Dulci-More to host mother-daughter duo
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SALEM -- Dulci-More: Folk & Traditional Musicians will host Cindy Harris and Rebecca Heath at 7 p.m. Saturday in the meeting room of the Dale Shaffer Research Library of the Salem Historical Society, 239 S. Lundy Ave. Parking is available in the municipal lot across Lundy. The building is handicapped accessible. Admission is $10 with an additional $5 covering all children in a family with a responsible adult.
Cindy Harris has been making and teaching music with voice, autoharp, fiddle and a variety of other instruments for as long as she can remember. She is particularly interested in traditional music of many varieties, and her repertoire includes everything from Irish tunes and Israeli dance music to dark Appalachian fiddle tunes from the mountains of West Virginia. But her playful side can't resist amusing modern songs about real life, which somehow co-exist with folk songs from long ago. A concert set from Cindy is always a collection of eclectic surprises bound together by a common theme that suits the occasion. Cindy will be joined by her daughter, Rebecca Heath, on bass and harmony vocals.
As a member of the Pittsburgh traditional music and dance community, Harris formed the contradance band GrayScale in 2018. With a repertoire based on traditional fiddle tunes, GrayScale placed fourth in the 2018 Neo-traditional Band competition at the Appalachian String Band Festival in Clifftop, W.Va. GrayScale is a favorite contradance and square dance band in Western Pennsylvania, and performed at several festivals while touring Australia in 2020.
Harris placed second in the International Autoharp Championship every year from 2013 through 2016 and won that contest in 2017, earning her a spot in the 2018 Champions Concert, where she performed in a trio with guitarist Bill Balassi and concertina player Jody Kruskal. She played in the Mountain Laurel Autoharp Championship every year between 2008 and 2019, missing the final only once, placing in the top three seven times, and claiming the championship in 2019.
Harris has two recordings of her own, "You Can't Get There From Here" (2006) with Heath, and "Potluck!" (2018), a collection of autoharp duets with 15 other fabulous autoharp friends. She was also included in the 2003 "Autoharp Legacy" project and appears on autoharp or fiddle on a number of other recordings. She has produced and also appears on three autoharp-related recording projects with members of the Cyberpluckers autoharp discussion group: a 1999 recording of the music of Stephen Foster, and two volumes of "Strike The 'Harp" featuring a wide variety of holiday-related music (2009 and 2013). All of her recordings are available at CDBaby.com
Harris has been married for 39 years to college sweetheart Rick Heath and has two daughters, bass player and singer Rebecca, and occasional singer and fiddler Sharon. They all live in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Harris performed and did workshops on her own at Dulci-More Festival 4 and with her Rebecca at Dulci-More Festival 8.
Since its founding in January of 1993, Dulci-More has met twice a month to enjoy playing and singing. The group occasionally performs for festivals, fairs, schools, churches, clubs, nursing homes, and others. The group also presented its Dulci-More Festival for 25 years featuring national, international, regional, and local musicians. The Dulci-More Fall Concert Series will continue with Claudia Schmidt from Connecticut on Friday, Oct. 6, Bob and Jeanne Zentz from Norfolk, Va., on Sunday, Nov. 5, and a Performance Song Circle on Saturday, Nov. 25.
No advance tickets or reservations are needed for the concert series. Free refreshments are available during the intermission. Everyone is welcome to attend. For information or directions, contact Bill Schilling at 234-564-3852 or bill@dulcimore.org or check on the web at www.dulcimore.org for more information about the club.