Focusing on music performance and moments in fiddle contests, their participants, and surrounding happenings, Chris Goertzen’s Southern Fiddlers and Fiddle Contests explores contemporary fiddling culture in the United States. Goertzen’s approach is to contextualize the artistic expressions and social interactions on and off stages, sketching the socio-cultural logics with which people have continuously been engaged in organizational activities of fiddling in local, regional, and/or national scales, through which they contribute to the dynamic formation of a significant American music culture. As a piece of ethnographic research resulting from long-term participation and interaction with attendants in numerous fiddle contests across the United States, this volume concisely portrays patterns and issues in different scales of fiddle contests. In characterizing these contests, Goertzen describes the favored styles and most played tunes, and portrays distinct arrangements, as well as the atmosphere, at a number of these events. In addition, he also elaborates on the common scenes, elements, and ethos shared among these contests.
The preface begins with the author’s recall of a real experience wherein he was put in a situation to reflect on the difference between fiddling and playing the violin. Goertzen uses this recollection to lead his readers into thinking about the historical implications of American fiddling. After a brief introduction to the focus of the book and its main themes, he launches into the various chapters. Chapter 1 (“American Fiddling of the Past”) historicizes the formation of American fiddling culture through a discussion of the early European settlers’ music and dance culture in American social situations in the eighteenth century, the massive population movement and the migration of fiddlers, black-white musical interchange, and the publication of fiddling sheet music in the nineteenth century. It also probes the initiatives of fiddling revivals, the release of commercial recordings, and the popularity of fiddle contests or conventions in the twentieth century. At the end of this chapter Goertzen uses a case study of George Cecil McLeod, a former Mississippi state senator, to illustrate the changes in fiddlers’ lives and activities in the last half-century.
Chapter 2 (“Modern Fiddle Contests: The Competition Itself”) centers on the competition itself today. Goertzen employs case studies to describe the basic format and flavor in five types of fiddle contests: 1) small contests at state fairs (with a case study on the Mississippi State Fiddlers and Liars Contest); 2) independent small contests funded by local philanthropists (with a case study on the Ashe County Old Time Fiddler’s and Bluegrass Convention in West Jefferson, North Carolina); 3) regional fiddlers’ “conventions” (with a case study on the Old Fiddlers Convention in Galax, Virginia); 4) “national” contests (with a case study on the National Old Time Fiddlers’ Contest in Weiser, Idaho); 5) presumably “the source of the modern contest fiddling” (43)—the Texas State Championship. Goertzen’s discussion and comparisons focus on the establishment, development, and current situation of these contests; criteria currently used for dividing contestants; types and characteristics of participants; and processes governing each of the events.
Chapter 3 (“Fiddle Contests Away from the State”) further unpacks the important activities surrounding fiddle contests, and analyzes the values commonly shared among different types of fiddle contests discussed in chapter 2. Goertzen emphasizes that “every successful fiddle contest is a multifaceted festival” (47), and that the phenomenon of American fiddle contests must be understood not merely as a domain of competition, but also as a space-time for social and musical interactions in jamming, camping, eating, and drinking--conducted across stages, parking lots, food stands, craft markets, and various kinds of nonmusical entertainment frameworks. He further analyzes the ways in which notions of “community,” “humor,” and “nostalgia” are conceptualized and embodied in contest attendants’ words and performance, illustrating the significance of the values that support these people’s continuous participation in fiddle contests.
Chapter 4 (“Fiddlers across the South”) is based on thirty-one interviews of fiddlers. Here, Goertzen paints a synthetic picture of American fiddlers by describing his interviewees’ life histories, learning and teaching processes, music tastes and activities, favorite styles and tunes, values and identities, as well as motivations to keep involved in fiddle contests. He groups different responses to the same question to show the variety of ideas arising around it. In addition to general analyses in this chapter, Goertzen creates an appendix at the end of this book, which comprises transcription of four interviews. The interviews unpack the interactions between Goertzen and his research subjects and the ways through which these fiddlers evaluate the meanings of fiddling and fiddle contests in their personal, family, and community lives.
The last chapter (“Styles and Meanings in Southern Fiddling”) analyzes some of the more popular tunes in American fiddle contests and their sonic characteristics in performance. Goertzen first discusses different interpretations of a tune titled “Leather Britches,” a classic that has existed in the American fiddling repertoire since the melody was introduced from Scotland in the late-eighteenth century. Goertzen compares different treatments for this tune in both old-time and Texas fiddling, two primary styles in American fiddle contests, in terms of the balance between melody and rhythm. He also examines the emphasis on variations in melodic subject and the role of other accompanying voices in fiddle ensembles in contrast to the leading fiddler’s line, and the way that the audience consumes music performance. Goertzen then analyzes different versions of the tune titled ”Mississippi Sawyer,” prevalent among old-time musicians, followed by versions of the tune titled “Dusty Miller,” popular among practitioners of Texas fiddling. In this way, he further highlights the characteristics of the two fiddling styles and shows how different personal and regional modes of playing could be categorized within the same fiddling style. Finally, Goertzen analyzes the Tennessee Valley Old Time Fiddlers Convention, a contest that is “physically located between centers of old-time and Texas fiddling” (106) and thus includes multiple structures of fiddle contests, attracting musicians of different fiddling styles. He uses this hybrid event as an example to show how apparently contrasting values in American fiddle contests, such as authenticity vs. creativity, and local taste vs. personal expression, are balanced in musicians’ performances and prioritized in judges’ decisions. Goertzen suggests that “nostalgia is the key to the enduring popularity of this event and the key to the health of the fiddle contest subculture” (117), because a yearning desire for the “virtues of historic small-town life, of community and family, and of individual creativity balancing harmoniously with local group values" helps fiddlers "enjoy what they’re doing” (119).
