Category: Celtic

New EP on Bandcamp! Exploring More of the Acoustic Sounds from the Dulcimer

I’ve been very busy in the last three or four months with producing these tracks in my home studio. I don’t remember a time in the past where I was so dedicated to getting a collection of tunes out, and getting everything sounding right.

I went into 2025 with a surge of interest in recording my own handcrafted dulcimers acoustically, using just a decent quality condenser mic. Much of my recording over the past decade has been with magnetic humbucking pickups — usually placed over the strings with device that hold the pickups securely. These pickups do a great job of amplifying the dulcimer, and they work incredibly well with the immersive and ambient reverb plug-ins I use with Logic Pro software. The downside is that they make the dulcimer sound VERY similar to an electric guitar.

Two tracks on this new EP that use mostly just acoustic dulcimer and acoustic guitar are the opening track “Allison’s Infinite Round I” and track 5 “Safe Passage Round II.” I think you will hear a difference in these tracks: to me, I notice the increased dynamic range of the dulcimer and acoustic guitar. There is also a fragility or delicacy in the tone, though there is also a certain kind of acoustical power that really kicks, particularly on the high-end.

https://jerryrockwell.bandcamp.com/album/safe-passage-to-green-fields

QuaranTUNE 7.0 is OPEN for Registration!!!

http://virtualdulcimerfest.com

Here are the three workshops I’ll be offering:

Peaceful Irish Airs and Lullabies (Level 3)

Friday Session 1 (9-10AM EDT)

Get totally enchanted with these slow, meditative airs from Ireland. “Báidín Fheilimí” (“Phelim’s Boat”) is a 3/4 time lullaby that we’ll be doing in a simple, sparse arrangement using a lot of open strings. “Eibhlí Gheal Chiúin Ní Chearbhaill” (“The Fair and Charming Eileen O’Carroll”) is much more mesmerizing and circular.

Soothing and Magical Chord Progressions (2 hour session) (Level 4)

Friday Session 4 (12:45-2:45PM EDT)

In this workshop, you’ll learn some soothing and magical chord progressions that are easy to play and fun. Most have only four chords and they are addictive! You’ll also learn a few of my original melodies that go with them. In the last part, we’ll explore some longer chord progressions that you can use for your own melodies, and we’ll add chords to some descending scales and modes.

Freeing Up Your Playing With Pentatonics (Level 4)

Saturday Session 4 (12:45-1:45)

The ancient 5-tone Major Pentatonic Scale is a great way to jump-start your improvising. You’ll learn how to flatpick this scale, and then we’ll apply it to the main chords you know. You’ll see that there aren’t any “wrong notes” when you play the pentatonics over simple chord progressions. Finally, using the examples of some original pentatonic tunes of mine, you’ll get some insights into building your own pentatonic tunes.

These classes are filling very, very fast (not only for my classes, but for the other fine instructors you may want to study with.

New EP on Bandcamp!

Here is a brand new EP for you at Bandcamp, where I have finally recorded some of my best takes of two pentatonic originals that go back a few years: Five Tones of Wonder, and Koehler’s Pond Meditation. There’s also some brand-new recordings of a few Celtic traditional tunes that have been great fun. These recordings have a bit more color and harmony than usual, and in the case of Ballinderry, I have revamped the tune into a kind of minimalistic, but jazzy round (even though it does not work as a traditional round in its original form). Another Irish tune in this collection is the ever-popular waltz South Wind. Red Is The Rose is a Scots melody attributed to Robert Burns.

Five Restful Tunes for Dulcimer EP

And here is a free pdf tablature download for 4 out of 5 of the tunes here (I don’t have anything in tablature yet on this new South Wind):

FourOfFiveRestfulTunesDownload

QuaranTUNE 3.0 Workshops I’ll Be Teaching In February

Quarantune 3.0 is right around the corner! In this post I want to give you a little sample of some of the tablature I’ll be using for each of my workshops. There will probably be much more tablature when we do the workshop, but this will give you an idea. Here is the QuaranTUNE web site where you can get registered for classes:

QuaranTUNE Dulcimer Festival

Level 2 (Novice) – Slow Variations on Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star:

2twinklevariationsDownload

Level 3 – Simple Chord Progressions (that may be new to you):

LoveBTU_chordsDownload
b-G-D-A_block1Download
NovembersWaltzTAB_helperDownload
desc_aeolian_34_1Download

Level 4 – Skip’s Heavenly Round:

SkipsRoundSoloV2Download

Level 5 – Dorian, Aeolian, and Mixolydian Modes (relative to DAD, or parallel for Mixolydian, so no retuning):

ilovemyloveDownload
SingingStoneFilesDownload
OutOnTheOpenSeasDADblockDownload
NovembersWaltzDownload

I’ll be happy to provide you with more info if you need it. Please see the Contact page.

Some New Tunes!

Golly, this quarantine has led to a whole bunch of creative work from so many artists all over the planet! I have been incredibly busy too: working on formatting block chord TAB in a table format on this blog (A LOT harder than you might think!!!), learning Finale (for the 3rd or 4th time!), and laying some new track ideas in Logic Pro X, which is the subject of this post.

Here is a tune I recorded a few days ago:

SummerTune No. 1