NEWS: We've moved to a new location! Take a Virtual Tour

Greetings from the Owner Our Staff Visit Us
History Our Stained Glass Window Larry Sifel
Music Articles Musician References
Store T-Shirts Fun Stuff See us on MySpace HMT Blog

Since 1972, the House of Musical Traditions has specialized in instruments from the U.S. and around the world. In addition to our collection of exotic, unusual, and vintage instruments, we also feature fun folk instruments for music lovers of all ages and abilities. We also have instructional and song books, and recordings of traditional music from around the country and the world.

Located in the heart of Old Town Takoma Park, we're open seven days a week: 11 am - 7 pm Tuesday through Saturday and 11 am - 5 pm Sunday and Monday. Visiting for the first time? Get maps and directions here. Can't make it to the neighborhood today? Take a virtual tour now!

Have booth, will travel: HMT can also be found at many festivals and events. Look for our booth at the Maryland Renaissance Festival, the Washington Folk Festival, the Washington Irish Festival, the Virginia Scottish Games, and many other local and regional events. We also underwrite a folk music radio program, Traditions with Mary Cliff on WAMU 88.5 FM in the Washington, DC area 11 pm to 1 am every Saturday night.

Music lessons and workshops: If you live in the D.C. or Baltimore area you may want to take advantage of our lessons programs. We offer private lessons and public workshops for many of the instruments that we sell: guitar, banjo, mandolin, lap dulcimer, hammered dulcimer, flute, harp, autoharp, fiddle, accordion, concertina, tinwhistle and more. Click here for more information or stop by and pick up our lessons flyer.

We sponsor the IMT Monday Night Concert Series: The Institute of Musical Traditions offers a wide variety of local and national music acts. You can visit the IMT web site for schedules and more information or visit us to purchase tickets or pick up a free flyer.

Above all, we at the House of Musical Traditions like to help you enjoy music; whether you play, sing, dance or listen! If there is something you want but don't see in our online catalog, please call, email or write us, we can probably answer your questions.

Fun Stuff

HMT now has a blog! Check it out: musicaltraditions.blogspot.com

INSTRUMENT DEMO VIDEOS on YouTube -- We've added more than 20 videos of our best guitars and mandolins being played by teacher Mark Sylvester. Click here to discover how wonderful a Yairi, Bourgeois, Breedlove, or Weber can sound... anytime you want!

Rubbing elbows with famous people: Owner David Eisner meets comedian Lewis Black and Tipper Gore.

Dave's on tv! HMT owner David Eisner hosts the Musical Traditions segment on the cable access TV show The Coffee House. Watch this clip.

See us on MySpace: houseofmusicaltraditions

Spreading fun and goodwill abroad: Nose Flutes Go International.

How good is your musical ear? Test it here: www.jakemandell.com/tonedeaf

Want to get to know the local drumming community? Come to the Friday Night Beat Jam.

Our staff had a great time meeting and greeting with the music community's finest at the 2007 NAMM Show Check out our photo scrapbook.

Our Staff

Most of us are musicians, and we're happy to discuss and demonstrate the instruments and music that interest you.

David Eisner -- Owner - Read more about him here -

Kristen Jones -- General Manager. She plays and teaches steel pan drums and cello.


SALES STAFF

Keith Carr plays bouzouki, guitar and tenor banjo. He also teaches bouzouki. Keith plays in a Celtic duo with flute player Rosemary Gano.

Rob Hinkal plays guitar and is a founding member of the band ilyAIMY.

Rob Bell plays guitar, mandolin, bass and cello. He is also studying audio engineering.

Jackie Sanchez plays guitar and mandolin and is also in a pre-med program at Montgomery College.

Paul DiBlasi III manages our books department as well as being an all-around sales guy, occasional mail order dude, and Official Humorous Merchandise Sign-Maker. He plays guitar and sings in the groups The Pyrates Royale and Calico Jack.

Wendy Morrison is our accordion and concertina specialist. She plays and teaches accordion, concertina, banjo, and whistle.

Stream Ohrstrom is our resident drum and flute expert. He does it all: playing, making, repairing and teaching.

Paul DiBlasi IV is our friendly and helpful Mail Order manager. Continuing the DiBlasi family Mail Order Dynasty at HMT!

Darcy Nair manages our web site and online catalog. She plays hammered dulcimer, Irish bouzouki, English concertina, bodhran and bones as a soloist and with The Pyrates Royale.

OTHER STAFF

Jay Murphy is our bookkeeper and accounts payable manager. (email)

Aleta Quinn is our cartoonist. (doesn't every store have one?) She is also a drummer and a Raks Sharki (bellydance) performer and teacher. Check out her web site, aletadances.com. Aleta is currently pursuing her PhD in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh, but still makes regular appearances at HMT. She is our former assistant manager and Renaissance Festival manager.

Rowan Corbett, another former assistant manager, also still makes regular appearances at HMT to do everything from fixing our computer problems to filling in behind the front counter, hanging slatwall or doing other various projects.
Rowan plays guitar, bouzouki, bones and djembe in the bands Tinsmith and ilyAIMY. He is also quite knowledgeable about acoustic pickups and amplification (read Rowan's article about acoustic amplification http://www.hmtrad.com/catalog/articles/guitar-amp1.html)

Trevor Higgins, sound engineer extraordinaire, runs our "Sounds Reasonable" pro audio department. He repairs audio equipment and manages our sound equipment rentals.