A form of cultural institution that is commonly organized throughout the world, the music contest is an establishment that assumes game rules, habitualized patterns, and normative values on the one hand, while also providing performative space for individual interpretation and social activism, on the other. In this framework, the value of the book goes far beyond its readability and contribution to our understanding of an important American vernacular culture. This is because the book avoids overweighing the normative effect of fiddle contests on shaping the ways of conceptualizing, categorizing, and representing fiddlers and fiddling. In addition, this book also gracefully illustrates how fiddle contests, as a primary form wherein the social life of fiddling has been able to continue thriving in contemporary society, give opportunities to express both shared and idiosyncratic artistic representation, facilitating musicians’ and other attendees’ reunions. In so doing they achieve organizational goals such as boosting the local economy and raising funds.
This book is also valuable because it is well-balanced between detailed depiction of individual cases and careful generalization about distinct patterns and common issues in fiddling culture. In addition, the book is methodologically important, illustrating the merit of integrating methods of case study and explicit comparison in interpreting the correlation between compared cases and highlighting the respective characteristics of each before foregrounding their theoretical significance as a research subject. While it is not entirely new in scholarly works on music culture, Goertzen’s mode of music analysis and comparison, which features real performances happening in specific milieu, is full of both regional characteristics and idiosyncratic expressions. Rather than merely presenting the main melodies of tunes, he organizes his material in a way that is still stimulating for readers who look for music analysis.
This book is characteristic of the norm in terms of how it deals with issues of cultural politics. Goertzen makes great efforts to describe the material conditions and poetics that provide a strong foundation for the organization and development of fiddle contests, but does not draw much attention to power negotiations and strategic alliances that also commonly serve as key catalysts for the continuation and development of organizational activities such as music contests. Here Goertzen indeed deals with controversies such as contestants’ criticism against judges’ decisions, but in general adopts a relatively euphemistic tone in describing these disputes. Goertzen also talks about issues of race, class, and gender, for example, in his discussion of the possible reasons why contestants and winners in American fiddle contests are mostly white (62-63) and have either upper-blue-collar backgrounds or come from the lower economic range of the white-collar population (69), and why women musicians are almost always relegated to supporting instruments in fiddle ensembles (111). However, in adopting vernacular viewpoints and personal observation to respond to these sensitive issues, his goal seems to be one of rationalizing these phenomena rather than problematizing them in search of a more critical account. While this might not be in accordance with his research interest, Goertzen could have provided a more stimulating analysis in relation to these issues by presenting some accounts and analyses challenging conventional thinking.
Another idiosyncrasy of the book lies in responses to theoretical concerns in scholarly works. Goertzen’s analytical foci in this book obviously respond to a series of issues significant for research in ethnomusicology, folklore, and related fields, such as notions of community and family (52), the adoption of sacred tunes in secular music activities (54), nostalgia (61, 118), the symbiotic relationship between fiddling and folk dances in the past and present (76), the characteristics of revivalists and their music (76, 80), and the embodiment of local identity via music performance (33, 115). Interestingly, except in his discussion of the notion of nostalgia, Goertzen offers scant reference to other scholarly works in relation to these themes. This, in my opinion, can be understood as a kind of personal writing style, which is not uncommon in ethnographic research. However, since Goertzen has already implicitly responded to so many theoretical concerns within his current and wider scholarship (some of which feature in his previous scholarly works, for example Goertzen 1997), he could have perhaps assisted readers conducting related research by further engaging with other researchers’ findings and arguments, such as those in Neil Rosenberg’s 1993 edited volume on folk music revivals; Jeff Todd Titon’s 2001 chapter on the rationales behind his musical notations of old-time Kentucky fiddle tunes; Aaron Fox’s 2004 book on the notion of nostalgia in country music and working-class culture; Shuhei Hosokawa’s 2002 article on the notions of art, entertainment and authenticity in music contests; and Amy Ku’uleialoha Stillman’s 1996 article on the ways by which tradition and genre conventions change in music contests.
To conclude, this book is a well-researched and beautifully written piece that explains the phenomenon of American fiddle contests in a lucid way and offers profound conclusions. It will interest both general readers and specialists examining the expressive form of fiddling and American cultures in general. An innovative analysis and a great collection of abundant information in relation to American folklife, social history, and music-cultural performance, the book will also be a useful reference for researchers and educators in the humanities and social sciences, especially those in folklore, ethnomusicology and American studies.
Works Cited:
Fox, Aaron. 2004. Real Country: Music and Language in Working-Class Culture. Durham: Duke University Press.
Goertzen, Chris. 1997. Fiddling for Norway: Revival and Identity. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press.
Hosokawa, Shuhei. 2002. “Singing Contests in the Ethnic Enclosure of the Post-War Japanese-Brazilian Community.” British Journal of Ethnomusicology 9: 95-118.
Stillman, Amy Ku’uleialoha. 1996. “Hawaiian Hula Competitions: Event, Repertoire, Performance, Tradition.” Journal of American Folklore 109: 357-380.
Titon, Jeff Todd. 2001. Old-Time Kentucky Fiddle Tunes. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky.
Rosenberg, Neil V., ed. 1993. Transforming Tradition: Folk Music Revivals Examined. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
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[Review length: 2046 words • Review posted on February 19, 2012]