Activity Page

Make a can-jo · Learn the Virginia Reel · Make a clothespin dancer or a limberjack · Collect a story from your ancestors · Map your migration · Make a Dulci-can

Make a can-jo

With recycled products and kitchen trash, children can create their own music on their own manufactured instruments. Appalachian musicians sometimes had to use what was at hand when store-bought musical instruments were not available or affordable. The Foxfire Books are full of examples of this type of resourcefulness. The can-jo is Russ's adaptation of the traditional washtub bass that is commonly used in Appalachian musical settings. Materials needed: large coffee can, wooden yardstick, string, paperclip, 2 nuts and bolts.

Directions: Punch a hole in the center of the bottom of a tin can (lid has been removed). Setting open end of can on a counter, drill two holes through the yardstick and the can so that stick extends up from closed end. Fasten with 2 nuts and bolts. Drill hole in other end of stick. Push string through the hole in the can and fasten to a paper clip inside the can so that the string cannot pop out. Stretch the string to the hole in the far end of the yardstick; tie securely and tighten as much as possible. (See picture.)

Learn the Virginia Reel

This is one of the most popular dances of the Southern Highlands. One good source for the dance is Traditional American Dance Book by Rick Meyers, 1983. Directions from the traditional dance community in Norfolk, Virginia, are found on the Seven Cities of Southeastern Virginia Folk Dance Connection web site: Virginia Reel. This dance is performed in long lines, up and down the hall. Imagine clearing the cabin of furniture and rolling up the carpet in order to have a dance! The fiddlers stood in the doorways to take up less space and to be heard equally well in both rooms of the cabin. "Stay all night, stay a little longer..."

Make a clothespin dancer or a limberjack

Using patterns provided in Homemade Instruments by Dallas Cline, collect materials and create dancers for accompanying your homemade musical instruments (see number 1). Call in grandparents to help with your building projects. Have them share some of their toy memories and demonstrate their favorite homemade pastimes, as in the Foxfire Book of Toys and Games.

Collect a story from your ancestors

Who are your ancestors? Make a family tree to find out. Ask questions and tape the answers or write them down. A good way to jog the memories of relatives is to show them an old quilt and ask for the story of its making. Other things work well, too: a treasured piece of furniture that's been in the family a long time, an old dish lovingly stored in the corner cupboard, a faded photograph. Along the way collect the family stories you hear from your parents, your grandparents, or favorite uncle or aunt. Polish one up and share it with your classmates. The class could put their family stories together in a book.

Map your migration

On a United States, North American, Western Hemisphere, or World Map, track your family's migration. Compare with others in the class. Compile a composite map of migrations. The Appalachian residents migrated from Europe, British Isles, Africa, Native America.... and are still migrating today....

This image is taken from the University Of Kentucky Appalachian Center.

Make a Dulci-can

Dulci-can with painted coffee can. Dave Whitacre's modified bridge design creates a louder sound.

Dulcimer, a word that comes from the Latin dulce melos, means "sweet sound." A lap dulcimer is a traditional Appalachian folk instrument played in the Southern Highlands. Brought into the mountain wilderness by European settlers who migrated west from eastern seaboard cities, the dulcimer carried their Scots, Irish, and English tunes from Celtic homelands to America's interior. The mountain dulcimer has ancient roots that probably reach back to Scandinavian origins. It is mentioned in the Book of Daniel 3:5 with other instruments of the time making "...the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer, and all kinds of musick." It is interesting to note that, according to Sara Johnson, the Kitchen Musician®, "the word in the original Hebrew text is now known to mean something other than 'dulcimer'; and it is believed the King James translators were doing the best they could with knowledge available to them at the time."

The dulci-can shown here is a straight-ahead utilitarian version of its more graceful hand-carved wooden ancestor of hourglass or teardrop shape. Made from a fretted fingerboard, three geared tuners, three guitar strings, and a recycled coffee can for a resonator, it can be played on a lap or a table top for even greater resonation. This particular design comes from the fertile imagination of David Ball of Knoxville, Tennessee. Please click Kenton County Public Library to view serveral videos of a recent workshop held in northern Kentucky at the Mary Ann Mongan location.

Materials needed to complete this project are listed below. This project is intended as an on-site, guided activity taught by the artist. Expect to pay $20.00 to cover materials for each student.

Fret wire
3 geared tuners
Wooden bridge
2-012 and 1-022 ball end strings
Large coffee can
Board (pre-cut, pre-drilled, pre-slotted)
Note: If you want to try and cut the fret slots, go to Doug Sparling's Fret Calculator for fret spacing measurements.