Wow. Dusty! Sounds fantastic. I am one of those beginning beginnerests, and now I am wishing I lived in Northern CA instead of on the Mid-Atlantic Coast.
Forming a dulcimer club
Hi @Bill-s. I started a dulcimer group that has been going for about 7 years now, so I guess it's a success. We meet monthly and only cancel meetings around the holidays when life gets hectic for all of us.
Here in Northern California, no one would hesitate to drive an hour for a dulcimer meeting, and I have some regular members who drive 2 to 2-1/2 hours to join us. Hopefully where you are in Michigan dulcimer players are a bit more common than they are here.
I started with perhaps 3 or 4 email addresses, but one of them was a woman willing for us to use her home, so that was a start. Initially, I actively recruited people, meaning I scoured the lists of members here at FOTMD and at the defunct Everything Dulcimer website and contacted anyone within a 3-hour drive, urging them to join us. A few months later I created a website, making sure to put certain key words on the home page (words like "dulcimer," "beginner," and the state, and any prominent cities in the area). Those key words help search engines find your site, so if someone does a search for "dulcimer clubs in Michigan" or "dulcimer clubs in Flint" you want your website to pop up. I still average about one contact per month through the website.
The trick for me was creating a structure that was interesting for both beginners and more advanced players. What I settled on is a three-part structure. The first hour is a free beginner lesson. I think this is essential if you want to welcome new players or people who played a little years ago and have put the instrument down. I tailor the beginner lesson to whoever is the "most beginnerest." So if someone has never played before, we start with the parts of the dulcimer, how to position the dulcimer on your lap, how to strum steadily, and most importantly, how to read tablature. If no true beginners show up, I ask whoever is there what they'd like to work on, so that first hour is a free lesson for whoever shows up.
After the first hour is group play of our common tunes. At our first meeting I brought a good beginner tune as did another member, and we also solicited ideas from others about what tunes to play. Over time, the list of the tunes we are actively playing has evolved, but most of our group play is pretty steady. When we first start our group play each month, I ask the other members to help me choose tunes that would be more accessible to the newbies, so that they don't get too intimidated.
The third hour is a song circle in which we take turns playing a song solo, calling out a tune for group play, or just "passing" and watching others. This part of our gathering was requested by the beginners who wanted to hear what the rest of us were playing when we weren't playing with them. But it has also been important for more advanced players who use it as a kind of dress rehearsal for songs they are working on that might not be ready for prime time yet. To be honest we don't always devote a whole hour to this part of our gathering, if only because our common repertoire has grown, and if we're having fun playing together, I don't want to cut us off. But I usually make time to ask if anyone has a song they would like to play for the group. Some never do, but others are happy to share tunes they are proud of but haven't quite mastered yet.
After we had been meeting for about a year, I got a call from a music store (it's actually a ukulele mecca of sorts) wondering if we would like to meet there instead. I hesitated at first, thinking most of us liked being out of the public eye in a private home. But I had also grown concerned about giving out a private address to anyone who contacted me saying they wanted to join. In the end, meeting at The Strum Shop has helped us immeasurably. If someone breaks a string or if their instrument needs some repair, it can be handled right there on the spot. And the exposure has also brought us new members. If you can find an arrangement like that, I highly recommend it.
Our gatherings have ranged from a low of 6 to a high of 22 or so, and I consider that a huge success. And although we meet just north of Sacramento, we have one member who drives a couple of hours from Reno, another who drives that distance from San Jose, and another who makes a similar drive from Marin County north of San Francisco. It takes dedication not only on the part of the organizer, but also on the part of the participants. I think the biggest challenges were getting the word out and developing a structure that works for beginners and advanced players alike. It takes some effort, so I can't tell you if it would be worth it or if you should just drive the hour to the existing group, but hopefully I've given you some ideas about how to get started if you wish.
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Dusty T., Northern California
Site Moderator
As a musician, you have to keep one foot back in the past and one foot forward into the future.
-- Dizzy Gillespie
Hello all, Does anyone here have experience in forming a dulcimer club? I live well over an hour from any club here in Michigan's Thumb and would like to gather some players who would like to share the music. I don't know any mountain dulcimer players in my area but I think anyone within a 30 minute drive would be interested. But I have to find them first.
Bill
