File: dockendorffharold06-oh-playingfordances_M.mp3
Speakers:
HD – Harold Dockendorff
KP: Did your parents play music at all?
HD: No. There was no music in the family, except my youngest brother he learned to play the Hawaiian guitar with the steel bar. And I learned to chord on that, too.
KP: Were there other fiddlers in the community?
HD: Not in our immediate community, no. It's Jack Webster who I mentioned to you. When I was still in my teens, a lot of school dances in local halls, and of course all the young people went to these dances. So I used to go to wherever Jack was playing and I enjoyed myself. I didn't drink or smoke, so I went there and had a good time cause I never left the floor very often. So I had the pick of the girls, cause more often the fellows drank at that time, home made beer and stuff, and while they were out tankin' up I could get the pick of the girls (laughs). I had a better time than they did. When I was about 13, I always loved fiddle music, so I bought a fiddle and started to pick at it. And I got good enough that I could play at the local dances. So in the late 30s and early 40s, I used to play at the school dances quite a bit. And when I wasn't playin' at a dance one night, I'd be at a dance where Jack Webster was playin' perhaps the next night. So the net result of that was that I only got to bed early about one or two nights a week (laughs).
