The Spring Dulcimer (SD) is struck with mallets like a traditional hammered dulcimer but uses springs as opposed to steel strings. It is the antithesis of a typical hammered dulcimer. It has a heavier, industrial sound that can be either melodic or atonal and percussive as opposed to the light ethereal sound of a traditional dulcimer. Unlike a traditional dulcimer there are no tuning pegs as the tension is fixed within the spring itself. Each spring has at least one bridge piece. A traditional hammered dulcimer has a few long bridge pieces that support all of the strings. The spring dulcimer is tuned by simply adjusting the individual bridge piece for each spring. This eliminates the laborious task of having to adjust the tension of numerous steel strings when tuning a traditional hammered dulcimer. A Spring Dulcimer holds its tuning fairly well for a long time. It is also one of the components of the Spring Pan Kit (SPK) but it can also be played on its own.
