A blues-oriented jam session is usually the last thing you think of when you hear that a violinist is coming to town.

Randy Sabien has broken the stereotype by turning classical and folk music into an astounding performance of jazz.

The violinist has appeared everywhere from smoky clubs to refined concert halls and has appealed to both audiences.

Sabien now lives in a log cabin in Hayward, Wis., where he manages his own record label, “Fiddlehead Music.”

Sabien talks of his unique sound, his influences and his life in the woods.

Your sound has been described by others as jazz with a mix of classical and folk music. How do you describe your sound?

Well, playing the violin, you’re going to have classical influence and, of course, there’s obvious folk influence because of the fiddling and all the ethnic and folk music played on the instrument. So those are sort of given. Maybe some of the more unusual influences then would be like the swing and blues styles that are associated with jazz. If you mixed classical and folk influences on the violin, and rhythm and blues and the advanced type of music you find in jazz, that’s what my sound is.

What kind of music did you play when you started, and how has your sound evolved over the years?

When I first started playing the violin it was classical music with the basic exercises and the basic tunes. When I got old enough I was in a high school orchestra and studied standard classic literature you study on the violin. But, I was always interested in rock ‘n’ roll. So, I was teaching myself to play the guitar and the keyboard along the way and put a garage band together that got together on the weekends.

So, that influence was going on, but not on the violin. My first step out of classical music was to play country fiddle. That started getting me a little closer to what I was doing on the guitar. When I heard jazz violinist Stephane Grappelli, that just totally knocked me out. When I heard him play, that’s what pushed me over the edge into really playing popular style violin music.

How did Grappelli influence your playing?

He was the first jazz violinist I heard. And he still represents, probably in my mind, the highest achievement of jazz violin. It’s like climbing Grappelli mountain in my life-long pursuit, of course I fall way short. But there’s other influences along the way that attracted me as well. There’s some other jazz violinists; one is named Stuff Smith, and he’s probably one of my favorites, a very rough sound.

And there’s lots of other musicians, too. I really see myself as a cross between Stephane Grappelli and Jerry Garcia because I like the swing stuff and that real elegant, sophisticated jazz, but I’m also really influenced by taking things out into the outer limits and doing jam stuff. Garcia was a big influence on me as well. I took both of those worlds and spit back out on my fiddle with my hands.

Fans are always commenting on how amazed they are at your performances. What is going through your mind, and what are you feeling during a show?

I think I tend to have more mundane thoughts like what the next tune’s going to be. Am I going to be able to pay the band? There’s lots of stuff that goes through my mind, and a lot of it has to do with playing and the show. But at the same time I’m very aware of the audience and what kind of energy they’re putting out. The audiences can go from being very polite and sitting still, like in a concert theater applauding politely in between the tunes, to dancing and hootin’ and hollerin’ during the middle of the solos, you know, just going nuts.

And, that affects the mood of the music, and they kind of all feed each other. A lot of what I think about depends on the energy, and it depends on the musicians in the band, too. Everybody comes to the show with a different mood, and I play with different musicians all the time. Those equations change from night to night.

You’ve also written pieces of music for symphony orchestras. Where do you see yourself in the future with your song-writing abilities?

I’d like to keep writing original material and putting out more CDs. In terms of the orchestra, that happened because I wrote a bunch of original material and recorded it on an album with my band and some of it solo. After I got it done, I listened to it and said, you know this stuff is really very symphonic, and that probably was because growing up as a violin player and playing in orchestras that stuff started getting recycled. So, I had somebody arrange some of these pieces for a full orchestra. Most of my original tunes are for the band, and they’re more jam-oriented. So, I just come up with a groove for the drummer and a baseline dependable of a melody and a chord progression, and that’s just a jumping off point for a jam to go wild.

What do you attribute to your quick success in the jazz world?

I think the violin was the main thing because it was a unique instrument and it’s a very versatile instrument so that I could play lots of different kinds of music. I could play with singer/songwriters and play folk music; I could be in a country-rock band; I could be in a blues band; I could be in lots of different kinds of music on the violin. Say if I’d been playing drums or saxophone, I would have maybe not have the same type of doors open for me.

What was the hardest part of jumping from a music teacher to supporting yourself solely as a performer?

The hardest part was making sure I’d have a gig and shows scheduled. If you have a teaching position like I had in Boston, you know that every single day you get up, go to work at such and such a time, and you end. You’re there every day, every week, all year long. But when you become a freelance musician and you have a gig booked on Saturday, and then you don’t have another gig booked for a month. That’s a pretty big eye-opener and a good motivator, too. You have to get something going; you have to survive. That was the biggest shock.

The other side of the coin was that I had all the days to myself. I was in charge of my life. Not having a schedule is a great thing. Then you’re free to compose during the day, or travel or do what you want. It’s pretty scary, but I’ve been doing it for a long time. I don’t know what else I would ever do.

You’ve lived in Massachusetts, Maine and Colorado. What made you settle in a log cabin in Wisconsin?

When I was growing up in Illinois, we’d take our family vacations up here, not far from where I live now. My great-grandparents and my grandparents were up here, and going to the lake for summer vacation was always what we did. That just resonated so much within me. As I traveled around the country and lived in different places, the same kind of things would resonate within me.

When I lived in New England, it was the lakes and the rivers and the forests. When I was in Colorado it was the trout fishing. Fishing has always been a big part of my life. Over the years, I kept gravitating toward the north woods of Wisconsin. I had real strong, positive experiences as a kid that stayed with me all the way through my adult life. When it came time for me to be able to choose where I could live I thought, hey, that’s where I’m going. I can live on a lake, I can go fishing every day and be in the woods with a log cabin.