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Resident of MD
email: bakerez1@aol.com
Boston, MA
email: hjcassel@earthlink.net
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Gahanna, OH
email: info@melindacrawford.com
A primarily self-taught Scottish fiddler since the age of eleven, Melinda
Crawford has won numerous awards for her solo playing and her compositions
at national competitions as well as from various regional highland games and
festivals in Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, and the state of
Washington. She has achieved fiddling titles including Allegheny Mountain
Fiddling Champion and Potomac Valley Fiddling Champion several times as well
as the 2003 U.S. National Scottish Fiddling Champion. During the summer of
1999, Ms. Crawford went to Scotland as a Vira I. Heinz scholar to study
fiddling and Gaelic. Ms. Crawford graduated magna cum laude in music education
from the Pappert School of Music at Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA, in 2000.
For several years, Ms. Crawford taught strings of all levels in Fairfax County,
VA, and directed a highly successful high school Fiddling Club. Her fiddling
was recently heard on the Discovery Channel's two-hour special, "Seven Wonders
of the Wild West." She is currently an active performer and clinician and is
working towards her Master of Music Education with an emphasis in alternative
string pedagogy at The Ohio State University.
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Resident of CA
Resident of VA
David Gardner began apprenticing with John Turner (a judge listed on this page) as a Scottish Fiddler 20 years ago, and has continued to work with him ever since. This summer David will be a faculty member at the Jink and Diddle Scottish Fiddling School for the 4th year in a row. As a competitor he has won 7 regional Scottish FIRE sanctioned fiddling competitions. As a judge he has been mentored by John Turner twice at annual instructional competitions held at Jink. As an orchestra teacher for 3 years in the Williamsburg/James City County Schools, he has judged more than ten solo and ensemble competitions. As a performer, he frequently appears with John and is a member of the well-known trio, The Virginia Company.
Contact information for David:
Regular mail: 10 Sidewinder Court, Williamsburg, VA 23185
Phone: (757) 820-0777
Cell Phone: (757) 209-4250
Jink & Diddle Web site: www.jinkdiddle.com
email: gardnerfiddle@gmail.com
email: gardnerd@wjcc.k12.va.us
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Resident of MA
Lakewood, WA
Manager: CALI McKASSON
csmckasson@hotmail.com
Ryan McKasson has been playing the violin for 22 years. His traditional
fiddle journey began at the age of fourteen, with the renowned fiddler
and pedagog Carolann Wheeler. Under her tutelage he explored a wide
range of American and Celtic styles, finally settling with the Scottish
fiddle tradition, the music of his heritage. Ryan attended the Valley
of the Moon Scottish Fiddling School in 1993, where he was exposed to
the Scottish fiddle styles of Alasdair Fraser and Buddy MacMaster, who
have since been his greatest influences. In 1996, he won the National
Junior Scottish Fiddle Competition, and in 1997, was the youngest to win
the National Open Scottish Fiddle Competition. Ryan released his debut
Scottish fiddle album, Tall Tales, on the Kalos record label in May 2004
with his sister Cali McKasson. Together, they perform throughout the
United States bringing audiences their own passion and love for the celtic
tradition. Ryan attended the University of Southern California where he
studied classical viola. He now lives in the Pacific Northwest with his
wife and daughter.
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Resident of MT
Resident of Nova Scotia, Canada
Resident of WA
email: calumbeg@comcast.net
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Resident of MA
email: bmcowen@comcast.net
Web site: www.mcowen.net
Barbara McOwen, Scottish Fiddler. Barbara began playing fiddle for
Scottish dancing in 1971, the same year she gained her B.A. in Music
from the University of California, Berkeley. She subsequently drew
upon source books and recordings, and her knowledge of Scottish
country and highland dancing, when forming her first band, the Berkeley
Scottish Players. Since then she studied fiddling and collected
material in Scotland over the course of a dozen trips there, and
has taught a number of music workshops in the U.S., Canada, Japan
and Australia. She currently leads Tullochgorum, a Scottish country
dance band based in Boston, is co-founder of the Boston Scottish
Fiddle Club and the N.H. Strathspey & Reel Society, and founded
and directs the Boston Harbor Scottish Fiddle School. She also has
a number of recordings and prize-winning compositions to her credit.
Barbara has a full-time schedule of private Scottish fiddle students
of all ages, has developed a course for teaching beginning through
advanced Scottish fiddle, and is currently writing a book on the
fiddle music of Highland fiddler Angus Grant.
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Resident of CO
Resident of ME
Web site: www.highlandsoles.com
Resident of VA
email: tullochmusic@verizon.net
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Resident of Quebec, Canada
email: laurarisk@sympatico.ca
Web site: www.laurarisk.com
Resident of CA
email: fiddlers@earthlink.net
Resident of CA
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Resident of VA
A prodigious and enduring performer, Master Fiddler John Turner is the only ten-time winner on record of the National Scottish Fiddling Championship. He has played a major role in the revival of interest in traditional Scottish fiddle music over the last three decades. As a recording artist he is featured on twelve recordings and has contributed tracks to more than seventy-five additional recordings. On stage, radio and television, Turner has performed throughout the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Japan and the Middle East. He has performed for six U.S. presidents, members of Britain’s royal family and many other heads of state from around the world. He has been featured on the popular radio program “Thistle and Shamrock”, “BBC Highland”, “Pebble Mill at One” and a host of other programs.
As a composer he has produced more than one hundred and fifty tunes many of which have been recorded by other artists. His recordings and tunes have been used for numerous traditional, modern and interpretive dance programs both on stage and on video. Turner has published two books of music and written numerous articles concerning traditional Scottish music. As a teacher, he has influenced thousands of students of all ages interested in this style of music. He is the founder and director of the Jink and Diddle School of Scottish Fiddling, now in its twenty- fourth season, bringing instrumentalists of all ages to the mountains of North Carolina each summer. He performs regularly in Williamsburg, Virginia and across the U.S., teaches privately, conducts workshops and serves as an adjudicator for fiddling competitions. In 2002 he was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Performance degree by Lees-McRae College in Banner Elk, North Carolina for his contributions to Scottish culture and the performing arts.
John is a Program Manager and Religion Programs Specialist (Public
History Development) for the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. His contact information in this role is
P.O. Box 1776, Williamsburg, VA 23187-1776.
Phone: (757) 220-7559 Fax: (757) 565-8083
Contact information for John:
Regular mail: 11302 Avocet Drive, Chesterfield, VA 23838
Best answering machine and general contact no. – (757) 220-7559
Weekend evening occasional only – (804) 778-4708
Web site: www.fiddletree-music.com
Web site: www.jinkdiddle.com
email: itrow@yahoo.com
email: JTurner@CWF.org
email: fiddletreemusic@aol.com
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