Archives Collection

CENTER FOR POPULAR MUSIC                                                             02-017

                        MISCELLANEOUS PHOTOGRAPHS                                                      

 

 

36TH Annual Tennessee Valley Old Time Fiddlers Convention

Photographs, secondary serial, and list of winners

 

Physical Description:

115 photographs: 1 B/W contact sheet (35 images) and 1 B/W contact scrap (1 image);

                              36 B/W 35mm negatives

                              2 color contact sheets        

                               35 color 4 x 6 ¼ prints and 40 color 35 mm negatives

1 secondary serial

5 page print out of convention winners

 

Dates:

October 5, 2002

 

Provenance:

Created by Center for Popular Music to document the fiddlers convention.

 

Agency History/biographical sketch:

The Tennessee Valley Old Time Fiddlers Convention was launched in November 1967 by Bill Harrison.  The contest, held at Athens College in Athens, Alabama, became a model for other contests like it in the South. The sponsor of the event, The Tennessee Valley Old Time Fiddlers Association was formed in the summer of 1967. The organization’s main objectives were sponsoring an annual fiddlers convention and publishing a regular newsletter.

 

Scope and content:

The 2002 Tennessee Valley Old Time Fiddlers Convention was held October 4 and 5, 2002 at Athens State University in Athens, Alabama.  CPM Director Paul F. Wells attended the convention and took these photographs at that time.  Categories included Senior Fiddle, Jamming on the Grounds, Classic Old Time Fiddle, Junior Fiddle, and Old Time Band.  Names of contestants are identified on the accompanying photo logs.   Names of the winners in all categories are identified on the manuscript print outs from the TVOTFC website. The Athenian is the Athens University student publication of which the October 2002 issue contains a list of 2001 winners and an article titled, “What exactly is the Fiddlers Convention?  A Historical Overview.”                     

 

Location:

Photographs are filed with other Center iconographic files (CPM-PR).  The Athenian is located in secondary serials.  The print out of winners is filed as addendum to Bill Harrison collection 97-050 in Box 2/2 of the Emmitt Crosswhite collection 01-015 in the manuscript section of the mezzanine stacks.          .

 

Related Materials:

The Bill Harrison collection (97-050) contains personal papers, performance programs, photographs, scores, pamphlets, newspapers, recordings, and other materials associated with the Tennessee Valley Old Time Fiddlers Association, the Convention, and The Devil’s Box.  The Crosswhite Collection (01-015) of manuscripts and sound recordings also contains TVOTFC materials. These are accessible by accession number in the Center’s database under various collection categories.  The Center also maintains books, periodicals, manuscripts, performance documents, and sound recordings relating to fiddle music and festivals.

 

 

LPC, March 2003