A semi-local friend recently invited a few players from around to jam at his house one Saturday, and Amy and I enjoyed the time very much. I hope he does it again. 

Will and Polly Duval and John Sherck, singing “For the Beauty of the Earth.” Photo by Paul Pare’.

1 beautifully composed web-based press kit
17 leads (people looking for music)
–only 1 of which specifically asked for hammered dulcimer
0 hires

If people could find me by searching for things like “classical,” “celtic,” “unique,” or “acoustic,” I bet I’d be doing better. But you can’t just say “classical” etc on this system — it’s only “classical harp,” “classical piano,” and so on, and there’s no “classical hammered dulcimer” option.

People hire me because they hear my music and like it, or because they’re looking for something different. Not enough people know about dulcimer to go looking for it.

I mentioned my concern about the categories, suggesting that it makes more sense to separate type of music from type of instrument, and one of the account executives responded that they’ve been using this system for 15 years. And some other polite but inactive language.

Bummer. I will NOT be renewing.

Scandinavian Walking Tunes

Polska efter Höök-Olle

Marenje

And here’s a video of the Masanga Marimba Ensemble covering the original by Mhuri Yekwa Muchena.

Slip Jig from Style, by Denis Carey

The hammered dulcimer is a hollow wooden trapezoid supporting many strings; like on a piano, notes are produced by hammers striking the strings. A dulcimist holds the hammers instead of using a keyboard to activate them. (A smaller distant relative, the mountain dulcimer, is played by plucking or strumming.) The sound is a little like piano, a little like harp, a little like guitar, and yet not quite like any other instrument – resonant, rich, clear, luminous.

It was in college that Marcy first saw and heard a dulcimer. Tim Seaman was playing in a church service, and she was captivated both by the shimmering sound and the dancing of the hammers. After getting her own dulcimer, Marcy was privileged to study with Tim, who, besides teaching tunes and techniques of all kinds, provided the warm encouragement of treating her as a real musician from the beginning.

Music has been part of Marcy’s life from the beginning. She wrote her first “song” at the age of three, on the black keys of the old blue piano in the basement. There were also children’s choirs at church, a brief stint with viola at school, handbells, organ, guitar beginning in late high school, a fabulous semester of harpsichord in college, and more choirs and other singing. Marcy found (much to her surprise) that the dulcimer fit her more naturally and intuitively than other instruments she’d tried. For one thing, there’s just two hammers to manage, instead of ten fingers. Also, it’s well-suited to visual learners; most scales involve identical patterns and spatial relationships, and many musical phrases form triangles, rectangles, lines, and other shapes.

In these eleven years of dulcimer playing, Marcy has performed a repertoire of classical, traditional, sacred, Celtic, and original music at a variety of events. There have been weddings, baptisms, special church services, and a memorial service. There have been fairs and festivals, farmers markets, teas, open houses, art museums and openings, Christmas parties, wine-tastings, birthdays, restaurants and coffee shops. Marcy excels at background music, when guests can relax, mingle, converse, listen, ask questions. She also really enjoys weddings and other such special occasions. And at concerts like this eleventh anniversary celebration, she feels honored to share her music in a more intimate setting.

That sense of intimacy also characterizes her three albums. No Loose Threads is a varied collection of music on hammered dulcimer with other acoustic instruments and some vocals. The instrumental What Child Is This? tells the story of Christmas from Eden to Easter. The Hanshaw Trio is the self-titled release of a mostly Celtic group featuring fiddle, guitar, and dulcimer. The Christmas CD is available through CDBaby, and all three are available through Marcy’s website, http://mp-dulcimer.com, or at the concert.

Maps and directions; Legion Memorial Building is #26 on the map, lower left by the lake shore.

Interactive tour

Liberty — student version

Liberty — at tempo

I’m not sure what’s going on with the ringing / buzzing.

I’ll present a concert in the Alumni Lounge of the Legion Memorial building on the Culver Academies campus, October 16, 4-5. Not especially geared toward kids, but all ages are welcome.

I’m starting to think about music… I pulled out John Rutter’s For the Beauty of the Earth again… would be lovely to have a quartet of voices for it. Maybe some other pieces with singers — Sheep May Safely Graze, in German; maybe others. I’d love to do some things with other instrumentalists, too — maybe some percussion, maybe harp, who knows!

I just have to keep in mind that it’s less than a month away… and to be realistic about how much learning and practicing time I have along with the rest of life.