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About the dulcimer festival
The Upper Potomac Dulcimer Fest was started in 1988 to gather some of the finest and most inventive players of the hammered dulcimer together to share ideas, techniques and repertoire and to teach new players on the instrument.
Now in it's 21st year, Upper Potomac has two hammered dulcimer festivals, and three other music weekends which attract a wide variety of musicians. Browse our web pages linked from here to find out about more about each of these special weekends. Located back in the heart of historic Shepherdstown at the Shepherd University Student center, the area churches and the War Memorial Building (aka Men's Club), the festival combines small town ambiance with convenient class sites..
Our Fall Dulcimer Fest, has an "a la carte" class menu, offering a variety of short intensive workshops during a three day weekend to choose from. Each day offers a a choice of classes allowing students to study with several different instructors during the weekend. In order to keep hassle to a minimum, classes run for the entire day, so Friday's class runs from 2-5PM, Saturday's is all-day from 10AM-5PM (with breaks) and Sunday's class is 10AM-12:30PM. Our featured performers are No Strings Attached and Mick Doherty from Oregon.
Our Spring Music Weekend offers three levels of dulcimer classes along with a variety of classes for other instruments following a specific theme which changes each year. Past weekends have included a Civil War Theme, England and Scotland… this coming year (2009) we are have guests from Mexico, Dulcemelos, Alejandra Barrientos and Hector Larrios as well as Ensemble Typmanon including Karen Ashbrook Paul Oorts and Nick Blanton, playing music from France. Students choose a single class for a total of 12 hours of instruction during the weekend.
Shepherdstown offers the festival a greater variety of food and lodging options than any other location. Blocks of rooms have been reserved at the Clarion ($95/room/night) and the Comfort Inn ($75/rm/night) for convenient access to our program events. Reserve early, these rooms fill fast!
Become part of the Upper Potomac community, browse all of our web sites and make plans to attend one or more of our events this year! All weekends have mixed instrument classes open to experienced players, but the spring and fall festivals have the strongest dulcimer content.
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