North Carolina Hourglass model with slotted headstock

Jerry Rockwell's
Mountain Dulcimer Page

Five Cups of Tea

Judith Giddings has done it again! Her gorgeous nature photos add SO MUCH to this short pentatonic tune (from my recent "Nine Meditations for Dulcimer" album).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjF31K_ZAYo&feature=em-share_video_user

Messing Around with
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star

I've been doing variations on Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star for decades now, and lately I've been making some simple TABS for DAD tuning. These have worked well in recent workshops in Ohio and West Virginia. Here are some of them in pdf format:

Twinkle Melody

Twinkle Melody 2

...and here are some lower parts that support the melody:

Twinkle Bass 1

Twinkle Bass 2

Twinkle Bass 3

Here is my main page at bandcamp, which goes to my recent Nine Meditations album (which has a little duet jam on twinkle in EBE, similar to some of these tabs):

Some GREAT Jam-Along Tracks!!

Stephen Seifert has some FUN Jam-Along tracks here:

http://youtu.be/7t7f7VwSFts

This has got to be one of the best ways to get your strumming rhythms going in a nice smooth flow!

Cuckoo Elegy Slideshow!

Judith Giddings (who is a fine dulcimer player as well as a wonderful photographer) worked out a really great slideshow with her spectacular nature photos to go along with my "Cuckoo Elegy" piece. We're finally live now with this slideshow and soundtrack:

http://youtu.be/75Cj_GpY2Pk

If you like this tune, you might be interested in the other eight tunes in my new "Nine Meditations for Dulcimer" on bandcamp.com:

http://jerryrockwell.bandcamp.com/

Beginning Work on New Theory Pages

The new year is upon us, and the musical activities seem to be accelerating at a very rapid clip. On the DulciTheory front, I've been meaning to add some audio to a few select articles, so you can hear some of the examples played on the mountain dulcimer. When I get some tunes up there, I will let you know with a link right here on the home page. Thanks for your patience!

SoundCloud!

Soundcloud is an incredible community of musicians and sound artists! I have decided to post excerpts from my "Best of 2012 Collection" at SoundCloud, and I have already posted four tunes, with five more to follow very soon. Here is a link to my SoundCloud profile, where you can hear all these tunes:

Jerry Rockwell at SoundCloud

One Of My Large Hourglass Dulcimers Played By A Master

Stephen Seifert is playing one of my recent LH models at Mike Clemmer's Wood N' Strings Pickin' Porch. The audio is quite good on this little concert, so you can really hear what's going on with the instrument:

http://www.clemmerdulcimer.com/?page_id=183

Light Into Darkness: Solo Study with Ground Bass

This is a piece which I continue to work on. It has the chord progression of D-A-Bm-G, which are the same four chords that the Axis of Awesome uses to play an incredibly long string of pop songs.

The version here is a solo study for DAD dulcimer, built on a ground bass. The bass ascends stepwise from the root of each chord, and ties the whole thing together. If you have someone to play with, have them constantly play the ground bass, while you try all the other parts over it.

Here is the pdf:

Light Into Darkness: Solo Study with Ground Bass

Here is an long, sleepy-time mp3 of Light Into Darkness. This version is very free compared to the the solo study with the ground bass. It also may help you sleep if you have problems with insomnia.

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