Great interview this month with seven time National Fiddle Champion and creator of the FiddleStar site, Megan Lynch Chowning! Megan doesn't compete in fiddle contests anymore, or judge them, or go to them, so I was very curious to hear about why. We talk about fiddling in California, fiddle contests, fiddle camps, and different kinds of learning and relating to fiddle music. Megan filled me in on the just-released John Hartford Fiddle Project Volume 2 that she co-produced.

Megan Lynch Chowning is a seven time national fiddle champion, touring musician, Grammy-nominated recording artist, teacher, singer, and flatfooter. She's toured with Pam Tillis and Lorrie Morgan, Dale Ann Bradley, Roland White, Larry Cordle, Jim Hurst, Chris Jones, 3 Fox Drive, Due West, Chris Stuart, and BEML (the duo of Bill Evans and Megan). 

Megan has released a series of entirely solo fiddle albums, focusing on crowdsourcing fabulous but slightly more obscure fiddle tunes. She has taught fiddle and vocals at prestigious camps such as Augusta Heritage Week, the British Columbia Bluegrass Workshop, Sore Fingers Bluegrass Week in the UK, Walker Creek Music Camp, and the California Bluegrass Association Camp, among many others. She’s the co-director (with her husband, Adam) of the IBMA-award-winning Nashville Acoustic Camps. But sometimes she just likes to sit quietly and smell the flowers.  

Thanks for listening!

My Fiddle Studio Book 1: Fiddling for the Complete Beginner is FREE on Amazon! It has over 30 easy beginner fiddle tunes with sheet music, tab, and a link to a video for each tune!

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You can reach me at [email protected].

My website for learning to fiddle is Fiddle Studio which has courses and a mailing list and my Top 10 Fiddle Tunes!