Emmett Hughes (1921-2011) was a fiddler of extraordinary talent and dexterity from Dromore, PEI. He came from a very musical family, began fiddling at an early age and from the start had an amazingly accurate memory for tunes. He worked as a dairy farmer and carpenter for years and composed 115 tunes between the ages of 60 and 70. He taught himself to read music so he could write the notes down accurately. He wrote in seven major and five minor keys and his tunes included slow airs, waltzes, jigs, clogs, marches, slow and fast strathspeys and reels. His tunes cover the range of speed from very slowly played slow airs such as Going Back Home, which depicts a farm worker slowly walking home down a red dirt road after a hard day’s work, and reels that he played breathtakingly fast and accurately.

Five tunes from slow to fast are included here, and three additional tunes of Emmett’s can be found on the Southern Kings Tune List: Autumn Trees Waltz, Combining the Lupins Reel and Little Red Gig.