About Us

Almost all of our tunes and songs are from the collections of Samuel Preston Bayard, who traveled throughout Southwestern Pennsylvania in the early to mid-20th century, preserving a musical heritage that otherwise might have been lost.

Our intent is to represent some of the music Bayard and his colleagues collected through the generosity of those older Pennsylvania fiddlers, fifers and singers. With your enjoyment (and ours) in mind, we hope to encourage other players in reviving some of this traditional music of our home state.



Mark Tamsula, Richard Withers,
Dave Krysty, Ellen Gozion
Pittsburgh PA

Digital downloads of our albums can be purchased here at
Snappin' Bug Music

Hard copy CDs are available from
Elderly Instruments

© 2019 Snappin' Bug Music
www.snappinbug.com


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Testimonials

  • THE SNOWY HILL “Superb. There are recordings that are all wrapping; this one is all gift. Richard is a great player and a fine singer, too.”
    By : Dave Richardson of The Boys of the Lough, 2019
  • UP JUMPED JOE IN THE MIDDLE OF IT " Great spirit!"
    By : Jim Younger
  • UNCLE ED " A great tune, and this performance really rocks!"
    By : Brian Peters
  • HALL'S OLD REEL / LOSCH'S OLD REEL " Great tunes and superb playing! Nearly got them now, after many 'turns'."
    By : Jim Younger
  • HALL'S OLD REEL / LOSCH'S OLD REEL " Absolutely love this superb playing! Fabulous tunes!"
    By : strings and things
  • CHASE THE SQUIRREL / FIRE IN THE MT " Aeeeee, great music, makes you want to stomp your feet, thanks......."
    By : tomcata1467
  • SOAP FAT MAN " Great video! Great Music.."
    By : Keith Attwood
  • "The Snowy Hill is my new standard for traditional music albums. ... As someone who only recently fell in love with the traditional music of Southwestern Pennsylvania, I'm grateful to know it's in such good hands. Richard and Co. are doing the brave and discerning work of not only preserving a tradition, but tending it so it can grow and flourish.”
    By : Cameron DeWhitt, podcaster, “Get Up in the Cool: Old Time Music with Cameron DeWhitt and Friends” - www.camerondewhitt.com
  • " Mark and Richard have once again drunk deep from the great Southwest Pennsylvania fiddle-tune collection of Sam Bayard. No reproduction or imitation here – pure old time Pennsylvania, freshly brought to life again by Mark and Richard."
    By : Alan Jabbour, folklorist and musician
  • " Anyone who has been around the hill at Clifftop for the last decade has heard the beautiful and rare tunes that Mark has rescued from the hills of Pennsylvania. Now he and Richard bring us a marvelous cd that does for that region what Bruce Greene has done for Kentucky and Gary Harrison for Illinois."
    By : Philip F. Gura, author of*America's Instrument: The Banjo in America*
  • " Mark and Richard draw from the deep well of traditional fiddle and fife music in the longstanding Pennsylvania tradition. The tunes flow forth not as artifacts but as living pieces of contemporary art. They pulse with an immediacy that is infused with respect, moving the listener with their immortality."
    By : Bob Buckingham of Fiddler Magazine
  • "Nice tracks there! Always a treat to hear the old tunes and songs not just preserved, but alive and lively,... present[ed] with a clear regional focus."
    By : Dan Gellert
  • " Samuel Bayard was the most prominent scholar of traditional Pennsylvania music. It is wonderful to know that this tradition still lives through the playing of Mark Tamsula and Richard Withers. Bayard would have been proud!"
    By : Carl Rahkonen, Ph.D., Ethnomusicologist, Indiana, PA.
  • " Dr. Sam Bayard collected the old tunes from the hollers and the hills …. Mark and Dick have brought them off of the flat page and back into our ears and straight to our tapping feet. You can hear the mountains in these tunes."
    By : Dave Krysty, Fiddler and Folklorist, Pittsburgh, PA.
  • " It is extremely doubtful if any other living man could have produced such a piece of research. Bayard's expertise in the field of general folklore, as well as fiddle and fife tunes could hardly be matched."
    By : George Swetnam, Pittsburgh 1983
  • " Mark and Richard have created an appealing aural anthology that revivifies the spirit of early Pennsylvania fiddlers and fifers, bringing Sam Bayard's collections to life in 3-D: dance, discovery, and delight."
    By : Deane Root, Professor of Music; Director, Center for American Music; University of Pittsburgh
  • " Nothing that Sam Bayard has written has ever been refuted."
    By : Kenneth Goldstein, head of the University of Pennsylvania's Folklore and Folklife department