Blake

Performing & Teaching

Blake has been performing on the fiddle since he was 6 years old, and has been teaching fiddle for over 25 years around Humboldt county. For the past several years, he has also been teaching the anglo concertina. 

Many of Blake's students are kids, but he teaches students of all ages and experience levels. If you'd like to see the kind of fun they get up to, you can watch a Blake Ritter Fiddle Academy performance from 2022 on Facebook.

Blake has performed at various festivals up and down the West Coast, including renaissance fairs, highland games, the KVMR Celtic Festival (CA), the Fairfax Irish Feis (CA), the Marin Irish Festival (CA), the Summer Arts and Music Festival (CA), the Humboldt Hills Hoe-Down (CA), the Cascade Celtic Festival (WA) the Bellingham Celtic Festival (WA), and many more! He is looking forward to playing at the Corvallis Celtic Festival (OR) for the first time this year!

He'll be teaching fiddle workshops at the upcoming Corvallis Celtic Festival – one workshop geared towards kids, and another for adults looking to learn some advanced Irish fiddle ornamentation & technique!

Blake is currently available for solo gigs (teaching and performing on both instruments), as well as group performances with Ceo, Harmonic Convergence, and Covered With Moss...

• Harmonic Convergence is a duo with Tai Evans (sometimes as trio with Alina) performing modern and trad folk songs around the Humboldt and Mendocino counties. You can hear them in this YouTube duet.

• Covered With Moss is a trio with Chris Hinderyckx and Sam McNeill, performing trad tunes around California, at festivals such as KVMR. You can hear them in this YouTube video.

• Blake has also performed with Summer McCall, when she was based in Arcata CA. They performed at KVMR and as a duo around California. You can hear them playing in this YouTube video.

Blake's Musical Background

As a teenager, Blake participated in and won international orchestra competitions in London and New York during high school. He's since been a finalist in the Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann multiple years running (video from Comhaltas.ie), taking home an All-Ireland medal in 2007. He's been featured on Clare FM radio, and was an in-demand Irish session host in Edinburgh when living in Scotland during 2024.

Blake has performed all over California for several decades, and has won fiddle competitions including multiple old-time contests in California and Colarado (playing Irish music), as well as the Mid-West Fleadh where he qualified for the All-Ireland on four separate occasions.

You can listen & find out more about Blake in this recent interview on Humboldt Hot Air (97.4 FM) here.

Some Fun Facts about Blake

• Up until 2020, Blake was working as a sushi chef, but he packed up his knives and decided to play music full-time! You can watch a slice-of-life video he posted from his sushi days at Tomo in Arcata (with music by Blake and Quinn Bachand) on YouTube.

• Blake grew up playing a number of sports, focusing mainly on baseball and tennis. He loved pitching, but numerous arm injuries kept him from playing past college. Fortunately for us, he has more time for tunes!

• Origami is another of Blake's passions since childhood. He started off selling his work at his elementary school's winter craft fair, and has now moved on to crafting his own paper and folding ultra-complex models (which can take 10+ hours to complete). He'll do commissions now and again, and you can view his work on display at the Schlueter Gallery in Old Town, Eureka, CA.

Some Irish Family History

While a DNA test revealed that over half of Blake's ancestors hail from the British Isles (including Northern Ireland and Scotland), many of the details remain a mystery. We would love to learn more someday!

What Blake does know is that his maternal grandmother Georgia worked at an Irish Pub in Chicago, after growing up as a performer in the Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus (the 2nd largest traveling circus in America during its heyday)...

Georgia Lee Free and her sister Constance Free performed feats of strength as the "Strongest Girls in America" during the 1930s, while their father, George Free, performed as a professional trick-roper, as well as an acrobat and a circus clown. To the best of our knowledge, he was of Irish-Blackfoot descent.