EXTENDED SESSION - Class Descriptions

THURSDAY (8:45 - 11:45) and (1:30 - 3:30)

Part 1 · Strong Foundations: Strumming, Fingering, and Playing by Ear
We’ll start by reviewing the essential right- and left-hand techniques that make everything else work better—relaxed strumming, clean fingering, and using bar-chords for simple backup. You’ll also learn how to follow by ear and read hands through call-and-response exercises.

Short Break

Part 2 · Simplify and Strengthen Your Playing
Learn how to take something fancy and turn it into a bare-bones foundational version you can build on far into the future. We’ll explore playing in different octaves and how to use variety in your strumming to bring tunes to life.

Lunch Break

Part 3 ·Minimal Chord-Melody and Improvised Arrangements  
Learn a minimal approach for fitting easy chords with melodies. I learned this from my mentor David Schnaufer and it’s a great middle point between drone-melody playing and three-finger chord-melody.

Part 4 - Making It Fancy: Fiddle-Style Dulcimer Playing  
We’ll take bare-bones versions of jam tunes and explore how to add tasteful notes between melody phrases, just like fiddlers do. This kind of playing is perfect when you really want to impress your listeners. 

Friday (Continued - same students)

Part 5 · Review and Reinforce: Putting It All Together  
We’ll revisit Thursday’s material and connect all the dots—strumming, chording, fingering, melody and rhythm—while learning a new tune by ear and watching hands.

Part 6 · Finger-picking Foundations
Learn a relaxed, musical approach to finger-picking that takes a simple melody to a fuller improvised arrangement using filler picking, brushes, and simple chording.

Short Break

Part 7 · The Three Main Chord Shapes  
I’ll give you the big picture on the three main chord shapes that help you play any major or minor chord anywhere on the fingerboard. I’ll also give you some ideas on why I call this my secret weapon. 

Lunch Break

Part 8 · Flat-picking and Pick-Strum Techniques
Turn any melody into a rich, across-the-strings version. You’ll learn how to move comfortably between single-string and cross-string styles and how to add strums naturally into your picking patterns. Includes some great exercises to get your hands working right.

Short Break

Part 9 · The Music of David Schnaufer – One Easy and One Challenging  
We’ll close with two arrangements celebrating the music and teaching style of my mentor, Texas dulcimer master David Schnaufer. You’ll learn two of his classic tunes while applying many ideas covered in this intensive.
 

You’ll leave with

• Clear tablature for everything we do.
• Multiple recorded examples you can revisit anytime if you’re willing to shoot the video with your phone. There will be times for this.
• A stronger, more musical approach to your playing.
• Tunes and techniques you’ll build on for years.
• The inspiration and tools to keep growing long after the festival.

ZOOM OPTION:  STEPHEN'S 10 hours of extended instruction will be offered as a Zoom option for those folks who cannot attend in person.  The Zoom feed will be monitored by BDF staff who will be sure that any questions are answered.  After the festival, a recording of this class will be available to all registrants. 

Course Description, Thursday & Friday (10 hours)

This class will focus on taking what you have learned so far and discovering how to progress to the next level of playing. 

The class will begin by revealing the 5 secrets to becoming a better player.

We’ll review the vital basics of timing and strumming while learning new tunes to add to your repertoire.

We will also focus on playing in different styles such as fiddle tunes, participating in jams and adding expression and dynamics to slower songs.

Most importantly this class will help you begin to develop your own style of playing.

Plenty of time will be available for questions and discussion.

Be sure to bring a pencil with an eraser, a capo, a music stand and a sense of humor.

Greetings! I am Diane, and I will be working with the 2026 Buckeye Mountain Dulcimer Beginners. 

The only prerequisite for this class is a desire to learn about the dulcimer. In our class, we will learn ELEVEN BASICS:

1)  You must tune it!
2)  Our right hands… picking & strumming
3)  Understanding tablature 

4)  Chords & Chord-Melody Style  

5)  Answering questions & pursuing rabbit trails  

6)  Notes & Rhythms 

7) Dulcimer Melodies  

8)  Our left hands… fingering & noters 

9) Instrument Care & Anatomy  

10)  Playing Tunes Together
11)  {Yes, the eleventh is “You Can Do It.”) You can !!!   

For   those who have been playing hammered dulcimer for a while, we will explore everal exciting ways of arranging, using expression, and even composing:

1) Basic practical chord theory: Getting a simple understanding of how everything is made out of the do-re-mi scale in its ‘boxes’ on the dulcimer – chords, melodies, etc.!

2) How to take a simple and slowish tune (we’ll use ones that you already know at first) and develop a special solo arrangement using a variety of clearly understood arrangement ‘tools’ like thirds harmonies, octaves, key changes, flams, etc.

3) How to adapt these techniques to coming up with special parts of our own when playing with others.

4) How to come up with original music in the moment without thinking at all, using specific tricks like triangular and zig-zag movements, throwing dice, etc.!

5) How to make your music personally expressive and meaningful.

6) An introduction to an understandable, stylized separated-hands technique that uses one, two, or three notes in the right hand to work as a ‘duet’ with a simple melody in the left hand.

And we’ll keep in mind the point each attendee is at in his or her own dulcimer journey!

ZOOM OPTION:  TIM'S 10 hours of extended instruction will be offered as a Zoom option for those folks who cannot attend in person.  The Zoom feed will be monitored by BDF staff who will be sure that any questions are answered.   After the festival, a recording of this class will be available to all registrants.

This workshop is for those players who have learned their way around their instruments and are ready to go a step beyond the simplest melodies. Our time together will be organized into chunks that will cover topics in both repertoire and technique. 

For example, we’ll have some fun with   rounds, learn tricks to follow along with fast fiddle tunes, play lyrical waltzes with musicality, explore some well-known classical melodies that will enhance your bank of tunes, and work on ways to add interest to your arrangements using melodic and rhythmic variations. 

We’ll explore chord structure in a way that will help you fill out your melodies when playing from a lead sheet, and cover some music theory (gasp!) that will relate to our instrument in practical, interesting, and helpful ways. Handouts will be provided for most tunes, but we will also exercise our ears – the best key to expanding your horizons.

This class will be an introduction to the hammered dulcimer for those who have little or no previous experience with the instrument, starting from “string side up”!   

We’ll cover basics such as the layout of the dulcimer and finding your way around all those strings.  We’ll also learn how to hold your hammers and strategies for determining efficient hammering   patterns.  

Of course, no introduction would be complete without discussing tuning the beast(!), so we’ll cover that as well.  

We’ll explore these topics while learning some of the most common jam tunes as well as some in the Buckeye Roadshow tune list.