David Moran and Joe Morgan.
I remember David learning and playing on his grandfather’s handcrafted instrument – the initial meeting of the Indian Territory Dulcimer Celebration, if I’m not mistaken - 1981 or so and he was 14 years old.  A couple years later he was playing “BIG RED”, a 65 lb. 4 string per course Paduk and spruce instrument I had built for him just like the one I was playing.  It sounded awesome but 65 lbs.?  How did that kid carry it around?  David goes on to win the national contest in a couple of years, graduates with a masters in music composition, I believe, no surprise, and joins up with dulcimer and guitar player and Lone Star State Dulcimer Society serious supporter (there aren’t enough of them) Joe Morgan, who goes on to produce the Winter Festival of Acoustic Music along with Linda Thompson, grand and wise author of numerous instructional books of the hammer dulcimer, leading tens of thousands through the process of starting out on the hammer dulcimer.  Some of the finest folks in the dulcimer world and I’m quite proud to be able to call them “close friends”.