Mark O’Connor emerged in the 1970s as a prodigy fiddler who won just about every contest he entered from age 12 on. That grounding in traditional music opened up into the most expansive and outlandishly accomplished career in the history of the violin, with major accomplishments and acclaim in bluegrass, country session playing, jazz, rock and classical music. The foundations of the story are now laid out in rich detail in the first volume of O’Connor’s memoir. He covers some of the highlights in a talk with Craig Havighurst.