Well here they are!

Two videos to guide you through the “slow part” of The Last of The Mohicans Theme. This smooth lyrical melody appears in the sounds track version as a layer over the rhythmicky (Hot Violinist technical term), five-note-roll-filled part that starts the song. This is a stroke of composer Trevor Jones's genius in arranging the basic fiddly part that was written by Dougie MacLean, god bless you wherever you are.

When I was first learning this song, I was sad that I wouldn't be able to play these two parts at the same time on one violin (without growing a couple more arms).

I was afraid it might not even work as a solo arrangement!

My game plan was to play the main fiddle part over and over again so many times at the beginning that it would almost start to create a loop in the audience listener's imagination. That way when I come in with the slow part, maybe they'll still be subconsciously feeling the other part and have a good experience.

There have a been a few critics over the years who will say something like, “Why does everyone like this? It's way too repetitive.”

But the overwhelming consensus (based on my observation of YouTube views, comments, roaring applause, festival-roaming people stopped in their tracks with turkey leg held up in front like statue of liberty torch, and tears streaming down the cheeks of even the toughest looking biker dude) …is …it works!

I recorded this very raw version with E Muzeki in 2005 for our Sindh album which is available in my webshop.

Many tunes on this album had complicated productions that took us multiple days to record but we decided to try this one raw first. We recorded the guitar and violin in two separate rooms but live together via the headphones.

I still remember standing beside the stone fireplace in our recording engineer Ron Flynt's living room right after that first take. I was surrounded by a maze of audio cables that snaked from the mic and my violin around the corner, down the hall, and back to the garage which had been nicely converted into a control room. I also had a plaid scarf rolled up on top of my head to keep the headphones from painfully resting on my elf ears. Sexy.

After a few generous moments of the last ringing guitar chord, Ron's matter of fact voice clicked into the headphones, “That was sensational.”

And that's the take we kept! I think that is the only truly one-take performance I ever released on any of my recordings.

Later with Circa Paleo we got back in the studio and had a field day (or ten) playing around with overdubs and all kinds of fun production tricks. That resulted in two versions of this song that we didn't want to part with, so we put them BOTH on our Tideland album. 😛

That one is out of print, but you can get a CD Baby download card with collectible album art sticker as part of my discography pack if you're interested in checking them out.

My most recent sheet music arrangement follows the formula of my original solo violin arrangement:

-Play the the rhythmicky part on repeat as much as feels satisfying to you (bars 1-16)
-Then the smooth melody in the high octave (bars 17-32)
-Then a variation of this slow melody in the lower octave (bars 33-49)
-Then back to the rhythmicky part with a variation to wrap it up (bars 50-70)

If you still need to get a copy of the sheet music, please sign up for my newsletter, then click confirm in the confirmation email you recieve, and it will fly to your inbox magically.

Instructional videos #1-8 on my YouTube channel are all about the faster fiddly part.

Now I've released video #9 which guides you through the slow melody in the higher octave:

And video #10 which guides you through the slow melody in the lower octave:

I hope this helps some of you guys to get a little bit more traction learning this one!

If this still leaves you with more questions, please post them in the comments section below, so we can all try to figure this out together.

If this is all still a little advanced for you, but you'd like to play this tune one day, please stay tuned! I have a very exciting plan in the works for you total beginners. I'll be sharing the details with you all very soon!

Here's an oldie but goldie from the E Muzeki days of yore!

We wrote it while our band was on tour in Florida in 2007 and first recorded it on our Agrafa album released later that year. It was influenced by some Appalachian fiddle tricks I learned from Judy Hyman along with a whole bunch of Hank 3 we were listening to in the truck on the way to and from everywhere.

We named it after a fishing spot off the Texas Coast near my home town of Flour Bluff.

Two jetties line the Corpus Christi Ship Channel as it enters the bay from the Gulf of Mexico. In Port Aransas you can park your car on the beach and walk right up onto the South Jetty and out toward the deep water where silver Tarpon and King Mackerel are swimming. The North Jetty is attached to Saint Jo's Island which can only be reached by boat.

Lets just say, if I were a tarpon, I would much rather swim near the North Jetty. It's a great place to be a human too. You don't have to race with everyone's kids to find whole sand dollars on the beach, there are rumors of buried Spanish treasure, and overall it's way more cool and fun than the normal mainland beach.

I guess it's officially called San Jose Island, but I swear everyone always called it St. Jo's.

There is a small, noisy public boat that runs out there across the channel and back throughout the day, but if you miss the last one back, you're stuck out there till morning. My friends and I would regularly do this on purpose.

My memories of St. Jo's Island and the North Jetty include:

– Sleeping on a rock under a twinkling black sky and being covered in salty mist.
– Wading through low tide at sunrise when my friend (and co-writer of this tune!) Mark caught a small shark with his bare hands.

When I say small, I mean it couldn't bite off your arm or leg, but it could still take off a hand in just the wrong situation. A finger? Easy. That's a story for another time as I would like to share the tune!

Here is a recent performance with my sister Kelly:

The fans at Groupees.com voted on this song to be performed and filmed in the living room as one of the rewards for their contribution to the fund raiser for Girls Not Brides Charity.

Fans were allowed to write in anything they wanted to vote for. As you can see by the 10.18% who voted for the category Who is Jenny?, not all these people were familiar with my music. So, I'm proud of The North Jetty for rising to the top in competition with some popular mainstream covers and folk standards! Go North Jetty!

The Agrapha CD by E Muzeki that includes the original recording of this tune is available in my discography bundle! Wink Wink!

I'd love to know what song you'd like to hear Kelly and I play next as this living room thing is becoming a bit of a tradition. Please let me know in the comments section below!