It's Dulcimer Festival Time! - Mel Bay's Dulcimer Sessions

It’s Dulcimer Festival Time!
by Lois Hornbostel
Download this Article.
Listen to an example of a popular festival tune
from this book (Spotted Pony)

This is a special time of year when mountain dulcimer and hammered dulcimer
players can feel an excitement in the air. A time to get together with other players and
to recharge our creative batteries by learning new skills and beautiful music. Dulcimer
festivals and week-long camps are blossoming throughout the country!
Dulcimer festivals attract healthy populations.
One of the most characteristic elements of the “dulcimer world” is that since the
1970s dulcimer festivals and camps have abounded. This has been largely due to the
relative scarcity of both hammered and mountain dulcimers compared to guitars,
banjos, fiddles, etc. These gatherings have provided dulcimer players with hands-on
classes, beautiful music, and communication with kindred souls. Dulcimer events have
made it easier to purchase and to learn to play dulcimers. Great performers, teachers
and instrument builders have developed. Excellent recordings of hammered and
mountain dulcimer music are available, along with instructional/repertoire books
(many of which are published by Mel Bay). All of these developments have been
nourished by the dulcimer events.
It’s true that they happen throughout the year, but as we enter the most travel-friendly
seasons we find more gatherings to visit, from Michigan to Florida and from Vermont
to California. Ireland and Japan now have dulcimer festivals.

North Carolina’s Smoky Mountains are the setting for
Western Carolina University Mountain Dulcimer Week, held in Cullowhee, NC.
This article is not intended to be a dulcimer events calendar, but more of a history
that focuses on some of the first dulcimer festivals and weeks, and how they
developed and inspired more events. The Dulcimer Players News
http://www.dpnews.com has complete listings of events featuring mountain and
hammered dulcimers. This magazine, published by Mel Bay author Madeline
MacNeil, is now in it’s 30th year and is a highly recommended resource for players
of both instruments.
We are using festival photos to which we have access and permission to use.
We would welcome more news from other festivals, perhaps for a future article.
The Cosby Dulcimer & Harp Convention was an event begun in the early 1970s
in Cosby, Tennessee by folk musicians Jean and Lee Schilling. It continued until just
recently, and served as a model for many other hammered and mountain dulcimer
events. It was a very informal event, with primitive camping in its Smoky Mountains
location, an open stage, some planned instructional workshops, potluck supper and
various novelties like a watermelon spitting contest. Many dulcimer players whose
names are now familiar as recording artists, luthiers and authors met there in the late
1970s: Madeline MacNeil, Leo Kretzner, Ralph Lee Smith, Keith Young, Sam
Rizzetta, Anna Duff, Jerry Rockwell, Alan Freeman, David Schnaufer, Jim Miller,

Alan Darveaux, and Larkin Bryant, to name a few. The Schillings were most gracious
to visitors, and Lee even gave classes to aspiring artists on record production.
Another important event of the same vintage is Evart, Michigan’s Dulcimer
Funfest, held at the Osceola County Fairgrounds. It is a large and popular event
featuring mainly hammered, and some mountain dulcimer activities. For info: Donna
Beckwith, 817 Innes NE, Grand Rapids, MI 49503.
Around the same time, out on the West Coast, the Pacific Rim Dulcimer
Gathering, spearheaded by folks like Robert Force, Albert d’Ossché, Michael
Rugg, Bonnie Carol and Neal Hellman, offered a weekend event that has been held
at various scenic spots in the Pacific Northwest. Focusing primarily a mountain
dulcimers, it included all kinds of music and instrumentation. As a result of this event,
Bonnie Carol and many of the Pacific Rim musicians produced a very important early
recording and book of contemporary music for mountain dulcimer entitled “The
Pacific Rim Project.” The Pacific Rim Gathering still lives. For information: Robert
and Jeanette Force, force@wsu.edu
Back on the East Coast in 1978 Dr. Bill Spencer, who headed the Music Dept. at
Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina, began the ASU Dulcimer
Playing Workshop. This week-long event focused on the mountain dulcimer, and
featured traditional musicians from the area from traditional mountain dulcimer
families, such as Stanley Hicks, Bob Harman, Leonard and Clifford Glenn, Edd and
Nettie Presnell, and Frank Proffitt, Jr. Ralph Lee Smith, the foremost historical
researcher and writer on the mountain dulcimer’s development, shared the history
and traditions of the mountain dulcimer with participants. In 1987 Dr. Bill Spencer
retired and asked performer/instructor Lois Hornbostel to direct the event. The years
that followed included saw continued growth of this event. Focus continued on the
remaining traditional dulcimer people like Jacob Ray Melton and the Glenns, but also
presented the burgeoning developments in playing styles. In 2000, Western
Carolina University’s relaxed mountain campus in Cullowhee, NC, became the site
of this large, comprehensive week. For info on Western Carolina University
Mountain Dulcimer Week: http://cess.wcu.edu/dulcimer
The Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Kansas is 33 years old. While it is not a
dulcimer festival, the contests it holds have provided an opportunity for hammered
and mountain dulcimer players who like to participate in competitions. For info:
wvfest.com

