Susan Trump
Susan Trump has been a favorite instructor and performer on the dulcimer scene for the past thirty-five years. She is known for her inspirational songs, her clear teaching style and interesting, playable arrangements. She has won awards in both mountain dulcimer and banjo competitions. Susan is a woman of many talents; performer, composer, recording artist, producer, teacher and author of books for the mountain dulcimer.
Susan comes to the dulcimer from a background in piano, with a degree in music education and a love of folk music, both traditional and contemporary. In the early 1970’s she taught guitar at the Guitar Workshop, where she got to know and was influenced by Jean Ritchie, the first person she heard play and sing with the mountain dulcimer. That inspired her to spend time traveling and meeting musicians and instrument makers in the Southern Appalachian Mountains, becoming immersed in the culture that produced the music and the instrument that she loves to play and share through her teaching.
Susan has produced three volumes of the widely acclaimed CD series, “Masters of the Mountain Dulcimer,” compilations which include music from the best dulcimer players in the country. She has also released four best-selling solo CDs. Her newest CD, “Songs of Faith and Hope,” a collection of “inspirational, uplifting songs for everyone” is being touted as her best ever!
She has written four books of music for the mountain dulcimer including two book/CD sets; one of the music of Turlough O’Carolan, and “Music from the Muse” a collection of twenty-one original compositions for intermediate level players.
Susan loves to teach and help people learn to play and enjoy making their own music. Since 2008 she has produced “Lessons in Your Living Room,” a monthly subscription series of lessons, which includes arrangements for novice, intermediate-plus, back-up chords, duet parts, introductions and endings, with TAB and instruction for all parts on CD.
Susan says this about her music, “The music I play is a combination of Americana and uplifting songs. Spending summers with my grandparents in a small town in Ohio instilled in me a love and appreciation for the front porch-friendly existence of life in a gentler time. That is the feeling that I hope to share with my students and audiences of today.”