In 1999 I wrote a personal account about my life with music up to that point and particularly in relation the hammered dulcimer. Perhaps it will be of interest!
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Visually on the hammered dulcimer the "shape" of a three-note chord (a triad) is often a triangle, with the "vertices" the places where the hammers strike.
Around 1990, as a relatively new player, I wanted to practice playing triangles in a repeating right-left-right-left pattern, so one evening I started near the top of the dulcimer and played the E minor chord then moved down to the next position (G major) and continued downward in this way till an even number of measures seemed to call for a change. I inserted a few other figures as part of this for interest (moving up a note for a moment, etc.), but the pattern was basically straightforward as a triangle study.
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People often ask me about the origin and history of the hammered dulcimer, and usually they have no idea that it has the popularity and heritage that I tell them about. It's a widespread, very international, musical instrument! Many Americans don’t know that it ever existed at all till they see my own instrument where I’m out playing, and they commonly assume that it’s some mountain instrument developed in the Blue Ridge or such (though I don't play it in a style that should lead to that assumption). So I get to enlighten them the way I was enlightened thirty-some years ago when I first saw one myself!
It's even considered a national instrument in a number of countries such as Hungary, India, China, and Iran.
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Harpsichords and clavichords had been in development for a few centuries when an Italian named Bartolomeo Cristofori decided in the late 1600s to try to adapt the idea of the hammered dulcimer to the chromatic keyboard design.
Harpsichords had only one loudness (known to us as “quiet”), and their tone was essentially always the same plucking-crow-quill sound as well. Cristofori recognized that applying the hammer concept could open the way to a great range of volume and tone --- so he worked on making a sophisticated key assembly that could handle the varied actions of swinging a hammer at the strings. Now, instead of the player’s moving two hammers around on a diatonic (do-re-mi) pattern of notes, he or she would be able to use all ten fingers to push buttons (keys) that swung hammers that were already oriented in front of their chromatic notes. (And separating the right and left hands for different musical roles could create the effect of a "duet" that we're so familiar with in keyboard playing.)
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Are you a musician who is tied to the page? Do you need to have notes printed in front of you in order to play? Or do you have to depend on a carefully rehearsed repertoire? Do you require a chord chart so you know the right harmonic structure? Or are distinct melodies your only option when you play?
Here's an example of how totally 'out of the blue' playing can be beneficial:
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