Fiddle Tunes
For as long as I have been playing fiddle, I have been composing fiddle tunes. Since my playing focus is in southern fiddling, I use southern folk fiddle techniques in my tunes. Some, like Carrollton, are an attempt to create a tune that would be a close fit to a traditional Mississippi fiddler's repertoire.
The Completely Lost Mississippi Fiddle Tunes project
108 new tunes with orphaned titles from various 1930s Mississippi sources.
The project consists of three recordings:
- The Completely Lost Mississippi Fiddle Tunes double cd
- Even More Completely Lost Mississippi Fiddle Tunes
- The Last of the Completely Lost Mississippi Fiddle Tunes
and
a pdf book of sheet music for all of the tunes profusely illustrated with wood engravings from the 1800s
Free download of all 108 tunes and pdf book at bandcamp.
Samples:
Prairie Queen - Dedicated to my friend Tricia Spencer, a great Kansas fiddler. The A part of the tune is the harmony for the B part. Brian Slattery, second fiddle, Jacques DiCroce, guitar, Charlie Shaw, bass - Notation
The Hawthorne Waltz wtith Ken Bloom, bowed dulcimer and Pat Schories, guitar
Shucking Out the Nubbins with Brian Slattery, banjo, Jacques DiCroce, guitar, Charlie Shaw, bass
Other composed fiddle tune projects
Doubletalk The titles are antique euphemisms, slang and idioms expressing double meanings. The compositions are at least two voices in counterpoint. Written in the Finale music notation program during the Covid epidemic of 2020-2021.
Clifftop 2020 contains sixteen of Hary's new compositions, each with a title pulled from a West Virginia map of the area near the Clifftop festival. Due to the pandemic, 2020 and 2021 are the years when the festival did not happen.
My recording, All the Tme in the World organizes my compositions up to 2006. Twenty-two of my tunes are on the cd, another 35 are downloadable for free from my downloads page.
Most of the tunes on my first two recordings are self composed, "Teaching the Mule Manners" and "Tunesmith"
Most of my other recordings contain some of my composed fiddle tunes.
All tunes copyright Harry Bolick, please contact me if you are interested in using them or have questions or comments.