Camps and workshops
Two Spring 2010 Weekend Workshops in the UK
A Berkshire, UK Easter Weekend with Northern Harmony
April 2-5 , 2010 (3 nights)
St. Cassian's Centre, Kintbury, Hungerford, UK
Tuition: £245 per person in 2-bed shared rooms or £285 for a single room. Concessions price £205. Commuters, £170.
Led by Village Harmony co-directors Larry Gordon and Patty Cuyler. An extended Easter weekend--starting with Friday supper and finishing in the mid-afternoon on Monday--of song & dance! Coming at the end of Northern Harmony's month-long spring tour of the UK, Patty and Larry will be joined by several of the group's instrumentalists and singers to provide you with a rollicking weekend of song and dance. We’ll sing both as a big group and in smaller classes from the wide range of world music traditions for which Village Harmony is famed—songs from the American shape-note and gospel traditions, South African songs and dances, traditional and arranged music from Bulgaria and Bosnia, traditional songs from Corsica and Georgia, and more. Each evening our final singing session will be followed by instructional folk dancing to live music, and our mornings will begin with South African dance songs. Price includes all meals from Friday evening through mid-day Easter Monday, and a copy of Northern Harmony’s tour workshop book & accompanying CD. Comfortable accommodations in single or 2-person rooms.
St. Cassian's is a residential retreat centre owned by the La Salle Brothers, an old manor-house dating from the early 17th century set in beautiful countryside in the Kennet Valley between Hungerford and Newbury in Berkshire. Simple, comfortable accommodation and spacious facilities and grounds. For pictures and more, see their website: www.kintbury.org
A Rustic Singing Weekend in Wales
April 30-May 2, 2010 (2 nights)
Cae Mabon, Llanberis, northwest Wales, UK
Tuition: £150 per person in shared cabins. Concessions price £120. Commuters, £110.
Led by Patty Cuyler and Larry Gordon. A magical weekend of song and dance in the amazing setting of Cae Mabon, a low-impact, sustainable retreat centre set in a clearing in an oak forest by a rushing stream at the foot of Mt. Snowden, 25 minutes from Bangor. Larry and Patty will team-teach a marvelous selection of American folk & gospel, Corsican, Georgian, and South African songs as we enjoy the wonder of spring in all its natural glory among the Welsh hills. Accommodations are in the centre’s six unique cabins (think ‘hobbit’ houses). Tuition includes all meals from Friday supper through lunch on Sunday. Limited space, apply early.
The Cae Mabon Retreat Centre in northwestern Wales has been evolving since 1989. It is set in natural woodland by a rushing river, near a deep lake, at the foot of high mountains and almost within sight of the sea, with an amazing family of beautiful, natural, earthy structures. www.caemabon.co.uk
Faculty
Village Harmony founder and director LARRY GORDON has been making community music in Vermont since the early 1970s. He founded Village Harmony in 1988. Though his first love was medieval and renaissance music, he is a vital figure in New England shape-note singing. Larry is an inspired organizer with an unerring eye for good repertoire and a unique knack of pulling together interesting combinations of singers and letting them shine. His patient and relaxed, yet demanding, teaching style and collaborative approach have shaped the welcoming atmosphere of the Village Harmony community since the beginning. Larry has led Onion River Chorus in Montpelier since the late 1970s, and is well known across the US and internationally for leading stunning periodic adhoc incarnations of Northern Harmony, a semi-professional tour group made up largely of veteran Village Harmony singers.
Co-director PATTY CUYLER of Marshfield, Vermont, is an energetic, dynamic workshop leader and director with special expertise in teaching Corsican, Georgian and South African singing and dance music. Her passion for honest, direct music coaxes fierce, forthright singing out of even the most timid singers. An instrumentalist from an early age, Patty is a brass player and self-taught accordion player. Since 1995 she has co-directed Village Harmony and Northern Harmony with Larry; in 2002 she founded a women’s Corsican trio and began the Montpelier World Music Chorus and Boston Harmony in 2004. Patty has edited and published two volumes of The Folk Rhythm South African songbook series, as well as three books of Georgian folk and sacred songs. She has also compiled a large collection of her own arrangements of old gospel-quartet music.