SPANISH FORT, Ala.—When Ona Collins wandered up the stairs of the Five Rivers Delta Resource Center for a break from Monday’s driving rain, she didn’t quite believe the cherubic symphony awaiting her.

“It sounded like a band of angels, and I just had to find out what was going on,” said Collins, a Spanish Fort resident who abandoned her weekly nature walk to enjoy the free concert of the Gulf Coast Hammer Jammers.

Totaling about 20 members, the Hammer Jammers are a collective group of hammered dulcimer players who typically meet in smaller groups across Baldwin and Mobile counties to practice their craft.

Hammered dulcimers—not to be confused with lap, or mountain, dulcimers—are trapezoidal-shaped stringed instruments believed to be the arguably ancient precursor to the modern-day piano. Unlike the piano, however, a dulcimer player strikes the strings with hand-held wooden hammers instead of her fingers to make the melodic, sustained notes.

The instruments—which are quite large compared to their mountain counterparts—range in price from $500 for a used model and as much as $1,000 to $2,000 for new models.

Ruth Geraci, an avid Hammer Jammer from the Summerdale area, helped organize the two-day event at Five Rivers for the express purpose of melding the smaller bands into one big group.

“This is the first time we’ve had this many of us in one place at one time,” Geraci said.

Indeed, some 17 players from across the region drew a crowd of more than 40 into the Tensaw Theater Monday, many straggling in like Collins once the Appalachian and Celtic music began carrying on the wind.

Sunday’s concert drew closer to 23 musicians and a standing-room-only crowd in the 90-seat theater, but Geraci said that particular gathering welcomed a wide range of instruments, including dulcimers, guitars, fiddles and even mandolins.

See the rest of this story in the March 19 Spanish Fort Sun.