i discovered today that i can fingerpick the dulcimer with better results than the flat pick. i finger pick guitar and play celtic harp occasionally, so its easy for me. i am getting much better rythym and i think a more reverberating tone--although not quite as loud. i find jamie rayburn, the verdant braes of skreen and wild mountain tymes just flow off my fingers and are easier to play than on guitar--i bet whistle accompanyment would go fabulously with dulcimer

so do many finger pick?

this one i bought was made by bighorn musical woodworks, by paul geiger, in 1978. it's plain but very nice wood and a beautiful sound. i don't imagine there are a lot of dulcimers with inlay and do dads.

i just bought a book of o'carolan for dulcimer. so i'll try that. i am using dad tuning. i am a dadgad guitat player and an adada cittern player and an adad bouzouki player--most of the time(i do use alternate tunings when the mood moves me), so i can quite easily transfer tunes, and i fact i am finding the dulcimer is expanding by bouzouki/cittern playing as i discover new tunes and ideas.

a luthier in maine i know said that he found references to eppinette/humel/scheidholt going back to around 1300 in northern italy, but they were chromatically fretted.

i did have a hungarian thingey like an eppinette, but it was crude and i sold it years ago. perhaps that was a mistake. i paid little and sold it for little. however it was a small one. i noticed that in the movie "doubt" a few years ago there was a hungarian dulcimer player in the opening scene playing a large one and playing it on a table. that would be easier but does it dampen the sound?

i find the fiddle tunes a bit more difficult than on bouzouki, but they are very prety, and there are several you tube videos of people playing very fast tunes on dulcimer. i like jean rithcie on you tube but i am trying for a more nova scotia gaelic sound. i was just trying tha me sgith--cutting the braken on bagpipes--i think. the drones are perfect.

i do not remember any cape breton dulcimer players when i was young but back then a banjo and mandolin were exotic. people played the piano, guitar fiddle and whistle and fiddle piano guitar and whistle and sometimes whistle fiddle guitar and piano-- then bagpies out doors or at big dances. however dulcimer has the drones for bagpipe tunes and for scotura tuning on fiddle.

i was just up in cape breton. lovely place to visit. i got reissued albums on cd of the north shore gaelic singers and winston scotty fitzgerald. i lost mine in a house fire. winston scotty was one of the standard bearers for the "softer style, angus chislom for the rougher style.cds are easier than vinyl anyhoo. and I GOT A NEW GAELIC COURSE BOOK FOR INTERMEDIATE LEARNERS can't wait. i grew up with a a bit of gaelic around but i have had no one to speak to for about fifty years so i'm pretty bad now. at least i know the spelling system(if you dare call it a system) and the basic pronounciation and grammar.

so now i am ready to sing chi me na morbheanna on dulcimer, maybe ma thoun gal dileas if i am ambitious