Thank you!!! I’m glad I asked!

Hey Carolyn, the standard for fret numbers with a capo on a dulcimer is that all the frets retain their original number except for the one with the capo.  So if you capo at 1, that capo-ed fret is referred to as 0, but the next one up is 2 and then 3.  If you capo at 4, that fourth fret becomes 0 and the next one up is 5 and then 6.

This is different than guitars and banjos, which causes a lot of confusion. At least it did for me when I first started on the dulcimer.

--
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

I'm experimenting with my capo. I'm looking at my chords, and realized, of course, that with no open strings, the chord doesn't change with the capo. I'm not used to playing that much in minor keys (with their chords) but I'm trying to figure a couple out. I have a couple pieces of tab to help me on my way. But I am a little confused. Looking at a piece from Bing Futch, (Star of the County Down) he has 000 as the open strum. Ok, no fretting. But then when the G chord/note is used, it's 333. Counting the capoed fret as zero would make it 222. Is that standard? Once you get up past the capo, to just go back to normal tab notation? The other piece of tab is Sally in the Garden, (arr by Allen Macfarland) who seems to be doing the same thing. 

So is that the way I should expect tab to be? I figure I'll mostly be playing by ear and with a bit of musical notation, but I want to get all my potential tools figured out.