped my father owned a music store when I was growing up.
Thanks for sharing this Ken. It brought back fond memories of Mr. Nicholas, as he was the first to introduce me to the dulcimer and spent a whole afternoon teaching me to play.
in John M Own words:
Of course, what everyone wants to know about is the dulcichord, the intriguing instrument pictured on the cover of Douce Amere which looks like the result of a drunken liaison between a dulcimer and a pedal-steel guitar..... “I wanted a harpsichord-kind of sound, and studied how they were made. The top is floating- it is only attached to the sides, and there is a gap at both ends. It was made from very good quality guitar tone wood and was braced on the underside using the fan-bracing system invented by Torres for Spanish guitars. It has two fingerboards, both of five single courses (DADAD) and both fully fretted. The bridges are only lightly held in place by the strings, there is no great pressure exerted. The levers pressed down to form barre chords on the furthest fingerboard. I used to play organ so was used to playing foot pedals. Unfortunately, the lever mechanism, though it worked perfectly well, was a bit noisy, and I virtually never used it, not even on the record! I still have the instrument, and in fact used it at a gig a couple of nights ago. It looks good and gives out enough volume for an audience of 70 or so, without the need to amplify it. The cover painting was a gift from a local artist, and is pretty accurate, even down to the wing-nuts (to dismantle the instrument for transport)”.
Great video! Thanks. I didn’t pick up on the range of that dulcichord, the basses are rich sounding. But, so it still makes me wonder what the other fretboard is for? It’s such a short scale.
In an interview by Graham Hood, John explains that, in the original dulcichord configuration, he added a complex mechanism of pedals and levers acting on the shorter neck, but that the result was too noisy to use. This can be seen on the record sleeve.
great thanks! So maybe this was more like the 1933 patent.
Here is a short bio on John:
1947 Born in Los Angeles, California
1950 Family moved to England
Instrument - making
1972 - 74 Training : Newark School of Violin Making. Pass with distinction
Music and Story-telling
1963 Met traditional music through Folk Clubs
1965 Started giving concerts, solo and in groups
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1976 Moved to Brittany
1978 LP "Douce-Amère" : traditional songs and instrumentals
(mostly with Appalachian Dulcimers)
1978 - 82 Member of the JOHN RENBOURN GROUP (vocals, dulcimers, violin,
mandolin). Tours + 3 LPs with the group.
since 1978 Solo concert tours: U.S.A., Germany, Ireland, England,
Italy, Hungary and France.
1985 LP "Spice of Life" : personal and traditional tunes and songs
(with Dan ar Bras, the Josquin des Prés Quartet etc.)
since 1996 Tours throughout France with the story-teller Alain Le Goff
for the story and music show ‘‘Baleines, baleines’’
2000 Creation of " LEGENDARY AIRS " , a solo show of ‘Stories told by Music itself’ (for all, rec. min. age 7 yrs ).
CD compilation of «Douce-Amère» + «Spice » (Kerig KCD185) : awarded "BRAVO" label from Trad Magazine.
2002 Creation of " WOLF ? " : a one man show, where the wolf is revealed through stories, with some music (for all, rec. min. 7 yrs ).
2018 Creation of " DREAMCATCHER " :
Great video! Thanks. I didn’t pick up on the range of that dulcichord, the basses are rich sounding. But, so it still makes me wonder what the other fretboard is for? It’s such a short scale.
Any earlier patents than 1880 out there?
All your comments make a lot of sense!
Beautiful! The sound hits my ears like it's a lute being played.
I agree Robin, the sound is lute-like. I have an album of his music. What is interesting is that somebody made a comment that he built a replica of a patented dulcimer. I thought it was the pedal dulcimer from 1933, but I think it might be this one from 1880 although the second neck looks unfinished.
https://73decb.a2cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Patent-1880-Double-neck-Dulcimer.pdf
https://youtu.be/sdAg3B5gAx4?si=4SW3rZFGlF9U-0a9
sounds good and interesting playing.
He told me last spring that he has quit building.
Our Christmas will be quiet as well…well as quiet as my granddaughters can be. We will attend Christmas Eve services and Christmas Day. I’ll dress for my grandchildren as St. Nicholas, (the one that really lived and still lives with Jesus), this Weds. on the feast day of St. Nicholas and tell his story.
Just finished playing dulcimer at our local antique store. Introduced the dulcimer to people wha have never met her…😊
Sorry, I was just kidding about making it a month, but I did think it was interesting to list events going on in the month.
Lots of Jean Ritchie and Ed Thomas history in March…
Today in Mountain Dulcimer History for March:
https://heritagedulcimers.wordpress.com/today-in-mountain-dulcimer-history/timdh-march/
@robin-thompson, Maybe if we have a couple of groups designating March for Dulcimer events we should make it International Appalachian Dulcimer Month?
I have found a Facebook page entitled international Mountain Dulcimer Players Day, March 9th. I am not on Facebook so I don’t know if it is active or not…I don’t think it affects us, but wanted you all to know.
If you are on messenger you could send a flyer for IADD to your dulcimer friends….just saying…🥴
I love my John Stockard!
Well I'm a child of the 70s, so this is the ad I imagine:
I hope this poster is better...fingers crossed.
Here is a early photo of Bruce playing the dulcimer. He has played most of his life.
Strumelia, If you can send me an email address, I will send you a copy and you can edit as you wish. Any help is appreciated.
I'm wanting thoughts on going ahead and putting this picture on my Facebook page.
Being that the date will change yearly it will make it possible for others to celebrate if not this year then next. It will not be a fixed day.
Should there be a group or team of people to plan and write the news releases for The International Appalachian Dulcimer Day? Making sure that we cross a few T’s and at least dot an “i” or two. Otherwise, we might of just of had a nice discussion but we could easily just forget to follow through. That is if you all feel strong enough about this.
Just checked and we cannot register a national day by designating a “last weekend.” It has to be a date for it to be a “day.” So we can skip the formal recognition if you all like and just promote the weekend ourselves. But we could see someone down the road establish a date as “Mountain Dulcimer Day” or something similar. But if we do a really good job of promoting our day we can diminish the possibility of that happening. The more we circulate this among all dulcimer circles, the better. What would you say as to the criteria for the weekend? Would we go with the beginning of the festival season?
I’ll check to see if we can schedule something like the last Saturday of March and register it on the national calendar.
I think I’m over thinking all of this…lol..maybe I am thinking on a festival mentality and not thinking of just a day to say Hooray for our Dulcimer!
INTERNATION APP. DULCIMER DAY.pdf - 354KB