In Kentucky in the late 1970s, Anne MacFie and Dick Albin, performers working
with the Kentucky Parks system, began producing numerous dulcimer events such as
the late September weekend Great American Dulcimer Convention, in Pine
Mountain, KY. It focused both on mountain and hammered dulcimers. In a beautiful
setting visiting dulcimer players got to hear and meet in person Jean Ritchie, I. G.
Stamper, and other traditional and contemporary dulcimer musicians. Anne MacFie
continues to present this event in late September, along with some additional winter
weekend dulcimer events. For info: http://www.pinemountainpark.com
Around the same time musician Nancy Johnson Barker founded Kentucky Music
Weekend, featuring performances, workshops and jams in Louisville, and the
Kentucky Music Week in historic Bardstown, KY, which offers a more in-depth
experience in learning mountain and hammered dulcimers and other instruments. This
event thrives in a sense of musical excellence and fun that features many well-known
dulcimer performers on its staff. For info: http://www.texas.net/~square1/kmw
Further north, in Lima, Ohio, Dr. Susan Porter of Ohio State University began an
excellent weekend event called the Great Black Swamp Dulcimer Festival. It
featured hammered, mountain dulcimers and other instruments and supplied many
fond memories of great music and times. After Dr. Porter’s passing the event was
suspended.
In West Virginia, at Davis & Elkins College, the Augusta Heritage Weeks have
been influential for about 30 years in the playing of both hammered and mountain
dulcimers. Augusta’s a Spring Dulcimer Week and some of Augusta’s summer
“theme weeks” provide classes in both instruments. For info:
http://www.augustaheritage.com
Coshocton, Ohio’s Historic Roscoe Village has presented hammered and
mountain dulcimer classes, performances, jamming and contests at their May event
for some 30 years. For info: http://www.roscoevillage.com
In the Los Angeles, California area, the Summer Solstice Folk Music, Dance &
Storytelling Festival is another of the older festivals. Although not a “dulcimer”
festival, it has many classes for hammered and mountain dulcimers. For info:
http://www.ctms-folkmusic.org

In the Northeast, the Cranberry Gathering in Binghamton, NY, is a lively weekend
featuring hammered and mountain dulcimers, and autoharp. It’s now in its 28th year.
For info: http://www.cranberrydulcimer.com
Also in the Northeast, the week-long Northeast Dulcimer Symposium was begun
over 20 years ago by musician Barb Truex, and is continued by fellow musician
David Moore. Held in Blue Mountain Lake, in upstate New York’s Adirondack
Mountains, the NEDS features a small but high-quality program focusing on
hammered and mountain dulcimers. For info http://nedulcimer.org
We encourage mountain and hammered dulcimer players (and those who would like
to learn more about the instruments and the people who play them) to expand their
musical horizons and circle of friends by attending a dulcimer festival in their area.
To “prepare” the new dulcimer festival visitor, we’ll finish this article with a gallery of
dulcimer event photos and a favorite jam session tune, “Spotted Pony.” It’s played
here at fiddle speed—faster than most of the group jams you’ll encounter!

Dulcimer Festival Photo Gallery
Classes in Appalachian dulcimer history and traditional music are a popular
feature, taught by expert researcher/musicians like Ralph Lee Smith, shown here
with some of his vintage dulcimers held by Youth Scholars at a dulcimer week.
Other instruction focuses on musicianship and more contemporary string
techniques, like this one for intermediate and advanced players being taught by
Larry Conger...

Staff concerts feature well-known dulcimer performers, teachers - and Mel Bay
authors!
Jam sessions are a popular feature of dulcimer events, both musically and socially.

George Haggerty shows how to end a tune in a jam session.
Sometimes you’ll even see “trick & fancy” dulcimer playing, as Mel Bay author
Neal Hellman and Robert Force demonstrate.

Festival “marketplaces” offer a variety of top-quality dulcimers like this mountain
dulcimer built by Jerry Rockwell and this hammered dulcimer built by Rick
Thum...

...Also available are dulcimer books, recordings and hard-to-find special dulcimer
items like this mountain dulcimer-inspired jewelry made by Josie Wiseman...
A Favorite Jam Session Tune: “Spotted Pony”