I've always loved music.  It has the power to comfort, to inspire, to empower, to challenge, and even to heal.  I picked up the guitar in high school, and while I quite liked it, I never achieved the level of proficiency I would have liked.  I found my real musical passion when I discovered the hammered dulcimer.  Ever since I first came across his music, Rich Mullins has been my favourite musician.  It was listening to him that I first heard the sound of the hammered dulcimer.  What a beautiful and really neat sounding instrument.  When Rich died in a car accident in 1997 I developed an intense inward sense that I had to get a hammered dulcimer.  And so my search began...

     Back then there weren't alot places to find a hammered dulcimer here in the Toronto area.  I phoned countless music stores, most of whom didn't even know what a hammered dulcimer was.  The few who did had no idea where I could find one.  I was eventually referred to a neaby builder.  I eagerly bought the dulcimer he had made.

     It wasn't too long before I realized that the dulcimer I had bought sounded lousy, didn't look as nice as alot of the other dulcimers I had come across, and was grossly overpriced.  I thought, "Surely I could build a better looking, better sounding dulcimer than this, and sell it for cheaper."  And so began by dulcimer building journey.

     I built my first dulcimer in 2001.  The first few I built were disasters, but after a very long learning curve, lots of trial and error, and advice from other dulcimer builders, I finally began building what in my opinion was a very respectable instrument.  Today, a few years later, I'm proud of the instruments I build and believe they are a very nice sounding, attractive, and competitively priced hammered dulcimer.

     Looking for the opportunity to get together with other dulcimer players and have a forum to play together and learn from each other, i founded the Southern Ontario Dulcimer Association in 2001.  We currently meet once a month from September through June.  For several years I played the hammered dulcimer in the rennaisance group Sommerset.  I eventually left the group to pursue my more personal musical goals.  I was a member of the Luthiers' Co-op, a group of Canadian craftsman committed to the propogation of acoustic instruments and excellence in craftsmanship, until it disbanded a few years ago.

     Why the name Legacy Dulcimers?  Since Rich Mullins is my musical hero, and my introduction to the hammered dulcimer was through his music, I wanted my company name to somehow be associated with him.  One of his last albums before he died was called "A Liturgy, A Legacy, and a Ragamuffin Band."  I took the name "Legacy" from there.  Also, the concept of a legacy is something that we leave behind us after we die.  The legacy we leave is not just the "stuff" we leave, but who we were while we were living.  I don't want to leave merely a legacy of material things for my children, but a legacy of love, of character, and committment to God above all else.  I want that to be my legacy.  So the word "legacy" seems to encompass all I could ask for to capture my heart for the dulcimer, and life.

     As well as building hammered dulcimers, i write music, teach and perform.  I'm a full-time cabinetmaker, but one day hope to be building dulcimers full-time as the demand increases.

                           PETER  AND  RICH  MULLINS