Fiddlekids Sessions

This music resource page is a collection of recordings and study guides for the tunes taught at the monthly Fiddlekids Sessions workshops. The materials available here are free for Fiddlekids participants to use for personal study. Please email questions to: singingwood.com

Recordings from fiddle instructor John Blasquez

Recommended Listening for Fiddlers

Singingwood Music

Download Instructions

To get a recording from this page, or to get one of the Transcribe study guides:

• right-click the link
• choose an option from the contextual menu such as: Save File, Save Link As, or Download File ...

Transcribe files should download with a .xsc extension. If not, simply add that extension to the downloaded file; if it has a .txt extension, remove that and replace it with .xsc 

To play the recording without saving it to your computer:

• click the sound file link to open and play the recording in a new window.

Using Transcribe study guides

There's a companion Transcribe file for each recording. Each Transcribe file is a study guide, a collection of pre-marked sections of the recording. The marks allow you to easily select and practice along with large or small sections of the tune. You can loop selected areas to study them carefully, and you can set the speed you want.

You can add your own measure marks and section marks to any recording, so its a great tool for independent study.

You'll want to get Transcribe if you intend to use these study guides available here.

Getting Transcribe

Transcribe is an incredible learning tool for musicians. It runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux, and it's available for $39.Read more about Transcribe software ... orclick here to download the Free 30-Day Trial from the author's site.

Playing with Mandolin

When I create my fiddle practice materials I sometimes record the material on mandolin, rather than overdubbing fiddle, guitar and mandolin. I record solo mandolin primarily so students can clearly distinguish the sound of their fiddle when practicing along—the sound of two fiddles easily merges and blurs, so it can be hard to distinguish the sound you make from the sound on the recording. Another reason for the mandolin recordings is to provide an opportunity to practice leading and following.

Following (back-timing) when sharing the melody with instruments

You can help focus various instruments for your audience by back-timing your fiddle.

Practice back-timing your notes when fiddling along with the mandolin recordings, letting the mandolin lead slightly. When you can hear the mandolin loud and clear this indicates that you've succeeded.

Back-timing naturally highlights delicate instruments, so it's a good general approach when playing fiddle with instruments that have short sustain, such as mandolin, banjo, harp. (When sounds occur within about 4 hundredths of a second they blend into a perception of single sound, and you'll primarily perceive the sound that happened first. (See the Hass Effect.) This is due to the "frame-rate" of the human nervous system. This is why you want a tiny amount of leading or following among instruments. This allows the audience and musicians to hear all notes clearly. And it's why we want to position delicate instruments first, to hear them clearly (lowering your volumes helps, but not nearly as much as "following".)

Leading (playing in front)

After you're comfortable playing behind the mandolin try the opposite. Lead out in front of the mandolin, pacing yourself just ahead. When you do this successfully you'll hear mandolin's presence and clarity diminish—sometimes the remaining sound is just the blunt click of the pick, with the clear tone barely discernable. (Ordinarily this is what we want to avoid, but here we want to experiment to observe the effect.)

You'll hear the tone of the mandolin more if you play behind, because you won't diminish its presence. When sharing the melody in unison melody with a fiddle, there's no better way to fully include the mandolin.

NOTE: When fiddle and banjo share the melody in unison, I may lead or follow the banjo, depending on the desired effect. The banjo sounds more percussive when the fiddle leads; when the banjo leads it sounds much richer, softer and more toneful. Both are nice effects. By consciously switching positions at the head of the melody you can breath new life into the performance.)