About the Organisers
The Golden Fiddle Awards has been awarding fiddle and violin players along with teachers and people involved in the industry for more than two decades.
It is the first awards system embracing all musical styles, which focuses on nurturing, supporting and rewarding the wealth of violin playing, performance and composing talent in Australia and New Zealand. We are now expanding into helping find instruments for underprivileged, remote and distant students of stringed instruments.
Our Mission:
To administer the first national awards system for string players embracing all musical styles for players, composers and teachers of classical, folk, rock, jazz, punk, Celtic, country, alternative and bluegrass.
To apply the talents of the professional players who have embraced the Golden Fiddle Award concept, to inspire the fiddle community of young, amateur and recreational players.
Mark Mitchell
Chairman
Through a friendship with a leading Tasmanian engineer and inventor, David Sugden, and encouraged by rave reviews from serious world-class violinists, Mark took on the development and marketing of the Epoch violin, now recognised as the first major improvement in strings technology in 400 years.
He has showcased the technology at the big music exhibitions in the USA, Italy and Australia and now, with the input from an elite team of R&D specialists, sound engineers and craftsmen in his factory in Ormeau, Queensland, he produces a dazzling array of strings, from the quarter size student acoustic violin to the now famed five string professional electric, the viola, cello and double bass, with its multiple sound outputs to suit different playing styles.
Most of Australia’s top stage players now recognise Epoch as the most inspiring and stable stage instrument because of its robust construction and bold sound reproduction.
In his other life, Mark and his SuperCool Group of Companies import refrigeration and automotive air conditioning parts and technologies and wholesale throughout Australia. He is a recognised expert in vehicle air conditioning and sits on several national boards that administer and influence governments on skills programs, refrigerant and environmental legislation.
Pixie Jenkins
Director of Media
Pixie’s fiddle playing is uniquely Australian, and with his amazing energy, storytelling and humour, he has become one of the most recognisable artists in the industry. He’s also one of Australia’s most eclectic and talented entertainers, playing roots, bluegrass and Irish folk styles with incredible dexterity and finesse.
Pixie has been a support artist and toured and recorded for some of the biggest names in the world, Bob Dylan to Cher; Jimmy Barnes to John Williamson and has been a studio musician on the recordings of 100s of other artists.
He is a multiple Australian Country Music ‘Golden Guitar’ awards winner, and John Williamson has stated that “Pixie Jenkins is the greatest fiddler Australia has produced”.
Over his life, he has also performed on stage in theatrical and musical productions with people like Normie Rowe and Jackie Love in productions such as Fiddler on the Roof, Oklahoma and South Pacific.
Pixie is often referred to as an ‘Icon’ (The Australian 2011) and a “living legend’. He received ‘Male Artist of the Year’ at the 2019 Australian Celtic Music Awards.
Andrew Clermont
Director of Talent
Andrew is one of Australia’s leading musicians and Bluegrass exponents – a virtuoso on instruments as diverse as the fiddle, the mandolin and the didgeridoo.
He has toured extensively around the world and played alongside the top names in music. He is a three-time National Bluegrass Flat-pick Guitar Champion, and he shared in the Golden Guitar for ‘Losin’ My Blues Tonight’ in 1987. Andrew’s International Supper Club in Tamworth has grown into a musical institution, and he sources world-class talent from his many world tours. He has starred around the world with the Fiddlers Festival, the nationally awarded group Dya Singh, Totally Gourdgeous, Terra Australis bush band, Celtic Conundrums and The Borderers. He has been recognised by his peers, having been granted the Musicianship Award at the New Frances Folk Festival.
He has starred around the world with his own International Supper Club, the Fiddlers Festival, the internationally awarded groups Dya Singh World Music Group, Totally Gourdgeous (Best Folk Group 2008), BluGuru, and recently awarded People’s Choice Award Winner Group – The Borderers!
He has been recognised by his peers, having been granted Musicianship Awards, including 3 -time Bluegrass Guitar Champion of Australia & the Hands of Fame honour.