Podcasts about american fiddle tunes

Vermont-born fiddler and songwriter Pete Sutherland has been a mainstay of the old-time music scene for many years. I first met Pete in the early 1980s when we both served on the faculty of the Augusta Heritage Program in Elkins, WV. I later caught up with him at the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes in Port Townsend, WA, where we sat down for a chat about the instrument and music we love.

Greg and Jere Canote are identical twins who play old-time fiddle, guitar, and banjo. Renowned for their musical stylings as well as their zany sense of humor and good-natured stage-presence, the Canote Brothers have toured the world sharing their infectious love of music. In this episode they talk about the challenges of being raised by their deaf mother, the creative beginnings of The Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, and the curious nature of playing music with your identical twin.

Album Liner Notes

“Old-Time" music could be loosely described as that body of music containing fiddle tunes, banjo tunes, ballads, and ensemble pieces in various instrumental combinations including the guitar, mandolin, autoharp, dulcimer, mouth harp, jaw harp, dobro, piano, and other  related non-electrified instruments. "Old-Time" music has often been preserved before the industrial age in the relative isolation of the Appalachian mountains. “The Milliner-Koken Collection of American Fiddle Tunes” contains transcriptions of over 1400 fiddle tunes. The book includes an artist profiles section with brief bios of the 347 fiddlers/bands represented in the book. A majority of these fiddlers were born before 1900. The collection also contains a comments section with interesting information about the tunes and fiddlers. Walt Koken began playing the five string banjo in 1959. He has played the banjo and fiddle in a variety of groups including “The Busted Toe Mudthumpers,” “Fat City,” “The Highwoods Stringband,” and the “Orpheus Supertones.” In the late 70’s, he retired from the old-time music business and worked as a carpenter. In the early 1990’s, he began playing banjo again, released several CD’s, and formed Mudthumper Music. The company is dedicated to the preservation of non-electrified, fiddle-banjo oriented music. Clare Milliner grew up in Chester County, Pennsylvania, not far from the original site of the Brandywine Friends of Old Time Music's annual Mountain Music Festival. She studied piano and violin, but when she heard fiddle tunes at the Old Fiddler's Picnic at Lenape Park near her home, it changed her approach to playing. She plays often for square dances, usually with the “Cacklin' Hens and Roosters Too,” and she and Walt play double fiddles, as well as fiddle-banjo duets.

Feb. 18, 2015. A tour of Norwegian and Swedish fiddle styles with Andrea Hoag (violin) and Loretta Kelley (violin & Hardingfele/Hardanger fiddle). Andrea Hoag and Loretta Kelley are among the United States' foremost performers of Scandinavian traditional music. Each of them has spent years studying with tradition-bearers in Scandinavia, and honing their own techniques at home. Speaker Biography: Andrea Hoag, as the recipient of a fellowship from the Skandia Music Foundation, studied at Sweden's respected Malungs Folkhogskola, becoming the first non-Swede to earn the certificate in Folk Violin Pedagogy, in 1984. Her program included in-depth study with elder tradition-bearers Pekkos Gustaf and Nils Agenmark, masters of the complex, demanding Bingsjo fiddling dialect; Leif Goras and Jonny Soling of Orsa; singers Maria, Britta, and Anna Rojas of Boda; Kalle Almlof and Ville Toors of Malung; and Pahl Olle of Ostbjorka, who is acknowledged as the foremost creator of the Swedish close-harmony playing style. Since that time, Andrea has taken every opportunity to work with several generations of fiddlers from many parts of Sweden, and has been called "like Pekkos Gustaf come to life again" for her faithfulness to the elder generation's style. Hoag has long been acknowledged as a stateside expert of Swedish fiddle tradition. Her teaching credentials include the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, Ashokan Fiddle & Dance Weeks, the Swannanoa Gathering, and the Berklee College of Music. She was director of the Seattle Skandia Spelmanslag for seven years, and led the group on an acclaimed performing tour to Sweden. She has been featured on NPR's All Things Considered and Performance Today, at the Kennedy Center and Library of Congress, and at numerous venues around the U.S., Sweden, and beyond. With a particular interest in in-depth musical conversations, She has collaborated across genres with many respected artists, from blues harmonica virtuoso Phil Wiggins to Kathak dancer Brinda Guha. Speaker Biography: Loretta Kelley has made over twenty-five trips to Norway to study with master hardingfele players. In 1979, while attending the Folk High School in Rauland in West Telemark, she studied privately for six months with Arne Oygarden, the leader of the Falkeriset Spelemannslag (fiddler's group) and a bearer of West Telemark tradition. In 1993 she received a grant from the American-Scandinavian Foundation to study for six weeks with the Londal-Fykerud tradition bearer Einar Londal of Tuddal, Telemark, and in 2001 she spent eight weeks in Tinn, Telemark, studying the Dahle tradition of hardingfele playing with the master fiddler Olav Oyaland, sponsored by a grant from the Norway-America Association. In addition she has studied intensively with the important tradition bearers Hauk and Knut Buen in Telemark, Jens A. Myro in Hallingdal, and Olav Jorgen Hegge of Oystre Slidre, Valdres, as well as made numerous study visits with Gunnar Dahle, Leif Rygg, Hallvard Bjorgum, Knut Myrann, and many others. In cooperation with Knut Buen, the Telemark virtuoso hardingfele player, Loretta has authored a booklet, "Knut Buen's Telemarkspel," of transcriptions of the tunes from Buen's teaching cassette. She has contributed two chapters to books published in Norway, "Hardingfela i Amerika" in Hardingfela, Det norske nasjonalinstrumentet by Halvard Kaasa and Astrid Versto (Grondahl Dreyer, 1997), and "Feleambassadoren Knut Buen", in Mellom hjertets slag og felas drag, Festskrift til Knut Buen (ed. Eivind Blikstad, Telemarksavisa, 1998). She has also written articles in print and online, and served as consultant and wrote extensive liner notes for an anthology of Knut Buen's playing, As Quick as Fire, published on CD by Rounder Records in 1996. For transcript, captions, and more information, visit http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feature_wdesc.php?rec=6714

Lee Sexton, banjo and lead vocal; Paul David Smith, fiddle; Doug Dorschug, guitar and harmony vocal. Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, Port Townsend, WA 7/10/04 Thanks to Charlie Beck for the recording.

Lee Sexton, banjo and lead vocal; Paul David Smith, fiddle; Doug Dorschug, guitar and harmony vocal. Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, Port Townsend, WA 7/10/04 Thanks to Charlie Beck for the recording.