Annotation:Five Stringed Fiddle (The)

Back to 

 FIVE STRING FIDDLE, THE. Scottish, Air or Waltz. D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. A modern composition by traditional musician, collector, teacher and compiler Nigel Gatherer, of Crieff, Scotland. The tune honors septuagenarian fiddler Dick Rutter of Edinburgh, originally from England. Rutter had come north to work but was laid off before his retirement, and had some difficulty collecting his pension. To survive he began busking in the streets and making fiddles by hand. Gatherer says: "He once found a lovely piece of laburnum and made it into a fiddle, but said it was very, very hard to work with. He has made a couple of five-stringed fiddles (one of them, when sold, paid for a top-range hearing aid which enhanced his busking abilities outside). Funnily enough, his favourite fiddle is still his first."  Source for notated version:  Printed sources:  Recorded sources:

Back to