Byron Berline
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Byron Berline (born 6 July 1944) is an American fiddle player. He is widely considered one of the world's preeminent fiddle players and is also one of the most significant figures in contemporary bluegrass music. In his career, Berline has recorded with several of the best known musicians of modern time, including The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Elton John, The Byrds, Earl Scruggs, Dillard & Clark, Willie Nelson, Bill Monroe, John Denver, Rod Stewart, The Eagles, The Band, Vince Gill, Emmylou Harris, Alabama, Mary Chapin Carpenter, The Dillards, and many others. His music has also appeared in many television and film soundtracks, including Star Trek, Basic Instinct, Blaze, and Back to the Future III.
Every September, Berline hosts the Oklahoma International Bluegrass Festival in his hometown, Guthrie, Oklahoma. The annual event is among the most acclaimed bluegrass festivals in the United States. Throughout the festival's existence, Berline has brought an array of legendary bluegrass musicians to Guthrie, including Earl Scruggs, Ricky Skaggs, John Hartford, and many others. The OIBF has featured performances by famous international bluegrass artists like the Czech band Druhá Tráva, the Swiss band The Kruger Brothers, The Japanese Bluegrass Band, and a variety of others.
Over the last thirty years or so, Berline has played alongside legendary banjo player John Hickman. Along with musicians like Earl Scruggs, Béla Fleck, and Snuffy Jenkins, Hickman is regarded as one of the very best performers of his instrument in history.
Berline currently owns and operates the Double Stop Fiddle Shop in Guthrie, where Hickman works as luthier. They, along with Jim Fish, Richard Sharp, Greg Burgess and Steve Short, make up The Byron Berline Band. The band travels around the country and to Europe regularly, but continues to perform two concerts a month in Guthrie, entertaining residents of their home town.
Berline was born 6 July 1944 in rural northern Oklahoma, near the border with Kansas. He started playing the fiddle at a very young age and quickly developed a remarkable talent for it. He graduated from the University of Oklahoma in the mid 1960s and moved to Southern California in 1969. In 1970, Berline won the National Oldtime Fiddle Contest Championship in Weiser, Idaho. Berline went on to win two more titles. In many of the competitions he attended in Weiser, younger virtuoso Mark O'Connor would earn the junior crown.
Soon after his move to California, Berline became one of the most popular fiddlers in the bluegrass world. Berline recorded several solo albums, most notably Fiddle and a Song, which featured guest performances from Earl Scruggs, Bill Monroe, Vince Gill, and Mason Williams. The album was nominated for two Grammy Awards in 1996: Best Album of the Year and Best Song of the Year. While in California, Berline collaborated with John Hickman and guitarist Dan Crary to form the band Berline, Crary, and Hickman; with the addition of Steve Spurgin and John Moore, that band became known as California. Berline was also involved with the bands The Flying Burrito Brothers and Country Gazette.
Berline was in the 1979 film, The Rose. in the film, Berline portrayed a country musician, and his face appears on screen for about ten minutes.
