Craig Judelman - Fiddle Position and the Left Hand

In this video Craig Judelman ventures into the seemingly muddy waters of how to hold the fiddle in oldtime and what to pay attention to in the left hand. Craig has given a lot of thought to these issues of technique as it applies specifically to fiddling through his own performance career and as a teacher. Ultimately, Craig doesn't give a single prescription, but a range of options and encouragement to build greater awareness of how different choices effect sound and ease of playability.
00:11 Introduction
00:57 How to hold the fiddle
03:45 How to position the left hand on the neck
07:25 How to position your left hand thumb
08:55 Straight wrist or flat wrist?
09:58 More on how to hold the fiddle

[@deltafour1212]

The most underrated teaching channel on RUclips! This man should have over a million views and subscribers. The information he shows you on fiddling is gold! !

[@ronblack2404]

Finally! Someone willing to teach examples the way many Fiddler’s play, those self taught or passed down Appalachian Style.

[@krystallinecestmoneau1358]

that casualchange of position was classsss

[@Yore297]

So underrated

[@JamGrassLad]

Super Helpful

[@marymckeough8418]

I have been looking and looking for advice on where to put my thumb when holding the fiddle. I have small hands and keep it lower on the neck. Just like you talked about. Now I can relax and worry about other fiddle problems I have. I cannot thank you enough.

[@michaelhoman7748]

Just found this channel, been a fan of your fiddling for many years bro - heard of you when you were w dust busters - so grateful to see you teaching here!

[@ashleyalexandermorris9645]

Lovely! I’ve just started to learn to fiddle and I was feeling really frustrated that I couldn’t get the sound I wanted (less classical more bluegrass) and this really helped me play around with my hand positions and tension.

[@stagelifelv9324]

You are a wonderful teacher! I am learning so much!

[@road2acoustic99]

Woaw, with all these different fiddle positions you can always play with a excellent tune ! Great video, thanks ! :-)

[@joseph2832]

Thank you

[@NotJenOrJane]

wow @1:23

[@richjakowski1056]

I notice you,re using a shoulder rest which sort of tell me in spite of all those other positions you play most often with it under your chin (or really your jaw).

[@craigjudelman]

it really depends for me. I do also play without it, especially if it's an old time gig (I also play a lot of klezmer and swing where I do mostly keep the fiddle under my chin (I prefer to think of it as on my shoulder as I still try to keep my chin from doing any work pressing down). I find that for my body sometimes even when I hold the fiddle lower the shoulder rest can still help me to keep the fiddle snug, but everyone's built differently, so I don't think there's any hard and fast rules about this stuff.
Honestly I very often will use multiple of these positions in a single tune, sometimes intentionally to give different muscles a break and sometimes just because it feels right/'happens', or if I wanna change where the fiddle is in relation to a microphone in a performance where I'm also singing.
But yes, I started off with classical music, so that may always be my 'default' position. When I first started old time fiddle, I was coming off a year dealing with tendonitis, so was also looking for different ways to reduce the strain on my body, but also it was a choice to force myself to use/inhabit my body differently and get away from all the habitual things I was doing based on decades of classical training. I was definitely influenced by the ideas of the Alexander Technique in this, and recommend researching it to all my students.
Thanks for Watching!