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Buddy Spicher

Musician · b. 1938 · DuBois, Pennsylvania · Wikipedia
Best known for Fiddle

Buddy Spicher is one of the most-recorded fiddlers in Nashville history — a member of the legendary Nashville A-Team of session musicians whose distinctive double-stop style and twin-fiddle harmony work shaped the sound of thousands of country, bluegrass, and pop recordings from the late 1950s onward. His versatility across genres — bluegrass, classical, jazz, western swing — made him the first-call fiddler for a generation.

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  • Born Norman Keith Spicher (pronounced “Spiker”) on a farm outside DuBois, Pennsylvania. Family surrounded by music: maternal uncles played fiddle, and his older brother Bob was a semi-professional guitarist who first taught him guitar in 1949 and then “Boil ’em Cabbage Down” on the fiddle a short time later.
  • Began playing fiddle at age 13; by age 15 was a staff musician on the WWVA Jamboree in Wheeling, West Virginia. At about 14 he met fiddler Clarence “Tater” Tate, who taught him double-stop technique — a signature of his later playing.
  • Moved to Nashville in late 1957 or early 1958 with Audrey Williams’s (Hank Williams’s widow) touring band, replacing fiddler Dale Potter. Played his first Nashville recording session in 1958.
  • Joined the staff band of The Wilburn Brothers Show, a syndicated TV program. Toured extensively as sideman with Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn, the Osborne Brothers, Ray Price (in the Cherokee Cowboys), Hank Snow, Faron Young, and Kitty Wells.
  • Settled into full-time session work in Nashville in 1968. Over the following decades, recorded with hundreds of country artists including Waylon Jennings, George Jones, Roger Miller, Charley Pride, Marty Robbins, the Statler Brothers, Hank Thompson, Bob Wills, Dolly Parton, Crystal Gayle, Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris, and George Strait (he played the iconic intro on “Amarillo by Morning”).
  • Cross-genre session credits include Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, The Monkees, Ray Charles, Henry Mancini, Dan Fogelberg, Neil Young, Steve Miller Band, Sir Douglas Quintet, and Linda Ronstadt (“Long, Long Time”).
  • Fiddle and cello player in Area Code 615, the Nashville country-rock supergroup formed from the Bob Dylan Nashville Skyline session musicians. Their Trip in the Country album was a top-five Grammy finalist in 1970 for Best Contemporary Instrumental Performance.
  • Recorded extensively with Bill Monroe during the early 1960s, appearing on more than 30 Decca/MCA sessions including “Little Maggie,” “I’m Going Back to Old Kentucky,” “Toy Heart,” “Louisville Breakdown,” and “Christmas Time’s A-Coming.” His last Monroe recordings appear on the Bill Monroe and Friends LP.
  • In the 1980s was a member of the country-jazz Superpickers alongside Buddy Emmons, Buddy Harman, Henry Strzelecki, Willie Rainsford, and Terry McMillan.
  • CMA Instrumentalist of the Year nominee (1983, 1985). First fiddler inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame’s “Nashville Cats” series (August 2008). Inducted into the National Fiddler Hall of Fame in 2010 with the notation that he has played on more recordings than any other fiddler.
  • Has taught at numerous fiddle camps including the Mark O’Connor Fiddle Camp and Montana Fiddle Camp. Owns and operates The Fiddle House studio in East Nashville. Notable students include Billy Contreras, Maggie Estes, Lisa Silver, and Dennis Stroughmatt.
  • Still actively performing and teaching in the Nashville area. Has released more than 18 albums under his own name including Front Porch Fiddle, American Sampler, Me and My Heroes, Buddies (with Buddy Emmons), and Air Mail Special (with Canadian fiddler Calvin Vollrath).

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