Biography:John Hand
John Hand
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|---|---|
| Given name: | John "Johnny" |
| Middle name: | |
| Family name: | Hand |
| Place of birth: | |
| Place of death: | Chicago, Ill. |
| Year of birth: | prior to 1850 |
| Year of death: | 1916 |
| Profile: | Musician |
| Source of information: | https://books.google.com/books?id=mnJJAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA117&lpg=PA117&dq=%22johnny+hand%22+fiddle&source=bl&ots=ng6UC5Qv-E&sig=ACfU3U0HhHsSb15NA1J7KwDKu4SxXwTH Q&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjbuaDetazpAhUPneAKHcoVB6gQ6AEwDnoECCMQAQ#v=onepage&q=%22johnny%20hand%22%20fiddle&f=false |
Biographical notes
This obituary appeared in Unity of Oct., 26, 1916, and may be (although no direct connection has been established) the Johnny Hand credited with several tunes in Ryan's Mammoth Collection (1883).
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"Johnny Hand" is dead, Chicago's greatest fiddler. He was a little German, who, sixty-five years ago, came from Germany as a modest
wood carer and cigar maker, but he brought with him we suspect, as a part of the immigrant "luggage", a fiddle--not a violin, but a plain
fiddle, and he was simply a fiddler who could compel heel and toe to keep time to his fiddling. Latterly, he became a "violinist", the "leader
of an orchestra."
He began in fiddling for barn dances; he ednded in playing the violin at millionaire weddings. He became the indispensable ornament
at swell functions, the pride and admiration of proud dames and famous capitalists. But all this time he was simpley "Johnny Hand."
He laid aside his carver's tools, he wore a top hat, but still he was the magician of the bow.