ABOUT

Blakeley Burger is a musician dedicated to the skill of her instrument. Since 2024, she has toured nationally and internationally as the fiddle-player for acclaimed singer-songwriter, Kelsey Waldon of Oh Boy Records (John Prine). She has recorded for and/or performed alongside numerous successful artists and bands, including Kelsey Waldon, The Local Honeys, Carla Gover, Don Rogers, Brit Taylor, Cait Justice, Nina Nastasia, Josephine Foster, Jayce Turley, Shouse and Hancock, Kentucky Wild Horse, The Song Sparrows, and YAPA!, among others. Having grown up fiddling, she received a Bachelor’s of Music (violin performance) from the University of Louisville in 2020 where her musical competence was further diversified through studies of both Classical music and jazz. In 2023, she was a Media Fellowship Recipient at Berea College’s Special Collections and Archives, where she studied both field and commercial recordings of several older generation fiddle-players. She has taught private music lessons and group classes both independently and through organizations such as Nelsonville Old-Time Week, the Cowan Creek Mountain Music School, the Louisville Folk School, Lexington Old-Time Music Gathering, and Yes Arts.  She served as a folk arts apprentice to Kentucky fiddle music scholars, Jesse Wells and John Harrod, (2021-2022; 2024-2025) through the Kentucky Arts Council’s Folk Arts Apprenticeship, and Cowan Creek Mountain Music School’s Charlie Whitaker Memorial Scholarship, incorporating traditional tunes as played by Kentucky fiddlers, and the stories and lives of those players, into her teaching. She has since served as a mentor artist herself through these programs, passing along the stories and tunes of these Kentucky folk musicians to both audience and student alike.