|  | | Lois Hornbostel | |  It’s not unusual to find Lois Hornbostel playing her mountain dulcimer with other musicians outside the dulcimer world. Her musical experience comes from participating in old-time string bands, traditional Irish sessions in New York, Louisiana Cajun music jams, and learning from other international folk musicians. Her current music project is a duet recording with International Autoharp Champ Mike Fenton from England. Lois’s favorite musical instrument, the mountain dulcimer, has been an inspiring “companion” through her musical journey. Her first recording, “Vive le Dulcimer,” was a finalist for an “Indie” Award in their World Music category. It helped demonstrate the mountain dulcimer's versatility, and over the years Lois has done important work to bring new music styles to the mountain dulcimer. Her Mel Bay books include The Irish Dulcimer, published in 1979, Anthology for the Fretted Dulcimer (folk music from around the world), Dulcimer Fiddle Tunes and American Fiddle Tunes for Mountain Dulcimer (mostly old-time), and Cajun Favorites for Mountain Dulcimer.
Lois's background includes having won the dulcimer playing championships at the Galax Fiddle Convention and several other similar events. In elementary school arts residencies she has taught over 19,000 children to play mountain dulcimer. Lois has taught mountain dulcimer to adults since the early '80s, and has also developed new teaching concepts through organizing large, innovative dulcimer weeks. For 12 years she directed the ASU Dulcimer Workshop in Boone, NC. In 2000 Lois founded the WCU Mountain Dulcimer Week in Cullowhee, NC, and produced it for 10 years. In 2000 she resigned from that and began independently producing her annual mountain dulcimer week, "Dulcimerville," in Black Mountain, NC. For the past 17 years she has also been program coordinator of the Swannanoa Gathering's Dulcimer Week in Asheville.
See more information about Lois at her website, www.LoisHornbostel.com.
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