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Dulcimer Doctor Chained To His Workbench For Three Days

July 26, 2024
 
Good Morning, Y'all!
 
I'm back home from the Evart, Michigan, dulcimer festival, aka "The Funfest," or more formally, "The ODPC Funfest." (ODPC stands for Original Dulcimer Players Club)
 
The festival was great, as usual. Lots of people making music, lots of jams, lots of classes.
 
Two of the Folkcraft endorsing artists had full class schedules - Bing Futch and Dave Haas. Past Evart festivals have had Wendy Songe, John Keane, and Karen Keane teaching, but those artists were all doing other things this year.

dave haas demoing his Folkcraft DulciVox at the Evart Michigan Funfest
Dave Haas, demoing his new DulciVox

I spent all three festival days anchored to the Folkcraft display, mostly working on customer instruments. I worked on a total of 48 instruments, from 19 different makers. Some instruments were minor jobs (adding strap buttons), some received regular maintenance (fretboard tweaking, new strings), some had more extensive work done (frets additions, nuts, bridges, pickup repairs). I had to bring a few instruments back to the shop - dulcimers that needed more extensive work than I could do without the full complement of tools I have here in Woodburn, Indiana. 

a Clemmer resonator dulcimer disassembled for repairA Clemmer resonator, disassembled for repair

By the time Saturday afternoon rolled around, and it was time to pack up, I was worn out!

Luckily, Evart is only a 4 1/2 hour drive north of Woodburn, so we were backing the trailer (full of dulcimers and repair tools) into the Folkcraft loading dock before 11 PM.
 
While I was away from the Folkcraft shop on Wednesday through Saturday of last week, Pam, Cheyenne, Dad, and Casey kept things going in my absence. They got a bunch of orders (lots of books and string sets!) out the door, along with making cases and dulcimers. We'll have a good number of dulcimer orders from March shipping out this week!
 
Speaking of books - our sale book this week (and we're nearly done with the sale books - after that, they'll be at regular price) is Shelley Stevens' book "Jam Tunes And Beyond." This collection of tunes is perfect for the more advanced player who's gotten bored with simpler arrangements. This intermediate-level book is just what the "Jam Doctor" ordered! With classics like "Mississippi Sawyer" and "June Apple," plus a few tunes which might be new to you, you'll have a ton of fun playing Shelley's arrangements. "Billy In The Low Ground" was a new tune for me, possibly it'll be a new one for you, too? Here's a link:
 
Shelley Stevens "Baker's Dozen #12 - Jam Tunes And Beyond"

This book will be $3.99 for the next week, then it goes back to the regular price of $12.

And while we're on the subject of Shelley's Baker's Dozen books, I just put in an order for the two of Shelley's books that we're sold out on: #3 and #8. We'll have to raise the selling price on those two books to cover the increased cost of printing and shipping. So, as we sell out on the other eleven of the Baker's Dozen books, the retail price will be going from $12 to $18. 
 
Thanks for reading, Y'all - Have a great weekend!
 
Richard Ash, luthier-who-doesn't-get-to-enjoy-dulcimer-festivals-as-much-as-he-should-because-he's-always-working-on-someone's-instrument