The fall and rise of the Cape Breton fiddler : 1955-1982

Abstract

In 1971 the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation television network produced a documentary film which stated that the traditional form of Scottish-style, instrumental fiddle music in Cape Breton was in decline and would die out. Vanishing Cape Breton Fiddler was the first work in any medium to make such a case. It provoked a response from many people who disagreed with its message. In the years that followed, their opposition to this message led to the founding of a committee which sponsored a new performance style, regular fiddle classes and an increased awareness of the importance of this music amongst the general population. In other words, the film generated an unintentional revival of traditional fiddle music. This thesis examines, for the first time, in detail, the content of the documentary and the conditions for fiddling that existed at the time it was made. It also examines in detail the way in which the responders acted and their motives for doing so. It is based on interviews with the documentary filmmaker and the key people who responded to his film.

The documentary film was partly right. There were fewer young people learning to play in the traditional style than there had been in previous decades. Yet there was still a good number of older fiddlers in the population. There was also a core group of people who were willing to pursue a new, stated goal: to promote the traditional fiddling style within the community and to young people in particular. It was this core group, combined with the efforts of older fiddlers which succeeded in giving the fiddle tradition a higher status than it had in the past. It is unlikely this would have happened without the broadcast of the film.