Jim McKinney, a fiddler from Romulus Michigan, is the winner of the 2005 Hetzler's Fakebook fiddle contest.
Jim started playing the guitar in 1978 and the fiddle in 1987. His grandfather offered to buy him a fiddle because he had taught himself to play guitar.
Jim found a cheap Chinese fiddle with case and bow for $100. It sounded awful, but before long he was hooked on fiddling.
Jim says, "For the first two months I had to practice in the basement because my family couldn't stand the noise. "
"I stuck with it and in 1994 started playing for fairs and festivals with a hammered dulcimer player. Now we play for weddings, receptions, contra dances, and Civil War re-enactment dances all over Michigan as the Golden Griffon Stringtet."
The Golden Griffon Stringtet is an acoustic, instrumental, square dance & contra dance band from southeast Michigan featuring hammered dulcimer, fiddle, guitar and bass.
