Cape Breton Fiddler: Johnny Wilmot

1916-1993

Below you can follow links to sources of some of the tunes on Johnny's recorded music. For players there are tune titles, composer information, history and references to books most of which are currently in print and available from Cranford Publications. You also will find music notation (GIFs and abcs) for many tunes Johnny plays.

My Friend Johnny is an article from the 1993 Silver Apple News ....below is an excerpt:

Musically, Johnny was fluently bilingual. He was one of the few musicians I ever met who had thoroughly digested both Cape Breton Irish and Cape Breton Scottish styles. While his own compositions often straddled this Irish-Scottish fence, his settings of traditional tunes kept the two separate, always displaying personal style without sacrificing the beauty and integrity of the 'original' melodies.

Johnny was exposed to live Irish and Scottish styles of music from the time he was an infant. Starting in the late 'twenties he began listening to the Irish 78s of Coleman, Morrison etc. and and later to the Cape Breton 78s of the Inverness Serenaders. He played most of the 'mainstream repertoire' including the majority of tunes recorded and played by other Cape Breton fiddlers between 1930-65. Many of these tunes were found in easily available books such as Cole's One Thousand Fiddle Tunes, J. Scott Skinner's, The Scottish Violinist, The Scotch Guard and The Skye, O'Neill's and Kerr's Collections.

 

Links to selected Wilmot recordings

1. Another Side of Cape Breton (a compilation from both LPs and 78s)

2.Cape Breton Fiddlers on Early LPs (Anthology reissue of Celtic label LPs recorded in the '50s and '60s. Carefully selected cuts from Dan Joe MacInnis, Dan R. MacDonald, Donald & Theresa MacLellan and Johnny Wilmot (4 tracks from Another Side)

 

 

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11/3/2000