# Marcy Prochaska: Hammered Dulcimer

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## Back to work

August 27th, 2007

I have not played my dulcimer regularly since a month or two before Amy was born last November. I have more or less kept it in tune, and I play a few minutes here and there most weeks.

I’ve found that there are a lot of things I don’t remember how to play, particularly classical stuff. So much comes back in the muscle, audio, and visual memory, but there are gaps.

Since I memorize, gaps mean I’ve got to go back into the sheet music, find the gaps, and learn what’s in them again. And it often means also finding where I’ve rewritten things in my memory and need to learn them again the correct way — at least where I care about there being a correct way or not, like in Bach.

Mark’s new job started last week, and we plan to give him a month or so to get settled into the new patterns and responsibilities before I go out for gigs and such.

But I have plenty of work to be doing just at home, relearning some things, reworking others, and refreshing my memory about more.

Today I took a half hour with a Handel bourree from Water Music — the one the Frugal Gourmet used for his soundtrack, but not at all that fast.

I’m actually sort of glad I’d forgotten so much of this one. Before, I played two voices simultaneously, but didn’t have a good sense of them as separate voices. Now I am working each one separately, keeping one to one hand and one to the other except for one pair of notes that works better switching hands.

Category: Miscellany | Comments: Just 1

## New address

August 8th, 2007

I have a new mailing address:

PO Box 64
Plymouth, IN 46563

Category: Site updates | Comments: 2 so far

## We’re home!

July 6th, 2007

Our family has arrived in Plymouth Indiana where we are starting to feel a little settled in our new home. Maybe soon I’ll be able to get my dulcimer tuned and get playing again. Meanwhile I’m ready to schedule some lessons if there are any students in the area.

Category: Miscellany | Comments: 3 so far

## Hanshaw picnic

June 18th, 2007

The Hanshaw Trio had our farewell picnic yesterday at Craig’s house.

First we played, then we ate, then we played some more, and meanwhile the kids turned cartwheels and played on the swingset and swam in the pond.

We played well considering we hadn’t played together since September!

One of the attendees took some video — I’ll post it when I get it!

Category: Performances, Photos | Comments: None yet

## Finally — WordPress Pages

May 24th, 2007

Well, now I’ve done it. My entire site — except the front page and the teaching articles — has been converted into WordPress Pages. Much easier to deal with than raw HTML. And I like the look better, too.

I think I’ve gone through and fixed all the links. If you find any broken ones, please let me know so I can correct them.

Category: Site updates | Comments: None yet