Our mountain dulcimers are crafted from a wide variety of hand selected, seasoned woods. Our tops are generally cut from Western red cedar, although a number of other woods are used for special orders and the Juniper model is made of solid aromatic red cedar. We also make solid black walnut, cherry, and maple instruments. Standard order instruments have black walnut backs and sides, but we also use other hardwoods such as maple (Ambrosia, quilted, and Birds eye), sycamore, cherry, zebra and rosewood.  Most of our instruments feature a decorative inlay strip in the center of the joined back.  Some of the inlays we use are pictured at left and we have custom inlays made by Lee Henson as well.

We use our own handmade precision molds and building forms, custom cut all bridges, steam bend our sides, and “bookmatch” our solid wood backs, sides and tops for wood grain artistry and tonal quality. We make all of our inlay rosettes, using such techniques as scroll “lace” and chip carving. Some of our instruments feature hand carved headstocks or sound boards. Finally, we outfit our instruments with the highest quality Grover or Waverly tuning machines and zither pins for precision tuning.

June Apple mountain dulcimers can be made to accommodate 3, 4, 5, or 6 strings. For each model, we offer traditional fretting or inclusion of a 6½, 8 1/2 and 13 1/2 fret (note that our standard fret pattern includes the 6½ fret).