Banjo and Hammered Dulcimer

For some time now I've thought that I should regularly share some of the great musical videos I've found on the internet, YouTube in particular being a wonderful free resource. There is a lot of really good music (to my ears at least!) out there - I'm not keen on heavily amplified music and there's no chance of any 'heavy metal' getting a show on this blog, that's for sure!

This evening then there is this recent addition to YouTube featuring two of my favourite instruments: the banjo and hammered dulcimer. I'm trying to learn to play the hammered dulcimer and would love to be able to play the banjo as well. To me this is a wonderful relaxing video to watch and to hear. I was a little bemused by what was happening outside to distract Christie; the answer is in her blog: she wrote a piece about doing this recording and someone added a comment querying what she was looking at right at the start. It turns out from her reply that her neighbour was just about to get out his lawn mower but realised she was recording and just came over to listen outside the window! Mystery solved then. After watching this video I shut my eyes to just listen to the sound and let it wash over me. Enjoy!

Additional note posted 29 September:
I should have added that the two musicians seen playing in this video are Matt Evans and Christie Burns who both teach at the Mountain Music Folk School in Chattanooga in the USA. Now when one embeds videos from YouTube there is a choice of sizes - with such good definition I selected the largest which I see cuts across the blog labels in blue on the right hand side but I think that loss is worth it to get a nice large video!

Hammered Dulcimer music to enjoy

I am a great enthusiast for the hammered dulcimer, even to the extent of having one of my own which I'm trying to learn how to play. This group in America have a few other acoustic instruments but they mostly are hammered dulcimers. I think it's a joyful sound - they are playing a medley of tunes: Ragtime Annie, Soldier's Joy and Golden Slippers at a centenary celebration of the Model T Ford. Hence the reason for the fashion statement! As an antidote to the frequent bad news around I hope you enjoy this music.