Stovin’s talent meant he never played second fiddle

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This article was published 26/04/2018 (2963 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

John Stovin would play the fiddle way past his daughters’ bedtime.

Jeanie Mckay, one of his children, said the teenagers drowned out the noise the best way they could.

“Shirley and I would just look at one another, put the pillows over our heads and go to sleep,” said Mckay, chuckling at memories from the late 1950s and early 1960s.

“I don’t think it’s because we hated the music. I think we had just enough and we couldn’t figure out why they didn’t have enough.”

For years, old-time fiddling echoed throughout the Stovin’s farmstead, outside Deloraine.

Whether it was a jam session at their home, dances at countryside schools or fiddling competitions near and far, John and his wife Helen played folk music with the best of them. They were affectionately known as the “little old man and the little old woman” at one competition.

More than two decades after John’s death in 1995, the man with a waltz named after him is about to be posthumously recognized for his lifelong contributions to fiddling.

John Stovin will be inducted into the Manitoba Fiddle Association’s wall of fame on April 29 in Carman.

“It’s finally happening, it’s past due,” Mckay said. “I’m just so proud to be there.”

The retired Brandon school teacher longingly remembers those house parties when the guests would stay put until one or two in the morning.

“When they got the instruments out and got playing, one tune would just lead to another, would lead to another, would lead to another,” she said. “And not one drop of alcohol was involved, just the pure joy of making music.”

Born in 1911, Stovin learned to play fiddle by ear from his father, Ted.

When John got married, his wife Helen became his accompanist. They were inseparable. She played keys for him, and sometimes the roles reversed and he backed her up.

Together, they drove eight or 10 miles by team and sleigh to dances farther afield, where they played from 8:30 p.m. to the early morning for $1.50.

John tried his luck at many fiddle contests, his accomplishments emphasized in many Brandon Sun articles. His family recalls one competition in 1975 when John celebrated his $7 first place prize with burgers for the family.

After he and Helen retired from the farm in 1976, they spent more time fiddling.

“They used the camper not to go to the lake but to fiddle contests,” said Shirley Brown, the eldest of the Stovins’ three children.

“They worked so hard and then they retired and they enjoyed their retirement.”

John won dozens of fiddling trophies, founded the Southwest Old Time Fiddlers group and his talent was in such high regard fiddler Eugene Laderoute named a waltz after him.

That arrangement will be played at the induction ceremony, Mckay said.

“My dad and my mom, you couldn’t help but dance to their music.”

Mckay recalls a write-up in an American bluegrass magazine, which proclaimed no one’s fiddling as enjoyable as the Stovins. “Because they played for the sheer joy of their music,” Mckay said.

Even as a teenager when she wrapped a pillow around her ears, Mckay said she always “admired their talent.”

“As I’ve gotten older, I’ve probably come to appreciate their music more than ever.”

Mckay said Brian Granger, a longtime fiddler from Nesbitt, was instrumental in encouraging the family to nominate their father for the posthumous award. He died in 1995 and his wife in 1998.

Brown believes the wall of fame recognition would have delighted her father.

“It’s wonderful to have a passion like that and then to have it recognized by your peers and the people he truly respected, it would have meant a great, great deal to him,” said Brown, who resides in Souris.

She always knew of her parents’ knack for fiddling, but revered their talent more as an adult.

Brown was at an art retreat in a remote Saskatchewan location when a throng of fiddlers moved in for a weekend.

Her instructor used the fiddlers as an inspiration.

“They don’t do it for fame, they don’t do it for money, they do it because it’s their passion and I want you to paint like that,” Brown remembers her instructor saying, “and I remember thinking, ‘Wow, that’s pretty special.’”

“That was the time I got reminded of (my parents’) passion.”

The wall of fame induction will be held at the Carman Community Hall on April 29. The dance runs from 2-9 p.m., supper is at 4:30 p.m. and the ceremony is at 6 p.m. Tickets are available at the door for $13.

Randy Weslak, Cameron Baggins and James Flett will also be recognized at the ceremony.

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