Jacob... "If you love it, it will come..." Thanks for saying that!

I'm working on my stepdancing-while-fiddling abilities now, so I'll offer my suggestions. I haven't arrived yet, so I can't guarantee their effectiveness, but I have definitely made some progress in the last couple of weeks that I have been seriously working at this.

1. When practicing this, arrange for some privacy, both auditory and visual. You need the psychological freedom to make a complete fool of yourself for a while.

2. There are two main difficulties to overcome: the mental coordination of simultaneously doing dance steps and playing and instrument, and the physical problem of playing a moving instrument.

So I suggest that you separate these skills in the beginning:

Learn to play a moving instrument by playing while simply jogging in place, or bouncing up and down, or prancing randomly around the room instead of trying to do choreographed steps.

You can work on your coordination without the moving instrument problem by sitting down to play and doing some simple footwork - experiment to find a chair height that works well for this.

3. Make it as easy as possible for yourself when learning! Pick tunes that are easy to you, and play them slowly. Get used to reels before moving on to jigs, or vice versa if you prefer. Before doing "the real thing" steps that dancers would use without instruments, choreograph some very simple steps for yourself. At first do the same step all through the tune, then try changing from one simple pattern to another every eight bars.

4. When waiting for a bus or a bathroom, practice the simple steps you've choreographed for yourself while humming one of the tunes you're practicing on, just to cement in your head how the steps correspond to the tune.

5. Wear shoes that are fairly loud. Besides making the practice more fun, it's helpful to be able to hear your feet's rhythm clearly through the tune.

I hope this is helpful - good luck to you and to me.

Marion