Make a Ray Jacobs’ Rocky Mountain Dulcimer

1 Make a Ray Jacobs Rocky Mountain Dulcimermake this GORGEOUS sounding instrument from a 2x4, cardboard, & plywood. It s cheap, beautiful, & Kiko Denzer, with help and inspiration from Ray and Shirley IN THE END, WE SHALL HAVE HAD ENOUGH OF CYNICISM, SCEPTICISM AND HUMBUG, AND WILL WANT TO LIVE - MORE MUSICALLY. ** Vincent Van Gogh, to his brother Theo, 24 Sept., 1888 in Arles. Translated by Mrs. Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, ed. Robert Harrison, no. 542. s wife Shirley is holding one of Ray s cardboard guitars. At her foot is a Dulcimer . Make a Ray Jacobs Rocky Mountain Dulcimer : Build this Gorgeous Sounding Instrument from a 2x4, Cardboard, & Plywood. It s cheap, Beautiful, & Easy-to-Build-and-Play Kiko Denzer, January, 2013 ISBN: 9780615748931 Published by Hand Print Press (paper & PDF) under a creative commons license: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs Unported (CC BY-NC-ND )You may share, copy, distribute and transmit the work for any non-commercial purpose but please do let us know!

2 And YES!~ holler if you have ideas for a derivative project. Downloadable PDF available free from : (AND0 RINT0 RESSs0/" s"LODGETT/2s s541-438-4300 Also contact us! about Dulcimer kits & (discounted!) bulk paperback ordersOTHERS BY KIKO DENZER:Build Your Own Earth OvenDig Your Hands in the DirtMake a Simple SundialHand Print PressContentsForeword .. 2 Introduction .. 3 Tools & Materials: what you ll need .. 5 Step 1: The Neck .. 7 Neck Dimensions (chart) .. 8 Step 2: Frets: Locating Fret Slots .. 12 Cutting Fret Slots .. 13 Get Your Frets in Place .. 14 Fret Chart .. 15 Prepping Frets for Glueing .. 16 Glueing the Frets in Place .. 18 Filing the Frets .. 19 Fret Ends .. 20 Initial Shaping of the Neck .. 21 Fiddle Break! (Instrument photos) .. 22 Step 3: The Plywood Back .. 26 Cutting the Blocks for Attaching the Neck.)

3 29 Glueing Blocks to Base .. 30 Glueing Neck to Body .. 31 Cutting Brace Blocks for the Cardboard .. 32 Step 4: Selecting & Cutting Cardboard .. 34 Glueing Sides & Top .. 36 Preview: How to Determine the Proper Bridge Height .. 38 Step 5: Lacquer Finish for the Neck .. 39 Step 6: Fitting the Cardboard Top .. 40 Step 7: Remanufacturing Tuners .. 42 Step 8: Tuners: Installing .. 44 Mounting Tuners .. 45 Step 9: Mounting the Bridge .. 46 Step 10: Mounting Strings & Finishing the Bridge .. 47 Play your Dulcimer .. 48 Basic Chord Chart .. 50 Musical Resources .. 51 STORIES: Meeting Ray .. 52 FAME: An American Teacher & her Czech Students Learn About Language & Harmony .. 59 About Hand Print Press (other titles) .. 61 Dulcimer Kits & Cottage Industry: ordering & participating.

4 622 Make A Ray Jacobs Rocky Mountain Dulcimer MET Ray Jacobs one May in California; he was teaching people to make something that looked like a 3-string banjo out of cardboard and scrap wood but it ..amazing! It looked so simple, I thought shoot, I could play that! Ray told stories about 20 years of teaching fourth graders, not just so they could make and play these simple, 3-stringed instruments but so they could participate in the world. He put an old V-8 engine in the classroom and challenged them to take it apart and put it together; he took them to a local pond to squelch and splash and take buckets of pond wa-ter back to class, where they put it in split 55-gallon drums so they could play and learn when their other work was done; he shepherded 20 generations of kids into 5th grade, many of them with dulcimers they had made themselves, on which they could all play melody and chords ex-traordinary gifts!

