Loralyn Violinist 137-12Lora started playing violin in 5th grade school orchestra. She was involved in many activities, including drama, piano, violin, and vocal lessons. As her love of violin grew, she allowed her other hobbies to take a back seat.  She received her Bachelor’s Degree in Violin Performance from the University of Utah, and a Master’s Degree in Music from Wichita State University. While in Kansas she served as Principal Second Violin in the Wichita Symphony and taught as adjunct faculty at Bethel College. After moving back to Utah, she became an adjunct violin teacher at Utah State University. She also enjoyed playing in the Utah Festival Opera Orchestra for 12 years, 3 of them as concertmaster. She has played with the Utah Chamber Orchestra, the Pioneer Theatre pit orchestra, and currently is a member of the Flagstaff Symphony.

Lora Staples is a fiddler and teacher living in Kingman, Arizona. She currently plays with the gypsy band “Gateway”, with the Flagstaff Symphony, and has recently played in the bluegrass band “Buffalo Nickel”, and the Celtic/Contra-Dance band “Leaping Lulu”.

She started her violin studies at age 10 in the public school system, and it quickly became her focus and passion. She earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Violin Performance from the University of Utah and a Master’s Degree in Music from Wichita State University. She has played professionally in numerous orchestras and pit orchestras and has been a featured soloist with several orchestras.

Her focus was always on performing until 1998, when an accident involving a finger on her left hand forced her to consider other options. At that time, she discovered her second love, teaching. She became a certified Suzuki teacher, ran a full studio of 40+ students of all ages for several years, and has since applied those same concepts to her fiddle teaching.

In 2010, she founded “Red Desert Violin”, which now provides online violin and fiddle instruction to people in over 35 countries. She loves helping people overcome their obstacles and watching how music positively impacts every aspect of people’s lives.

Class: Basic Adult Fiddle

Playing level: High Adult Beginner. Students should have the very basics of fiddle playing learned including bow hold, fiddle hold, tuning the instrument, basic bow technique. They should have a minimum of 10 fiddle tunes learned and memorized.

We will start by learning 5 CORE tunes, and if the class is able to do more, we will do as many as possible! As we learn the tunes, we will focus on the following crucial topics: How to play faster, ear training and how to play by ear, improving our internal rhythm and how to use a metronome.

Of course, Lora will answer questions and if the majority of the class wants a special lesson on a certain topic, time will be made for that topic.

 Tunes learned will be a mix of waltzes, hoedowns/reels, and if time permits, jigs. Here’s a link to the audio and sheet music/tab.