Grandpa's Fiddle

Grandpa's instrument was not a violin it was a fiddle. Fiddles he said were for playing lively fun music for family and friends not the chamber kind of music. We loved to hear him play and often asked him to play for us. We would gather around him and listen until grandma said, "Enough those children need to get to bed." Then we would ask him to just play one more song, of course he would play another one for us.
The music we grew up on was old fashion country music, ballads and hymns. When the family got together at grandma and grandpa's the old tattered hymnals would be gotten out of the bookcase and real singing would begin. They would sing songs that would make everyone smile and sing along. Grandpa would get out the fiddle and play along. Now they call it improvising, then we just called it fiddling.