5 I thought, someone should put this into a book so every 4th grade teacher can do what Ray did! I ve been a teaching art-ist in the Oregon schools, and know how WLJKW WKH EXGJHWV DUH DQG KRZ GLI FXOW LW is for kids to get good, hands-on activities. When teachers are so bound by schedules, test requirements, and policy that they can t afford to engage kids in anything QRW VSHFL HG LQ WKH FXUULFXOXP LW WDNHV DQ outsider to do the creative projects. Life and beauty grow by exchanges of gratitude, grace, and peace, by which we learn about love and feeling and how to belong to something larger than our own small selves. It comes natu-rally, asking only that we participate. Participation makes community, and community makes the soil where beauty feeds and culture grows. Ray s Dulcimer is the kind of gift that makes it possible.

6 But to measure the exchange only in dollars is like trying to grow a garden on concrete. Seeds life! need dirt, and dirt came as a gift long before we divided and converted it into a speculative commodity. Real estate, prop-erty, (intellectual or material), belongs to life, as we do. If we make merchandise of everything we think, feel, say, or make, we enslave ourselves. A free people sing, celebrate, and share. Ray told me, if I can spend an hour or two making music, it s a good day. This book is published under a creative commons license: please share the free PDF. The paperback can be had from Hand Print Press or Amazon; that price helps pay production, distribution and, (perhaps) some living and working ex-penses for author and family. Ray also sells instructional CDs, insruments, as well as his and Shirley s music.

7 Write them at POB 794, Eureka MT 59917. Make A Ray Jacobs Rocky Mountain Dulcimer 3 Ray s shop is on the sec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didn t ask why the shop was up top, but I admired the stair design, which leads to a tiny landing just below a trap door. On one side of the landing is a small, final step: when you reach the landing, you turn, put your right foot on the small step and launch up into the shop.]

10 Coming down is not a simple reversal, but a new dance in which a small mis-step could drop you much faster than you d want to go. Every entrance and exit made me stop and pay atten-tion. Make A Ray Jacobs Rocky Mountain Dulcimer 5 TOOLS & MATERIALS: WHAT YOU LL NEED <RX GRQ W QHHG D ZKROH ZRRG-VKRS OLNH 5D\ V RU D ORW RI SRZHU WRROV $Q\ KDQG WRROV \RX PD\ QHHG WR EX\ ZLOO KDYH PXOWLSOH XVHV DQG DUH ZRUWK OHDUQLQJ WR XVH *RRG KDQG WRROV ZLOO VHUYH \RX ZHOO IRU D ORQJ WLPH 0 RVW VKRXOG EH HDVLO\ REWDLQDEOH XVHG LQ \RXU ORFDO WKULIW RU UH VWRUH RU DW \DUG VDOHV ,I \RX DOUHDG\ KDYH D ZRRG VKRS RU D WRRO NLW \RX OLNHO\ KDYH DOO \RX OO QHHG TOOLS +DPPHU D UHJXODU % R] VPRRWK IDFHG QLVK KDPPHU LV QH GRQ W JHW D KHDY\ IUDPLQJ KDPPHU ZLWK D WH[WXUHG IDFH +DQG VDZ , UHFRPPHQG % D GXDO SXUSRVH -DSD-QHVH VW\OH SXOO VDZ ZLWK ULS WHHWK RQ RQH VLGH DQG FURVVFXW WHHWK RQ WKH RWKHU EXW D FRQ-YHQWLRQDO SXVK VDZ ZLOO ZRUN QH DOVR %DKFR PDNHV WKH EHVW RQHV FRSLQJ VDZ ZLWK QH % WRRWKHG EODGHV RU PRUH WHHWK SHU LQFK VPDOO DGMXVWDEOH % FDUSHQWHU V VTXDUHPHWDO OH LW VKRXOG EH DV % SHUIHFWO\ DW DV SRVVLEOH 5D\ VD\V LW V ZRUWK FRP-SDULQJ OHV EHIRUH \RX VHOHFW RQH 7 DNH D VWUDLJKW HGJH DQG OD\ LW RQ WKH OH WR PDNH VXUH LW V QRW FXSSHG RU EHQW.