A fretted zither traditional to the southern Appalachian mountains of the eastern USA consisting of a narrow fingerboard attached to a larger soundbox underneath. Variant names include ‘delcumer’, ‘dulcymore’, ‘harmonium’, ‘hog fiddle’, ‘music box’ and ‘harmony box’. Long found only in scattered pockets of tradition, the dulcimer has since the 1950s gained popularity outside the mountains; by the end of the 20th century it was being widely used by both amateur and professional musicians in folk-based repertories.
The organological development of the Appalachian dulcimer divides into three periods: transitional (1700 to the mid-1800s), traditional (mid-1800s to 1940) and revival or contemporary (after 1940). During the transitional period the dulcimer developed in the Shenandoah River Valley region of southwestern Pennsylvania through the blending of British (predominantly Scottish) musical traditions with those of other immigrants, who brought with them the German Scheitholt and possibly the Swedish hummel, the Norwegian langeleik or the French épinette des Vosges. In the traditional period the dulcimer solidified into its present shape. Two makers were probably responsible for the dissemination of the instrument within Appalachia. J. Edward Thomas of Knott County, Kentucky, had connections with the Hindman Settlement School in eastern Kentucky and made dulcimers between 1871 and 1930, many of which he peddled from a mulecart. C.P. Pritchard of Huntington, West Virginia, manufactured what he termed an ‘American dulcimer’ and offered strings by mail order. Both made instruments in hourglass form with three strings.
Towards the end of the 19th century the Settlement School and crafts movements brought the dulcimer to the attention of outsiders, and the interpretation of Appalachia as the home of America’s ‘Elizabethan ancestors’ encouraged a romanticized view of the instrument as emblematic of an imagined Appalachian culture. This attention encouraged mountain residents to preserve the dulcimer but also discouraged them from developing it any further. In the early 1900s it was taken up by scholars, notably I.G. Greer, and folk music enthusiasts, such as Andrew Rowan Sumner, Mellinger Henry, Maurice Matteson and John Jacob Niles (see illustration).
Around the middle of the 20th century the dulcimer entered the urban northeast folk revival scene, largely due to the Kentucky-born musician Jean Ritchie, who performed and recorded extensively and published the first important instruction book (1963). The recordings and performances of revivalist (Richard Fariña, Paul Clayton, Howie Mitchell, Betty Smith, Ann Grimes) and traditional players (Frank Proffitt, Frank Proffitt jr, the Melton and Russell families of Galax, Virginia, the Presnell and Hicks families of Beech Mountain, North Carolina, the Ritchie family of eastern Kentucky) introduced the dulcimer to a wide audience and dulcimer making became a hobby and cottage industry thoughout the USA. Makers refined the instrument and developed new variants: a cardboard dulcimer, a ‘backpacker’s dulcimer’ or dulcerine (a fretboard without soundbox) and a electric dulcimer. A magazine, Dulcimer Players News, was founded in 1975.
The instrument is usually 75 to 90 cm long, its width varying according to the shape of the soundbox, commonly hourglass or teardrop, although oval, diamond, rectangular and other shapes are found. There are many variants, including a child-sized one and a larger one for concerts. The dulcimer has three strings, usually of metal, sometimes with one (the melody string) or more doubled. Contemporary dulcimers frequently add a fourth string, either doubling the melody string or equidistant between the melody and middle strings. The fingerboard is divided by metal frets into two and half to three octaves of the diatonic scale, rendering the dulcimer a modal instrument; the two most common modes seem to have been Ionian (the major scale) and Mixolydian. Two common Ionian tunings have melody and middle strings at the same pitch with the bass string a 5th or an octave below. Other tunings have melody and bass strings an octave apart with the middle string a 5th above the bass, or strings tuned to create a chord. Some contemporary instruments have extra, chromatic, frets, and players have devised more tunings and adopted the capo tasto to change key without retuning. On earlier dulcimers the frets were under the first two strings only, but on contemporary instruments they extend the full width of the fingerboard, allowing all strings to be used for the melody or chords.
The instrument was usually placed horizontally across a table or the player’s lap. The right hand sounded the strings by plucking with the fingers or a plectrum made from wood or quill (or, occasionally, bowing) while the left hand played a melody by pressing on the fretboard with a noter (a wooden rod used as a slide) or the fingers. Melodies were usually played on the first string only, the others acting as drones. Techniques for using all the strings for melody, for playing chords and for finger-picking have been developed by both traditional and contemporary players. The traditional repertory included British ballads and hymns, dance tunes, play party songs, minstrel show tunes, sentimental popular songs, gospel, blues and commercial hillbilly music. The older British-derived repertory was emphasized by the romanticists of the instrument and the dulcimer was still associated with those styles at the end of the 20th century, although contemporary players had expanded the repertory enormously. Because of its soft volume, the dulcimer is thought to have been used to accompany singing or for instrumental solos, but it was also in string bands and instrumental duets, where it sometimes played the melody and sometimes provided harmony or a rhythmic accompaniment through the slapping of the pick against the strings. At the end of the century there were numerous clubs, and workshops for playing and making the instrument were common throughout the USA.
C. Seeger: ‘The Appalachian Dulcimer’, Journal of American Folklore, lxxi (1958), 40–51
J. Ritchie: The Dulcimer Book (New York, 1963/R)
Dulcimer Players News (Winchester, VA, 1975–)
J. Ritchie: Jean Ritchie’s Dulcimer People (New York, 1975)
M. Murphy: The Appalachian Dulcimer Book (St Clairsville, OH, 1976)
L.A. Smith: ‘Toward a Reconstruction of the Development of the Appalachian Dulcimer: what the Instruments Suggest’, Journal of American Folklore, xciii (1980), 385–96
L.A. Smith: A Catalogue of Pre-Revival Appalachian Dulcimers (Columbia, MO, 1983)
L.M. Long: The Negotiation of Tradition: Collectors, Community, and the Appalachian Dulcimer in Beech Mountain, North Carolina (diss., U. of Pennsylvania, 1995)
R.L.Smith: American Dulcimer Traditions (Lanham, MD, 1997)
For further bibliography see Zither.
LUCY M. LONG