The best way I have found so far to find great fiddle music starts with a visit to www.irishfiddle.com. The Irish have a great tradition of fiddle music, and this site gives you a list of 100 suggested musicians complete with mp3 samples selected by the site’s author. You can’t download the mp3s but you can listen and find a lot of great music. Unless you are a connoisseur, there should be plenty here for your listening pleasure. It also has some links to programs that can inform you on where the hot fiddlin’ comes from today, along with programs that give a historical perspective as well. One of the best programs I listened to features a fiddler/composer out of Chicago by the name of Liz Carroll. Her work is brilliant and features the excellent guitar player John Doyle.
You can also go to YouTube and find an endless array of videos of fiddlers (good, bad and indifferent) to check out. I find that having my list of great players gleaned from www.irishfiddle.com helps to separate the wheat from the chaff. If you find a video that you really like, there is software that can convert video files to audio so you can play it on your IPod.