"Don Perkins With His Fiddle"
Don recently released another CD to add to his collection of wonderful fiddle music for his fans' enjoyment.
I was fortunate enough to be able to assist him in this endeavor, feeling very proud to have been asked to be a part of the production.
The CD is titled "Don Perkins With His Fiddle". It is now available for purchase by writing Don at his home in Chazy, NY. United States Postal Money Orders are accepted. Include $15.00 for the CD and $3.00 shipping charges ( available for shipping within the continental United States only ). Please print your return address. His address is:
Don Perkins
1197 Rte 348
Fiske Rd.
Chazy, NY. 12921
Tunes included on the CD are: Happy Acres Two-Step, Wake Up Suzy, Lancer's Quadrel, Soldier's Joy, Bonnet Trimmed in Blue, Conster's Hornpipe*, Swamp Lake Breakdown, Rozanna Waltz, Rippling Waters Jig, French Hornpipe, Romeo's Last Chance, Mississippi Sawyer, Rock Valley Jig/Whalen's Breakdown, Jack Pine Reel, and Operators Reel. (* Conster's Hornpipe is featured in Don's "North Country Fiddler" fiddle book published in 2006. This book contains the sheet music to 25 of his favorite fiddle tunes. Be sure to inquire about how to obtain a copy).
Don's sister, Phyllis Ezero, plays the keyboards on all the tunes of the CD and calls out a square dance with the Operators Reel.
I was fortunate enough to be able to assist him in this endeavor, feeling very proud to have been asked to be a part of the production.
The CD is titled "Don Perkins With His Fiddle". It is now available for purchase by writing Don at his home in Chazy, NY. United States Postal Money Orders are accepted. Include $15.00 for the CD and $3.00 shipping charges ( available for shipping within the continental United States only ). Please print your return address. His address is:
Don Perkins
1197 Rte 348
Fiske Rd.
Chazy, NY. 12921
Tunes included on the CD are: Happy Acres Two-Step, Wake Up Suzy, Lancer's Quadrel, Soldier's Joy, Bonnet Trimmed in Blue, Conster's Hornpipe*, Swamp Lake Breakdown, Rozanna Waltz, Rippling Waters Jig, French Hornpipe, Romeo's Last Chance, Mississippi Sawyer, Rock Valley Jig/Whalen's Breakdown, Jack Pine Reel, and Operators Reel. (* Conster's Hornpipe is featured in Don's "North Country Fiddler" fiddle book published in 2006. This book contains the sheet music to 25 of his favorite fiddle tunes. Be sure to inquire about how to obtain a copy).
Don's sister, Phyllis Ezero, plays the keyboards on all the tunes of the CD and calls out a square dance with the Operators Reel.
Don Perkins
Other than my parents and their lasting impact on my classical music, I can't think of one individual who has had more effect on my "other" type of music, Bluegrass and Fiddling, than my dear friend Don Perkins, North Country Fiddler. So this page is dedicated to him. I'll be adding more photos and features as time permits. The header photo above was taken by his wife, Pat.
Here's the link to Donnie's Fiddle Hangout page: http://www.fiddlehangout.com/myhangout/home.asp?id=2427
Here's another link to "The Perkins Family" website: http://www.perkinsmusic.net/fr_memories.cfm
Here's another link to "The Perkins Family" website: http://www.perkinsmusic.net/fr_memories.cfm
Don Perkins & Ted Wrench
Don Perkins, North Country Fiddler
I began playing the fiddle at five years of age. I didn't learn how to read music, but rather listened intently to my mother, Lois, as she would hum the tunes while playing the piano. My maternal grandfather and my paternal grandmother were both fiddlers. The Perkins family is steeped in French-Canadian fiddle music tradition. On the maternal side, ancestors emigrated from Canada to the USA back in the early 1800's and on my paternal side, ancestors came from Scotland and Ireland.
My father, the late Francis Perkins, considered one of the best square dance callers around, called to square dances at Grange halls in the North Country, and as a result of this early exposure, I played my 1st square dance at the age of ten. Been fiddlin' ever since.
