How to Pass on Fiddle Skills

Playing the fiddle is a time-honored tradition in many American communities. But what about when you've spent years honing your fiddle skills and want to contribute back to the musical community? Expert fiddlers can choose several different ways to pass on their fiddle skills to younger musicians. It is important to cultivate these cultural traditions so that they don't get lost to the laxity of the future's technology-aided lifestyle.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

1. Do public events. Sign up to demonstrate your fiddle skills at a community day or other event to get more exposure as an expert. You can also see about teaching at a local civic center. Test the waters to see what kind of interest is there in your community.

2. Go to regional fiddle events and festivals. These greater fiddle gatherings tend to include informal places for fiddlers to show off their talents and pass on skills to younger generations. You'll probably learn a bit yourself, too. Check out sites like Fiddle Fork Online for lists of events or contacts.

3. Write a book. One way to really get all of your experience into a single volume is to go about writing a full manuscript. Again, you may want to gauge the interest by publishers before starting. On the other hand, if you're less of a performer and more of a writer, you may want to self-publish. With any luck, your book will be around for a long while to inform the fiddle community.

4. Post on fiddle sites or blogs. If you are looking to demonstrate a number of fiddle points over time, try getting involved in an online community like CYBERGRASS or another forum or blog. Online writing is an efficient way to get your messages out to a wide potential audience.

5. Advertise for paid private lessons. Aspiring fiddlers in your area might pay to learn the talents you have gained over the years. Like any instrument, paid lessons are generally hard to come by and take a degree of advertisement and accumulation of clients over time.