Marcille's
musical interests have taken her from the grand opera houses of Europe, to
one-room cabins in remote coves of North Carolina, to the Wonderful World of
Disney!
Native Floridian Marcille Wallis is a classically trained pianist who began her musical studies at age six. Using her polished skills and talent she added the guitar and eventually the hammer dulcimer as well as other folk instruments to her repertoire. As a full time professional hammer dulcimer player, Marcille now tours the country entertaining at fairs, festivals, churches, concerts, pubs, bookstores, workshops and private functions. Drawing on her 23 years in the classroom as a Mathematics teacher, Marcille's shows are both entertaining as well as educational as she takes audiences on a "tour" of the Celtic lands and their history.
With eight CD's to her credit, Marcille's music can be heard on radio stations and Internet broadcasts world-wide and on PBS Television across the U.S. Marcille tours as a soloist performing at The Shaker Woods Festival in Columbiana, Ohio, The Big E in West Springfield, Massachusetts, The Mount Dora Art Festival in Florida, The Mount Mitchell Craft Fair in Burnsville, North Carolina, and the Yellow Daisy Festival in Stone Mountain Park in Greater Atlanta, Georgia as well as numerous Howard Alan events. She also occasionally performs in small ensemble and with a full show band which includes a wide variety of musicians as well as a superb dance couple in Traditional Celtic attire. In the period spanning 2000 to the present, Marcille produced three concert series including "Christmas With the Celts," "My Heart's In The Highlands (a musical tribute to Robbie Burns)," and a high energy St. Patrick's Concert Series. In addition to all this, Marcille is also the founder and nucleus of three Celtic Festivals in Southern Florida which she produces every year with her production company, Celtic Heritage Productions, Inc.
In
Marcille's Own Words:
Born and raised in sunny Florida, I began to study classical piano at age
six. I developed an early love for folk music by taking up the guitar at
age nine and soon afterward formal piano recitals contrasted gigs featuring
"The Manatee Avenue Demons," a group of neighborhood kids who played
sandlot baseball by day and Bob Dylan tunes at night! As a teenager I
broadened my musical horizons even further and was afforded the chance to study
for a summer at London, England's Royal Academy of Music. My instructors
there were some of the same people who had taught Elton John and collaborated in
songwriting with Paul McCartney!
I have played in professional capacities since I was a teenager, accompanying singers and instrumentalists of many different musical genres, from country singers to aspiring rock stars to operatic sopranos. For many years I was organist in my childhood church (First Baptist Church of Arcadia, Florida) and I've anchored the orchestra at piano for a number of Broadway-style musicals.
An interest in early music led me to take up the dulcimer in 1991. I attended Asheville, North Carolina's inaugural "Swannanoa Gathering," an annual series of folk arts workshops internationally known as an inspiration for serious students of traditional acoustic music. I've attended five additional "Gatherings" experiencing Old-Time Week, Dulcimer Week, and Celtic Week, and have assisted Maggie Sansone in the teaching of a beginning hammer dulcimer class.
Working with Port Charlotte guitarist Anthony Delle Donne I began making presentations in Charlotte County, Florida, schools. Out of this collaboration grew an invitation for us to play at the newly opened Celtic Ray Public House in Punta Gorda, Florida, in 1997. Drawing upon our shared love of music and my years in the classroom, we formed Ceol Binn.
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths." Proverbs 3:5-6
I'm now on MySpace!
Click
her picture to see Maggie Muggins:
The real brains behind our operation!
The hammer dulcimer is a musical instrument with truly ancient origins. No one can say for certain when the hammering or beating of strings to produce music first began, but many cultures around the globe have an ancient musical heritage that includes an instrument resembling, in both sound and style, my own dulcimer.
The direct ancestor of the hammer dulcimer is the psaltery, known to have originated in Asia Minor over 5,000 years ago. Many scholars believe that the dulcimer originated in Persia (what is now Iran) somewhere around the 9th century. The dulcimer migrated into northern Europe during the Middle Ages, brought from the Middle East by returning Crusaders.
Another theory suggests that the dulcimer is a product of Medieval France. Most intriguing to me is the evidence that an instrument very similar to a dulcimer actually existed in Biblical times! A musician playing a hammered, stringed instrument appears in an ancient Assyrian bas relief, and since the modern harp was certainly not in existence at that time, it is very possible that this hammered, stringed instrument was the "harp" played by King David!
The term "dulcimer" evolved from the Latin "dulce melos" - sweet sound. (As "ceol binn" means "sweet music" -- get it?) Historians surmise the dulcimer was the inspiration for the piano.
My
dulcimers, one of which is pictured at right, are crafted by master builder Sam
Rizzetta of Inwood, West Virginia. Click the small picture for a closer
look.
For more information on the dulcimer, visit "The Official WWW Hammered Dulcimer Page." Mountain dulcimer as well as hammer dulcimer enthusiasts can find a teacher, a club, links, and much more at "Everything Dulcimer." Brett Ridgeway maintains a national site at www.homestead.com/hammerdulcimer and Sharon Skaryd has a regional (Michigan-oriented) site at www.dulcimers.com.