I've been privileged to travel in the company of such fiddle greats as Jimmy Hamblin, Frank Orsini, the late Ken Bonner, George Pratt and Rollie Swinton. I've also had the good fortune to guest with many well known bands, including Bobby Hicks, won many championships and to carry on this beautiful music I've loved for so very long. Even got a tip of the hat once from none other than Bill Monroe who smiled and said "Mighty fine job, son."
It don't get much better'n that!
Don Perkins
Here's the "Introduction" as written and published in Don's fiddle instruction book titled "Don Perkins, North Country Fiddler":
DON PERKINS, North Country Fiddler
As near as I can remember, Don and I met in the sixties. He had been playing publicly for over fifteen years. I had developed an interest in the five-string banjo and joined up with Wallace "Pete" Richardson , his son, Rocky and other band members Tom Wallace, Ricky Parrow, and my brother, David Warner. We called our group "The High Peaks Boys". We started a grassroots bluegrass music club and named it the High Peaks Bluegrass League (HPBL) and went for many years with over 600 paid members. We produced many bluegrass shows and festivals in the late '60's and early-to-mid seventies in and around Upper Jay and Keene, NY. Don would often sit in with us when he wasn't playing a square dance or a country music gig. In the late seventies, Don started playing with "Fred Pike, Sam Tidwell and the Kennebec Valley Boys" from the Cambridge, Maine area. This was essentially when Don started playing bluegrass music professionally. He had played square dances starting at the age of ten.
Don's music schedule kept him out of the area a lot, so I didn't get to pick with him nearly as much as I would have loved to. When we finally got together in the same band - "Cedar Ridge" ( Bill Ryan, Ken Meyer and Rick Moon ) - in the mid-nineties, we took an instant mutual respect and admiration for each other as friends and musicians and we've hit it off ever since.
In all the years and thousands of playing hours that I've spent with Don, He has always been able to pull a few tunes out of the hat that I've never heard him play before. Just when I would get to thinking that I could stump him with some tune I was sure he'd never heard, he'd play several variations of it, and ask me if that was a good key, or if I'd rather he played it in some other key. The more time I've spent on stage with Don, the more inspired I've become to play at a deeper level, and I could never thank him enough for the professionalism he has taught me both on stage and backstage.
This book is an effort to repay him for so many years of genuine friendship and most importantly to share him through his music with his countless fans.
Enjoy. I sure have!
Frederick Warner
Author "Don Perkins, North Country Fiddler"
Don's music schedule kept him out of the area a lot, so I didn't get to pick with him nearly as much as I would have loved to. When we finally got together in the same band - "Cedar Ridge" ( Bill Ryan, Ken Meyer and Rick Moon ) - in the mid-nineties, we took an instant mutual respect and admiration for each other as friends and musicians and we've hit it off ever since.
In all the years and thousands of playing hours that I've spent with Don, He has always been able to pull a few tunes out of the hat that I've never heard him play before. Just when I would get to thinking that I could stump him with some tune I was sure he'd never heard, he'd play several variations of it, and ask me if that was a good key, or if I'd rather he played it in some other key. The more time I've spent on stage with Don, the more inspired I've become to play at a deeper level, and I could never thank him enough for the professionalism he has taught me both on stage and backstage.
This book is an effort to repay him for so many years of genuine friendship and most importantly to share him through his music with his countless fans.
Enjoy. I sure have!
Frederick Warner
Author "Don Perkins, North Country Fiddler"
Don Perkins, North Country Fiddler
Don's fiddle book is available by emailing Don. donaldperkins41@yahoo.com
Don may also have a supply of fiddle CDs he's produced. Be sure to ask.
There's more about his latest CD that I just finished producing for him here on this page. It's titled "Riding The Fiddle Bow".
Don may also have a supply of fiddle CDs he's produced. Be sure to ask.
There's more about his latest CD that I just finished producing for him here on this page. It's titled "Riding The Fiddle Bow".
