Deitrich Bonhoeffer, one of my favorite heroes had an excellent mother. She home schooled her children through early childhood and made sure Christianity was an influence in their lives. She also instigated a Friday music time in which the family gathered to play and sing together. Much of the music they enjoyed were hymns and praise to God. As Deitrich grew up, the Friday music nights continued to be a favorite ritual that was not easily missed. They also invited new and old friends to join and those evenings became an inspirational influence in the lives of many.
As I read about these music nights it made me wish I was better at playing the piano or the guitar so I could strike up a music night at my own house and help my children to feel comfortable with making music as well as passing on those old time honored hymns many of our churches are sadly letting fall by the way side. Alas, I don't carry a tune so well and my instrument playing skills are sadly elementry. There is no money for music lessons. What to do!?
Then I discovered the mountain dulcimer. It is a simple instrument that can be played by anyone no matter how lacking in musical education they are. I think it is a great way to begin enjoying music at home because it is so quickly learned. The thing that makes it so easy to play is that you only use one finger to play the notes. Also, unlike a guitar, the notes go in order like a piano so it is easy to anticipate where your next note is going to be. You can start playing the songs you like very quickly by ear. A dulcimer can cost around $200 but my hubby found a used one on Craigslist for $20 and got it for me at Christmas time this year. By New Years I had figured out how to tune the thing and started playing a few songs from my dulcimer book. By February I was having my musical mother translating a few hymns for me to play and by March, I was plucking out songs that I wanted to learn all on my own.
The other instrument we found that is easy to learn is the recorder. Recorders are very inexpensive and easy for small hands to hold. If you buy plastic ones you can wash them in the dishwasher. Most of them come with a fingering chart. My boys are learning to play the recorder from Sally Jones's Recorder Curriculum. I will add the web site for it when Sally Jones gets back from Japan. It comes with a book and a play along CD. It goes slowly teaching several fingerings and beat. Kids can play along with the CD lessons while looking at their books. It requires no musical ability from the parent.
The recorder and the dulcimer sound very nice together. I am looking forward to the boys learning more songs on their recorders that we can play together. They also like to sing along with the dulcimer which has given us the opportunity to learn some of those great old hymns.
Our home has transformed from a place where only recorded music was played, to a home where music lives and breathes echoing off the walls. On sunny mornings, you can sometimes hear the strumming of the dulcimer or the trill of a recorder coming from our back yard. We may not be so talented, but we are learning to enjoy making music for our pleasure and for the glory of God.
A good site to learn more about playing the dulcimer is
http://www.leecagledulcimers.com/index.html
She has books and information for beginner dulcimer players as well as a very informative free instructional video under dulcimer lessons on her web site. I would recommend sticking to the DAD tuning on your dulcimer until you are very comfortable playing it.
Here is a hymn I translated for you to dulcimer from my Lutheran Hymnal in DAD tuning. 0 means to play the melody string open and M0 means to pluck the middle string (the A drone string) open. 6+ is fret 61/2. Check out Lee Cagle's beginner dulcimer lesson at the above web site for fret number explanation.
This Is My Father's World
This is my Fa-ther's world, And to my lis-t'ning ears All
0 1 2 4 2 1 0 1 2 3 5 4 2 1 5
na-ture sings, and a round me rings The mu-sic of the spheres.
4 2 2 1 0 2 1 0 M0 0 1 2 4 1 2 0
This is my Fa-ther's world; I rest me in the thought Of
4 7 4 5 6+ 7 7 6+ 5 7 6+ 5 4 5
rocks and trees, of.. skies and seas; His hand the won-ders wrought.
4 2 2 1 0 2 1 0 M0 0 1 2 4 1 2 0
My favorite praise song also sounds great on the dulcimer
Song of Micah 6:8
He has shown the, O man What is good and what the Lord re-quires of thee.
0 0 1 0 4 5,4,5 5 5 5 4 4 4 4 3 3 4 3 2
But to do just-ly and to love mer-cy
0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0
And to walk hum-bly with your God.
0 0 0 2 1 1 0 0
