Mobile Site

Fiddle Player…Fiddler Maker

Video

Enlarge Video

Download Video

Video RSS

Embed:

WKRG.com Related Resources

More –› Related Articles

Discuss this in the forum

By Jere Hough Meteorologist / Feature Reporter

M30o93H7pQ09L8X1t49cHY01Z5j4TT91fGfr Fiddle Player…Fiddler Maker

Published: Mon, June 25, 2007 - 6:06 am
Last Updated: Thu, August 23, 2007 - 1:43 pm

Jere Hough

A few years ago a music store owner walked through the gates of a big bluegrass music festival, and through all the din of several jam sessions, he could hear a fiddle so sweet that it stood our above all the noise. He found the fiddle player, 'way in the back lot, and offered him cash for the fiddle. The player said, "I made this fiddle and it's not for sale." Meteorologist Jere Hough found that same fiddle player playing that same fiddle...just down County Road 5.

Eldon Bryson's fingers have been playing string instruments since he was five years old. He mostly plays the fiddle these days. He likes how the one he's playing now sounds. And he does know fiddles.

He admits, "I've repaired hundreds...up into the thousands, I guess."

He makes them, too, from very special wood.

Bryson says, "Tone Wood...it's been cut for a hundred years."

He uses Flamed Maple for the back and Italian Spruce for the top...and he literally tunes the wood by sanding it thin, so that it registers just the right tones.

He explains. "It's like two people singing. The back's got to be in harmony with the top. ... Listen to this." He draws the bow against the wood at the top of the fiddle's neck. A clear note is heard. "See. that's the harmony. That's what my top's tuned to." He plays a string. "That's what the back's tuned to. ...You can tell when you start carving on a piece of wood just by handling it, you can hear music in it...You get a bad piece of wood, throw it out."

...Even though a block of wood only big enough for a violin's neck costs $400!

He currently has orders for eight violins. "I can build one in a month and a half. That's why I got this bed out here the shop. I start gluing and I sleep awhile, then I glue awhile."

And he plays awhile, too.

Jere Hough listens and then comments, "Ahhh...sweet sounds. And to think it all begins with a hundred-year-old piece of wood. On County Road 5 in the Dawes Community, I'm Jere Hough, News 5."

P.S. Bryson says there is a very clear difference between a fiddle and a violin: you carry a fiddle in a flour sack and a violin in a case.!

News Map

Email to a Friend

Printer Friendly

Recent Commented on News Reports

Day 1: Putting It In Park

8 Total Comments

How am I going to get to work without driving? One the first day of our series, I'm carpooling more »

Soldiers Homecoming

2 Total Comments

The fourth of July means different things to different people but for one family in Baldwin County it means---Homecoming. more »

News 5 Hot Dog Eating Championship…

1 Total Comments

In commemoration of Friday's, Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Champioships in New York, we here at News 5 decided to put on our own hot dog eating competition. more »