More About Me

I focus on various styles of traditional southern fiddle: oldtime mountain fiddle, Louisiana Cajun fiddle, pre-war blues fiddle and early bluegrass. Most of my students are intermediate or advanced players. Lessons are tailored to each individual student's learning style and musical interests. I teach by ear, making use of extensive source material from my collection: field recordings, reissues of ྊ's, out-of-print LPs, etc. Students bring a recording device to the lessons since I don't use printed music. In addition to working on repertoire, we work on technique, including the all-important bowing. When learning a traditional fiddle style, I believe that it's best to start by mimicking the source as exactly as possible (within the limits of the players abilities of course!), in order to preserve the wonderful quirks and flavors of the music. This is an important step on the road to creating a player's own individual style of fiddling. I don't currently give online lessons, but if you're interested, contact me and we can give it a try! I also teach 2 group lessons: old-time string band (with Allegra Yellin and Jordan Ruyle) and a string band blues class. I've been interested in southern old time fiddle styles for decades, have been part of many old-time, Cajun, bluegrass and acoustic blues bands. I've worked with a number of important roots musicians, many of whom are my long time heroes, including Dewey Balfa, Marc & Ann Savoy, Danny Poullard, Mike Seeger, Tracy Schwarz and Ginny Hawker, Alice Gerrard, Bill Evans, Jim Kweskin, Geoff Muldaur, Dave Alvin, Laurie Lewis, Maria Muldaur, Jody Stecher & Kate Brislin, etc. etc. In 2010 I became the Artistic Director of the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, a week-long workshop of traditional music that's been going since 1976. I'm also the Director of the Berkeley Old Time Music Convention. I teach at my home studio in Berkeley, California. Read more about me here: http://ericandsuzy.com/suzymore.htm