Richard Moody

He studied classical viola at the University of Manitoba and at the Conservatoire National de Musique in Caen, France, before turning to folk, pop and jazz. Based in Winnipeg, he became a session player and released two recordings of his own as a jazz violist and singer-songwriter. He played with Paris to Kyiv, the Trivocals Jazz Ensemble and the folk group the Wyrd Sisters, and he has performed or recorded with the Bills, Joel Fafard, Jane Siberry, Glenn Buhr and the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra. By 2010 he was the violinist in the Bills, and he played violin on his sister’s solo album The Garden that year.

With the Wailin’ Jennys he was on mandolin when the trio appeared on WBUR in Boston in May 2014. He is one of the additional musicians on Fifteen (Red House, October 2017), the album the Jennys made for their fifteenth year, credited on viola and violin and on mandolin for one track; the album was nominated for a Juno as Traditional Roots Album of the Year in 2018. A 2021 concert listing calls him one of the group’s long-time side players, with violin, viola and mandolin in the lineup, and he was still touring with the Jennys on fiddle, viola and mandolin in March 2025. In 2019 he was teaching fiddle at the Fiddleworks camp in British Columbia, as a resident of Victoria.