Black Mountain Music Fest done, back to the wood shop

Happy Friday, Folkcraft people!

I hope you've had a good week, and that you are able to include some dulcimer time in your weekend!

We're finally back from this week's dulcimer festival - our first "in person" event since March of 2020. Dad and I drove down to Black Mountain, North Carolina for the eponymous Black Mountain Music Fest. Four days of classes, plus concerts and socializing the day before and the day after the class days.

As is typical for a high-class music festival, the Folkcraft Endorsing Artists roster was well-represented. I'm in the above photo (left), and following me from left to right you see Wendy Songe, Bing Futch, Mandy Tyner, and Dave Haas. John Keane and Karen Keane, our other two Artists, had school commitments, and weren't available to teach and perform at this year's Black Mountain festival. Rumor has it that they're on the roster for next year, though!

Mandy Tyner did her inaugural performance as a Folkcraft artist, and did a stellar job. She played some banjo, and some dulcimer. And she sang, too. Utterly spectacular, of course.

Evidently, she's a fan of Carter Family music. Who would have thought? You'll be seeing more of Mandy over the coming years, for sure.

Featured video

I'm not giving you an instruction video this week. Instead, you get a performance video. Wendy Songe performing at the Black Mountain festival with Erin Mae. They're both kind of good.

I hope you all recognized the understatement in the last sentence. Seriously amazing, both of them. Click on the image above to see the video on YouTube.

The response to our "Featured Folkcraft Player" newsletter segment has been OFF THE CHARTS! We have submissions from y'all that will take us into December, but keep them coming - it'll be good to schedule out into the first part of 2022!)

Featured Folkcraft Player: Mike Squint

In 1977 I discovered the mountain dulcimer sound while traveling through Chattanooga. That unique sound stayed with me long after I returned home. I had the dulcimer bug. I built a McSpadden Dulcimer kit and was teaching myself to play by the end of that year.

The next ten years I learned to play a few songs which I liked such as "Help Me Make It Through The Night" and of course "Boil Them Cabbage Down" without knowing...

Mike's bio continues on his page at Folkcraft.com. Click here to see all of our submitted photos and bios.

Featured PDF download

At the recently-concluded Black Mountain Music Fest, I got to spend a few hours with Aaron O'Rourke. I've mentioned before how amazing he is, and I'll say it again now. Seriously amazing.

Anyway, I got to spend some time with him, chatting, picking his brain. Doing some setup work on his new Folkcraft dulcimers (I always travel with luthier tools when I go to festivals!). So this week's featured download is another of Aaron's books:

Aaron is known for his flatpicking prowess, and this book will make you sound exactly like him.

Yes, I'm lying. But it'll get you closer, anyway. You'll like this book, for sure. Well written, and approachable, even for less experienced players.

Thank you for all of your support - the book, string, and instrument orders keep the doors open and the lights on. All of us at Folkcraft sincerely appreciate you all.

That's it for this week - thank you for reading!

Sincerely,

Richard Ash