LAKEWOOD, Colo. — At first glance, Jesse Quintana looks like any other Bear Creek High School senior juggling school and soccer. But off the field, he’s striking a different kind of chord as one of the top young fiddle players in the country.
“I was two years old when I got my first fiddle,” Quintana told Denver7 Sports. “My mom and dad just got me a small fiddle for Christmas, and I was into it right away. I would play that thing for eight hours a day, just nonstop.”
His love for music started even earlier, thanks to family traditions and Colorado’s bluegrass culture.
“My grandma played the violin, which is more classical-based, but at the White Fence Farm, there was a lot of bluegrass jams that I would go to,” he said. “My parents would bring me there, even when I was in the womb. My mom said whenever we’d go to a jam, I’d just be kicking a bunch.”
When he was just 4 years old, Quintana stepped on stage with his fiddle for the first time at the National Western Stock Show, where he still returns to compete every January.
“Oh, it’s so fun. It brings in people from all over the United States, and we get to fiddle together,” he said. “I fell in love with it; it’s an adrenaline rush for sure.”
Since then, Quintana has competed and won at both state and national levels. On the soccer field, he brings the same passion and discipline, but his coach, Brent Carpenter, said his humility stands out most.
“Jesse is such a humble kid,” Carsaid. “You would really never know what champion he is — I mean, he’s a good soccer player, but you would have never known that he had this other skill that so few humans possess. I mean, he’s top 1% of all fiddle players.”
After high school, Quintana plans to study engineering, but he doesn’t plan to leave the fiddle behind.
“I definitely want to keep it up on the side and keep going to competitions and start teaching if I get a chance,” he said.
Balancing two passions that couldn’t be more different, Quintana proves that young athletes don’t have to choose just one path.
