LEWISTON — The many strings of the hammered dulcimer will ring though the Oasis of Music this Wednesday, April 25, at Trinity Church, 247 Bates St., Lewiston, from 12:30-1 p.m.

This week’s musican Greg Anderson began playing the hammered dulcimer in 1977 as a diversion from the daily grind of graduate studies. Falling in with other newbie folk musicians in the Seattle area to get his chops in order, he eventually meandered to Lexington, Kentucky, in his very cool VW microbus — trailing his future wife — where he helped found the Foot in the Door String Band and began playing for regional contradances.

A few years later, still trailing that future wife, they settled in Bowdoin, Maine. In 1984, he joined other local Maine musicians to form the enduring Maine contradance band, Scrod Pudding. The band has now been together for more than 30 years.

Anderson’s repertoire ranges widely, including old-time New England fiddle tunes, Quebecois folk music, a bit of French folk music, English country dance music, and contemporary music in the fiddle tradition including his own compositions.

For his concert at the Oasis, Anderson will play a program of some of his favorite tunes composed by his dulcimer heroes and mentors, a few traditional tunes, and a hand full of his own compositions inspired by a year spent in Bordeaux, France, at the turn of the millennium — then following his wife and their three children. Although he’d love to earn a living playing music, Anderson has maintained his day job, working in the biology department at Bates College.

Admission to the Oasis of Music is free. For more information call 344-3106.


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