Canadian fiddler Natalie MacMaster will be on stage at the Performing Arts Center on Dec. 14. Courtesy photo

NASHUA – A fiddler since the age of 9, Natalie MacMaster will showcase her passion at the Performing Arts Center on Dec. 14.

Growing up on Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia, playing the fiddle was part of everyday life.

However, almost no one made a living playing the fiddle. There were only a few rare exceptions including MacMaster’s late uncle, the famed Hugh Alan “Buddy” MacMaster.

“All the people who I knew who played the fiddle had regular jobs,” she said. “I didn’t know you could just play music for a living.”

In 1989, MacMaster decided to take a chance and pursue fiddling. She released her first album, Four on the Floor, when she was 16.

“That introduced me to the wonderful world of music and selling it,” said MacMaster, adding that she would sell cassettes out of the back of her car.

Her second album, Road to the Isle, followed in 1991.

During the 1990s, MacMaster felt herself being tugged toward having a traditional day job. She went to school to be a teacher and graduated in 1997.

Yet, her love for fiddling was too deep to do anything else. MacMaster went on to release In My Hands in 1999 and My Roots Are Showing, which was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2000.

She has since won two Juno Awards, numerous Artist of the Year Awards from the East Coast Music Association and been named Fiddler of the Year by the Canadian Country Music Association. In 2023, she was inducted into the Canadian Fiddle Hall of Honour.

In addition to her uncle, MacMaster said she has also admired the work of Willie Kennedy and Arthur Muise.

Looking back on her career, she said the “rhythm and feel” of fiddle music has changed over the years.

“It has a little different nuance now,” she said. “It has its own life, it transposes a person’s being.”