The spirits of
three old master fiddlers join us for
A
Mighty Session
at the New England
Squeeze-In 2009
Rachel Hall - English concertina
Ken Sweeney - English concertina
Rick Mohr - fiddle
Adlai Waksman - melodica
(pictured from left to right)
After picking three highlights from that session to post, I thought I would learn more about the tunes and in all three cases I found an old master fiddler responsible for our enjoyment.
Highlander’s Farewell
(5.5 MB)
Highlander's Farewell
is a classic southern fiddle tune and has been recorded by many
including Emmett Lundy from Grayson County, SW Virginia. Follow
this link to oldtimemusic.com and read an extensive
and fascinating biography of Lundy as well as hear him playing a
short clip recorded in 1941 by Alan and Elizabeth Lomax.
I first heard this tune long ago, played by fiddler Ruthie Dornfeld
on her American
Cafe Orchestra recording, still great
listening.
You can get the dots for this tune from The
Phillips Collection of Traditional American Fiddle Tunes Vol 1, by
Stacy Phillips.
Grasshopper Sitting on
a
Sweet Potato Vine (3.1 MB)
fiddler Luther Davis (also from Grayson County, Virginia) is usually credited with this tune. Luther is quoted as saying, "I don't want talking, I want fiddling!"
My band Grand Picnic often plays Grasshopper at contra dances and we included a version of it on our CD, available here.
You can get the dots for this tune from The Phillips Collection of Traditional American Fiddle Tunes Vol 1, by Stacy Phillips.
Viksta-Lasse
(1897-1983)
Eklundapolska Nr.
3
by Viksta-Lasse (Video Link)
Steven Epstein took
this video as Rachel lead us in a fine Swedish polska written by
the “wild and woolly farmer-fiddler” Viksta Lasse Larsson born in
the village of Viksta in Uppland.
This is a well known Swedish session tune recorded by bands world
wide including the Vermont band Nightingale, the English band Last
Orders and the Swedish band Vasen who say of composer
Viksta-Lasse... ”He was just a farmer, living in his own little
world, but when he played the fiddle, he was fantastic... He had
this big expression when he played, jumping up and down and
laughing all the time. It was his life. He was such a good
fiddler... he couldn't have been a very good farmer." Rick reports
that in a concert he attended, Vasen told a story about how Viksta
Lasse would “make up great tunes on the spur of the moment but he
never wrote anything down and usually couldn't remember them later.
So his friends would write them down for him!”
You can get the
dots for this tune from
Richard Robinson’s excellent TuneBook Live!
