Stick Dulcimer in French Walnut by Michael J King

[michael j king]

I normally make a small number of these a year between other commissions, this Stick Dulcimer is made using Steamed French Walnut offcuts from a furniture workshop, Birch from an old sofa and offcuts of German Spruce from a guitar soundboard.

This is one of my 580mm scaled instruments that I am increasingly getting fond of, (my short scale model) Tuned to D









This instrument still has the protective plastic on the small scratch plate, I should have a video of this soon if I can share that

[Jon Whitney]

A very handsome instrument indeed. Thanks for showing it.

[Jason Rodgers]

I really like the looks of that. How far up to the heel is it hollow? What sort of bracing do you use?

[michael j king]

Normally I use two fan braces and two braces either side of the sound hole, I have been making them for 13 years now with slight variations internally and in scale length, My fingerboards cover solid wood and not open space so the free area of the soundboard is the sounding part, The back is minimally braced, one diagonal brace unless I do a multipiece back. (I Love edge jointing small pieces of wood for some crazy reason) I save guitar and Ukulele offcuts and collect spare bits of wood and every so often make a few recycled Stick Dulcimers like this out of the left over woods. I do have a video on the short scale Stick Dulcimer in D and its bracing on Youtube along with the Stick Dulcimer making Course itself

[Bryan Bear]

Nice looking. It all fits together well in a classy way.

[Clay Schaeffer]

Hi Michael,
Welcome to the MIMF.
Nice instrument. Some day you may be known as the Stradivarius of the stick dulcimer! I've enjoyed watching your youtube videos on building stick dulcimers and have been inspired by them to build a simplified HPL bodied model. They are a lot of fun to build and surprisingly loud for such small bodied instruments.

[Chuck Tweedy]

Real nice instrument Michael.
I also checked out you videos and website. Great stuff!
I'm also a Linux & OpenShot user. Yea!

[michael j king]

Bryan, Clay, Chuck,Thanks so very much! I have really tweaked thing's over the years to improve the balance and sound, making the sides thicker, leaving linings square, thick brass tailpiece. The sound produced from such a small body is always amazing and out of proportion and the tone on the spruce tops improves further still after a few months playing. This year I have also started to make all mahogany ones which seem very different, more punchy, great played in sound from the moment you put strings on them.

[Simon Magennis]

Very nice. I will have to did round on you tube and remind myself what one should sound like.

Thanks.