Lorraine Hammond

The original sounds of New Britain are resurrected through the playing of multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Lorraine (Lee) Hammond. A self-trained dulcimer participant, Hammond was known as “the Jimi Hendrix from the Appalachian Dulcimer” with the Harvard Crimson, as the German music mag Musikblatt described her as “the best possible of most Appalachian dulcimer players.” An old-timey-style banjo participant, Hammond positioned third within a fiddle and banjo competition in Lowell, Massachusetts in 1994. Hammond can be equally skilled on the Celtic harp, which she’s studied during intensive excursions to Scotland. Hammond’s musical strategy was crafted during her years as a child when she was befriended by neighbor Oscar Degrenia, a world-renowned folklorist. Another neighbor, Ed Canby, led her towards folk music of important mountain dulcimer participant Jean Ritchie. After motivating a roommate at Goddard University in Plainfield, Vermont to mail-order a dulcimer, Hammond trained herself to try out. Her musical understanding was extended when she was subjected to bluegrass and traditional folk music while doing work for the Serenity Action Middle in Washington, D.C. A turning stage in Hammond’s musical development arrived in 1962 when she structured the Yelping Hillsides Folk Event in Connecticut. Through the weekend-long event, she fulfilled several Boston-area music artists including banjo participant and keyboardist Rick Lee, whom she fell deeply in love with and wedded a year later on. Hammond continuing to grow like a musician. Functioning at each day treatment middle in 1969, she was influenced to come back to Goddard University to review early child years. When an adviser recommended that she pursue an education in music rather, she persuaded a music teacher, Dennis Murphy, to simply accept her as an apprentice. Among her first tasks was to create and create a dulcimer of her personal. As well as Rick Lee, Hammond produced her documenting debut having a duo recording, Surviving in the Tree, in 1975. Following the launch of two extra duo albums, Hammond and Lee became a member of with whistle participant Sarah Bauhan and fiddler Jane Orzechowski to create a music group, Solomon’s Seal. In the past due 1980s, Hammond and Lee started to encounter marital problems. Pursuing their divorce, Hammond became a member of with virtuousic guitarist Bennett Hammond, who she afterwards married, to create a fresh duo. Lorraine and Bennett Hammond, who reside in Brookline, Massachusetts with Bennett’s girl, Alaina, continue steadily to collaborate. In Oct 1977, they released a duo recording, Cape and Isle Methods, their instrumental soundtrack using their video released by Site Productions. Lorraine Hammond’s single recording, Love Includes a Existence of ITS, presented instrumental support by her spouse. Lorraine Hammond has already established a long participation using the Cambridge Middle for Adult Education. Furthermore to teaching Appalachian dulcimer, five-string banjo, folk harp, songwriting, and fundamental music theory, Hammond offers structured the center’s two annual music celebrations — the Blacksmith Home Folk Event in Oct as well as the Blacksmith Home Dulcimer Festival in-may. Hammond offers penned two songbooks, Barley Break, Elizabethan Music for Appalachian Dulcimer as well as the Magic Dulcimer, and continues to be featured on the six-cassette group of music training released by Homespun Tapes.