Homespun Video has released two new DVDs for new students of traditional American fiddle music. Both are taught by Jim Wood, a five time Tennessee fiddle champ, noted performer and teacher, and organizer/arranger for The Tennessee Fiddle Orchestra.

Both DVDs are geared towards beginners, and are designed to follow one upon the other.

The first is appropriately titled Fiddle for the Absolute Beginner. This two hour starter lessons covers the basics of proper technique and how to tune your instrument, but sets to work quickly showing how to use a simple A scale as the basis for a number of familiar fiddle tunes.

Tips are included to help even a very new fiddler participate in jams right away. The DVD – with a printable music booklet on the disc – sells for $24.95.

The second release is called 20 Easy Tunes for the Beginning Fiddler, and contains precisely what the title describes. You’ll learn popular jam standards like Soldier’s Joy, Buffalo Gals, Sally Ann, Redwing, Sally Goodin, Fire on the Mountain, Arkansas Traveler, Angeline the Baker, Down Yonder, and several others over the course of this 2 DVD set.

It also includes a play along feature where you can practice your tunes with Inge Wood on guitar and Jim on second fiddle to make sure that your timing and intonation are on track.

This 2 DVD set sells for $34.95, and also includes a printable music booklet.

You can see sample video from each project on the Homespun web site.

Happy Traum, founder of Homespun Tapes, has posted a free lesson online as a Christmas gift for the many guitarists who have supported his company since it was formed in 1967.

The song is Joy To The World, arranged for fingerstyle guitar in drop D tuning.

These days, most folks know Happy for his administrative and managerial roles in the company, but in the early days, he was one of the primary instructors, along with his brother Artie who passed away earlier this year.

You can watch the video lesson for Joy To The World on the Homespun web site.

Homespun has released mandolin transcription books to match two recent CDs from Butch Baldassari, Mandolin Hyms and Appalachian Mandolin & Dulcimer. Each book contains complete mandolin transcriptions in both tablature and standard notation, plus a copy of the original CD.

Mandolin Hymns contains 15 popular hymns and sacred songs including I Am A Pilgrim, Amazing Grace, Simple Gifts and What A Friend We Have In Jesus.

The book offers 37 pages of mandolin transcriptions and the accompany CD has the songs performed in instrumental arrangements in a string band style with Butch on mandolin. Other players include Aubrey Haynie and Andrea Zonn on fiddle, Robert Bowlin on guitar, Stuart Duncan on banjo, and Dennis Crouch and Mike Bub on bass.

The Appalachian Mandolin book includes the CD Appalachian Mandolin & Dulcimer, which featured duets between Butch and the late dulcimer legend David Schnaufer, along with mandolin transcriptions for the 14 traditional tunes they recorded.

Fans of Appalachian fiddle music will recognize the tunes, with favorites like June Apple, Sandy River Belle, Black Mountain Rag, Flop Eared Mule, Cold Frosty Morn and 9 others included.

Our regular readers will recall that Butch has been battling a pernicious brain tumor this past year. A great many of his friends and students in the mandolin world have been very generous in their support, and picking up these two new Homespun book/CD sets would be a fine way to champion Butch and all he has contributed to our music, while you pick up some fine music and mandolin arrangements at the same time.

We are delighted to pass along that Butch is currently in a clinical trial at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and is in good spirits according to his wife, Sinclair.

Pete Wernick, a.k.a. Dr. Banjo, has long been regarded as one of the pre-eminent banjo instructors in bluegrass music. His book, Bluegrass Banjo, published in 1974, has sold over 200,00 copies and taught thousands to become banjo pickers over the last 30 years. Together with Tony Trischka, he compiled the reams of information offered in the massive volume, Masters of the 5 String Banjo, with interviews, photos and information on 68 popular banjo players.

Pete has also released a number of instructional videos, focusing primarily on helping new players get started and learn to jam with one another.

His newest, Bluegrass Banjo Backup, has just been released from Homespun Video. It is designed for new pickers, and includes footage from his previous Bluegrass Slow Jam and Bluegrass Jamming DVDs. After showing video from an actual jam session, Pete describes the techniques, lick and patterns being employed, which are also found in the included tab booklet.

The new Wernick DVD can be ordered directly from Pete’s web site, or from Homespun, which also features a couple of bits of sample video.