Fiddle Community in Toronto's West End

Come get in the groove!

World on a String is a fiddle community in Toronto, with group classes for adult fiddlers, monthly kitchen party jams, and hosting special guest workshops and  house concerts. We focus on traditional and modern folk tunes from around the world. Collaboration & jamming encouraged!

Named "World on a String" for our love of celebrating tunes and traditions from around the world, Lea Kirstein founded these Intermediate and Novice group classes in 2017 in midtown Toronto, offering stepping stones to participating socially in joyful folk music making in the community, while developing skill-based sequential technical development on the violin / viola / cello, offering "jam survival skills", repertoire development in multiple traditions, and help dismantling our fear-based music making we learned in our childhoods, or ways we can overcome the fear of staring at the "blank canvas" and give ourselves compassion and grace to start new projects!

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“Since joining group, I have gotten more confident with my instrument, and performing. I have gotten an experience to learn by ear with an amazing and energetic group of fellow musicians. Every class is so fun and I cannot get the tunes out of my head. I love every minute of it.”

— Maddy M., student since 2017

Lea Kirstein

Founder - fiddle // viola // cello

Collaborations with other musicians have led her on tours across Canada and the US with: Medusa (global chamber folk quartet), Iskwē (Juno winning electro-folk artist), Citizen Jane (folk pop duo), Roaring Timber, the Folk Arts Quartet, and Balfolk Toronto (social folk music and dance.) She has recorded with JUNO nominees, and currently freelances in the Toronto music scene with trad folk, modern folk, new classical, jazz, pop, and singer-songwriters.


Lea is the current Artistic Director of World on a String in Toronto, a collective presenting concerts, jams, and group classes for fiddlers of all ages, focusing on traditional folk tunes from around the world.

She is in demand as a guest workshop clinician and educator, having been invited to perform and teach at the following fiddle camps, strings programs, and music schools: the Valley Youth Fiddlers (Smithers), Former Artistic Director of Bad to the Bow Youth Fiddle Groups (BC), AlgomaTrad (Ontario), Fiddleheads (Quebec), Cariboo Chilcotin Youth Fiddlers (Williams Lake), Fiddleworks (Saltspring), AVIVA Young Artists Program, World Fiddle Day Toronto, and  Vancouver CeltFest.

Áine Schryer-O'Gorman

fiddle

Áine Schryer-O’Gorman has been playing fiddle for 16 years, learning music while touring and playing for dances with their family; being surrounded by the magic of their parents’ (Julie Schryer and Pat O’Gorman) music camp AlgomaTrad; and being influenced by many exceptional and generous musicians including their brother Benoît, uncles Raymond, Louis, Pierre, and Dan, and the Brian Pickell Band. They grew up competing at Ontario fiddle contests, winning the 18 & under category at the Pembroke Fiddle Contest in 2019. In the past few years they have been focussed on developing their Irish style of playing, with mentorship from Patrick Ourceau. They now reside in Toronto where they balance passing on the traditions of Canadian fiddling as a teacher with World on a String, and bringing their passion for music into their career in community arts (Jumblies Theatre, Gather Round Singers, Arts for All).

“Lea Kirstein is a master teacher, fiddler, violist, cellist and all round simply brilliant educator who uses the best of Orff, Kodaly, Suzuki, and rhythmic folk-musics from these parts and around the world to teach and lead ecstatic musical learning.”

— Arno L., student since 2018