Couldn't Have a Wedding without the Fiddler

Canadas Prince Edward Island is home to one of the oldest and most vibrant fiddling traditions in North America. First established by Scottish immigrants in the late eighteenth century, it incorporated the influence of a later wave of Irish immigrants as well as the unique rhythmic sensibilities of the Acadian French, the Islands first European inhabitants. In Couldnt Have a Wedding without the Fiddler, renowned musician and folklorist Ken Perlman combines oral history, ethnography, and musical insight to present a captivating portrait of Prince Edward Island fiddling and its longstanding importance to community life. Couldnt Have a Wedding without the Fiddler draws heavily on interviews conducted with 150 fiddlers and other Islandersincluding singers, dancers, music instructors, community leaders, and event organizerswhose memories span decades. The book thus colorfully brings to life a time not so very long ago when virtually any occasiona wedding, harvest, house warming, holiday, or the need to raise money for local institutions such as schools and churchswas sufficient excuse to hold a dance, with the fiddle player at the center of the celebration. Perlman explores how fiddling skills and traditions were learned and passed down through the generations and how individual fiddlers honed their distinctive playing styles. He also examines the Islands history and material culture, fiddlers values and attitudes, the role of radio and recordings, the fiddlers repertoire, fiddling contests, and the ebb and flow of the fiddling tradition, including efforts over the last few decades to keep the music alive in the face of modernization and the passing of old-timers. Rounding out the book is a rich array of photographs, musical examples, dance diagrams, and a discography. The inaugural volume in the Charles K. Wolfe American Music Series, Couldnt Have a Wedding without the Fiddler is, in the words of series editor Ted Olson, clearly among the more significant studies of a local North American music tradition to be published in recent years.