Recordings
Washington Traditional Fiddlers Project -- Vol.I

Old Time Dance Fiddling

"Days are gone...Just stop and visualize a minute, what it'd be like, no phonographs, no radios, no TVS...to get your music. Your little group there, say fifty to a hundred. You're isolated right in there, miles and miles to the next town, days to get there a-horseback. Here comes a stranger in. They play or they sing something', gone the next day you might say. You hear that: you want to play that. Then after he's gone, you try to play that, or you try to sing it. That's what we faced...that's your old time...out in the west."
- Harold Shafer

Fiddling in the Northwest has undergone rapid change in the last 50 years with the tradition from traditional country dance fiddling to swing, country & western and modern contest fiddling as well as urban square and contra dance fiddling. Recognizing the need for documentation and preservation of the older styles of fiddling in the state, Frank Ferrel of Centrum, along with Vivian Williams and Kathleen Oyen, initiated a series of interviews with traditional old-time fiddlers. Through the Washington Traditional Fiddlers Project, Northwest Folklife has continued to interview and record fiddlers who played for country dances prior to World War II in an effort to learn about the music and dance scene of those times and how it has changed. Of the 32 fiddlers interviewed, extensive music recordings of 28 were made.

Selections from these field recordings are presented on a cassette tape available through Northwest Folklife, Washington Traditional Fiddlers Project Volume I. In addition, there is an accompanying booklet with photographs and short biographical sketches of musicians included on the tape. These are men and women who played old-time country dance music at a time when it wasn't necessarily considered "old-time" music but simply music. They learned in the traditional fashion from family or community members and reflect the rich fiddling traditions which have contributed to Washington's fiddle styles.

The fiddlers presented on Volume I are amongst those who learned in the original country dance context. They learned by ear in the traditional manner from family and other fiddlers. Some play entirely in the older styles and others have incorporated more modern elements. All, play in ways that reflect the regional styles they grew up with and carry on the traditional styles that have contributed to Washington's rich traditions of old-time dance fiddling. Like learning a language, the subtleties of fiddling styles can best be learned first hand in a person-to-person context. These are the "old timers who learned from the old timers." And they have much to teach us.

Fiddlers featured on Volume I include: Mary Acocello, Glenn Berry, Jim Calvert, Oscar "Red" Cook, Marty Dahlgren, Floyd Engstrom, Jim Evans, Amos Fine, Bruce Foster, Joe Hanson, Jim Herd, Harry Johnson, Henry McVeigh, Hubert Mitchell, John Norton, Joe Pancerzewski, Martin "MC" Pigg, Cotton Roberts, Lyman Rogers, Ed Senna, and Harold Shafer.

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