8th of January

by Steve Eulberg

We are excited to announce that we have a new Fiddle Lesson posted on DulcimerCrossing.com. The 8th of January is a tune that was written to celebrate and commemorate Andrew Jackson's victory over the British in the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812.

This tune appears on Steve & Vi's Fiddle Whamdiddle recording Not My Monkey.  (The mountain dulcimer lesson is on the production list for recording.)

In the 1936 Jimmy Driftwood was teaching high school in the Ozark mountains of his home state of Arkansas and he wrote lyrics and set them to this tune in order to interest his students in learning history. The Battle of New Orleans won the 1960 Grammy Award for Song of the Year.

Jimmy Driftwood's commercial success helped to bring resources to the northeast corner of the state of Arkansas and established the Ozark Folk Center with its Ozark Opry Stage in Mountain View, AR. (Steve has performed on that stage and taught for several festivals there.)

Watch Vi's introduction above and subscribe to DulcimerCrossing.com to have access to all of the episodes in this lesson set.