About Me
Jackie Ambrow has played traditional Irish dance music on fiddle for over 25 years. She grew up in St. Louis and began learning classical violin at the age of seven. In Kansas City while a medical student at UMKC, she had the privilege of studying under Tiberius Klausner and Charles Stegeman at the UMKC Conservatory of Music. In the early 1980’s a friend in Kansas City put on an LP for her recorded by master Sligo fiddler Kevin Burke. At that point she went rogue (with her Conservatory mentors’ blessings) and immersed herself in Irish music. She played in Irish music sessions wherever she could in Kansas City Columbia and St. Louis. She filled in on fiddle with the band Scartaglen in Kansas City in the 1980’s mostly for their weekly gig at Jimmy’s Jigger at Stateline and 39th Street and on the streets in KC. Fortuitously she spent some time back in St. Louis at McGurk’s where she met the likes of Irish fiddling legends Andy McGann James Kelly and Kevin Burke. Fellow St. Louisan and Irish fiddler Niall Gannon told her about the Missouri Traditional Artists Apprenticeship Program (TAAP) and how he had apprenticed to James Kelly through the program. Niall encouraged her to ask Kevin Burke if he would be willing and as a TAAP apprentice she became one of his first formal students. In the 1990’s Jackie got together with Tom Schultz (vocals guitar bodhran mandolin) and Sarah Fitzgerald an Irishwoman from County Tipperary (piano accordian and whistle) to form the band Mulligan’s Stew. As Mulligan’s Stew Tom Sarah and Jackie played regular gigs at Shattered in Columbia and various festivals and other venues until Sarah and Tom both moved away. More recently Jackie provided atmosphere with Irish fiddle music for Central Methodist University’s production of “”The Cripple of Inishmaan”” on March 5 2010 and served as the guest musician for the 2010 St. Patrick’s Day show for KOPN’s Farm and Fiddle. You can listen to the archive of that show at KOPN.org. Currently Jackie plays down at Paddy Malone’s Pub (paddymalonespub.com) in Jefferson City on most first Saturday nights (always check with them to be sure of the date: 573-761-5900). Allen Tatman owner of the pub has invited her to record on the Pub’s 10th anniversary CD with other Pub regulars sometime later this year. Jackie has lived in Columbia Missouri for the last 20 years. In her spare time she is a certified Unity Prayer Chaplain (and Prayer Chaplain Trainer) through Love & Light Ministries serving at Unity Center of Columbia Missouri and a positive practitioner of Clinical Hypnotherapy Applied Anthropology and Spanish/English Interpreting and Translation. She enjoys the music ministry at Unity as she plays in the Instrumental Ensemble (violin) and Unity Band (mandolin) and sings alto and second soprano in the Choir.”