I got into teaching fiddle accidentally.

It wasn’t too long after I’d picked up my violin after a lot of years of keeping it in a closet, and discovered that I really like playing Irish and Scottish dance music. Someone asked me for some help playing her new fiddle, and she was scared to ask her teacher, for some reason or other.

Fifteen minutes later, she was so tickled that she could actually play what she heard in her head, she blurted out, “You should be a real teacher!”

Now that was a sort of compliment.

I think.

Anyway, I took her advice over the years, and gradually started teaching and coaching people who really wanted to learn  to play some Irish or Celtic music.  Some didn’t read music at all. Some were classical players, and really good ones, far better than I would have ever been if I’d continued studying music in college.

Many of my students are adults, trying out something they’ve always wanted to do. Or they used to take lessons when they were kids, and burned out on the discipline and practice. Some are kids now who are taking classical violin lessons, and are burning out on the pretty intense competition.

Whatever their motivation, they all seem to like music, and making music, and they are in the process of discovering it in themselves.

I am not a classical music teacher, per se. But I teach that all good music is from the heart, and it is for the joy of it. I use a varied selection of music for my students, depending on what they like to hear, and try to teach good intonation, tone, bowing technique, and listening skills.

And I learn more from my students, young and old, as they learn how to listen and play with other musicians and learn more about themselves in the process. They’ll never be Jascha Heifetz (nor will I), but they will perhaps be happy, and they’ll keep playing into their old age.

And they all help make me a better teacher.

By learning you will teach; by teaching you will learn.

Latin Proverb