Carignan, Jean

Jean Carignan, (December 7, 1916 – February 16, 1988) was a Canadian fiddler from Quebec. Carignan was born in Lévis, Quebec, on December 7, 1916, later moving to Sherbrooke and then Trois-Rivières with his family; the family moved to Montreal when Carignan was ten years old. As a child, Carignan studied with noted Quebec fiddler Joseph Allard, as well as learning the music of the great Irish fiddlers Michael Coleman and James Morrison and the Scottish fiddler James Scott Skinner. In his mid-teens Carignan joined George Wade and his Cornhuskers. Carignan was a friend of famous violinist and conductor Yehudi Menuhin. In 1974, he was made a Member of the Order of Canada as "the greatest fiddler in North America". He died in Montreal on February 16, 1988, at the age of 71. In 1976, The Folk Music Sourcebook (Sandberg and Weissman) wrote about Carignan : "Carignan's technique is amazing, but more so the joy and energy with which he applies it. There are few players in any music who reach his degree of virtuosity without sacrificing feeling or originality"—p. 84. As a fiddler, he was always aiming for the strictest authenticity in his executions, displaying an attitude of absolute rigor when playing his repertoire of 7,000 pieces learned from Coleman, Skinner, Allard, Wellie Ringuette and many others.