Marcy Prochaska: Hammered Dulcimer

How would you answer this Christmas question -

A myth?

Some kid conceived with Mary’s other boyfriend, hushed up with some holy dream story?

An ordinary man with a good moral message?

As a Christian, I believe this Child is God, who took on flesh and dwelt among us, who entered our world as helplessly as the rest of us do, who bore our sorrows and took the punishment for our sins, in order to redeem what went wrong in Eden, and to restore us to our Father who loves us.

If you celebrate Christmas, may it be merry.

Whether you do or don’t, joy, peace, and blessings to you in the new year.

I have one more “gig” — playing the offertory in church this Sunday (”Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” with Camille on flute) — and one more recording session on Tuesday (Craig’s tune “Cherry on Top”), and then that’s it for this holiday season.

It’s been a nice full one this year, starting with the weekend craft show at Mom’s Place in mid-November. The busiest time was the weekend before last, when the trio had two gigs in Corning (about nine hours including travel and a dinner break) and then a gig near Albany the next day (about twelve hours for that one, yikes!).

Though I’m a little sad to be almost done with playing for a while, it’ll be good to

Every fall it’s time to review for Christmas: to look over the sheet music, try to remember the solo and trio arrangements, change my mind about some of them, learn some new ones, reject ones I don’t like this year, and practice practice practice.

This week, I’ve been working mostly on the solo stuff.

I’d like to be able to do solo versions of all the pieces on my Christmas CD, What Child Is This?. Some of them are already solos: He Shall Feed His Flock, What Child Is This? / Menuet. Others are multi-tracked, with other instruments and/or with multiple dulcimer parts. These I have to simplify for dulcimer, except Christ Child Lullaby, which I think I’ll play

Today I ran through the set list for my anniversary concert, including what introductions and other talking I want to do. It’s an hour and forty-five minutes long, which is about fifteen minutes longer than I’d like — I was tired before I was done, and my guests will be sitting on a persian rug or in hard metal chairs.

I’ll have to think about what I can cut short — particularly talking — and maybe plan a short break in the middle. I don’t really want to cut out any tunes… I’m geeky enough to have planned five sets of five tunes for this fifth anniversary, and I don’t really want to change that.

Yesterday I tried some percussion rudiments practice on my hammered dulcimer. Last weekend I had a workshop on the topic at the Upper Potomac Dulcimer Fest; I’d done some visiting afterwards and got home Thursday, and recovering from the trip and other things kept me busy over the weekend.

The first thing I worked on was the single stroke roll, RLRLRLRLR, increasing tempo to find the point of control.

Then I tried a few paradiddles (RLRR / LRLL), but my left hand was so uneven I decided to work on some partial paradiddle exercises instead. The right-handed ones — like RLRLRLRL / RLRRL — were easy enough but not likely to develop my left hand. (Duh.) So I did a bunch of

Waterfall at A Sort of Notebook has started up her practice pact again. Each week participants make notes in the comments to record how much time they’ve spent practicing their instruments. Besides me (hammered dulcimer), there’s a pianist, an oboist, and a bassist. No other folkies (yet). It’s a little added motivation, and interesting to actually keep track of how much I’m practicing or not practicing (I’d like to average two hours each weekday), and fun to hear what other people are working on.

My practicing is usually organized around gigs or other projects. Right now, the main projects are The Hanshaw Trio’s home recording, a concert with Pas de Deux, and a wedding with another harpist.

The

Today I need to tune again for a gig at the local Alterra nursing home, and that reminds me of my earlier post about my fears for the Cranberry Dulcimer Gathering, which I ought to report about.

I tuned without any big problems last Wednesday, and the dulcimer sounded fine at that evening’s jam and while we were practicing on Thursday. Later Thursday, though, I was starting to worry about our plan to play on the Commons Friday, because I wouldn’t have time to retune between playing there and leaving for the festival. We decided to stay home instead, which reduced my worry.

It came back the next day, when we started to practice and Rick said the difference between

I love C. S. Lewis’ Narnia Chronicles. I think they’re not only good literature, but full of fruitful ideas. One is the idea that Aslan, the Christ-figure, is not safe, but good. God is not in the business of wish-fulfillment or comfort or convenience. Not that all wishes, comforts, and conveniences are bad, but that sometimes there is something more important. God’s purposes and ways are higher than ours, and can be quite dangerous to us in an earthly sense, but we can have confidence that whatever he brings our way, he will carry us through it, and all things will work together for our ultimate good (Romans 8:28).

I have been thinking about the upcoming Cranberry Gathering,

Today is tuning day. About once a week I tune my dulcimer; lately that’s been Thursdays because The Hanshaw Trio is recording on Thursday evenings.

Tuning is my least favorite thing about the hammered dulcimer. That’s putting it mildly. My screensaver says “Tuning is evil.” I’ve called it my nemesis. It’s sometimes had me in tears, and once almost ready to quit dulcimer altogether. It’s been a while since I’ve felt that bad about it, and in fact lately I’ve been feeling, if not enthusiastic, at least less frustrated.

A little background on what it’s like to tune a dulcimer. Mine has ninety strings, all of which are tuned by turning little squared off pins with a T-shaped, star-bit wrench. Thirty-eight of

My band, the Hanshaw Trio, has been booked for a St. Patrick’s Day gig at the Moosewood Restaurant here in Ithaca.

One of the persistent questions in my musical life is the question of identity. There are musicians who are experts in a particular tradition like Irish music, or Renaissance, or Baroque; they study their genre by listening to recordings, studying with masters, doing research in music libraries, and so on. Then there are musicians who just do their thing, working on their own and developing their own ideas and techniques. And all sorts of others in between.

“Who’s right?” is probably not a proper question. Musical identity depends on the musician’s interests, learning style, background, passions, gifts, etc.

If you come to