Village Harmony Week in Québec

June 21-28, 2026
(7 days)

  • Leaders: Nicholas Williams, Mary Cay Brass & Lonnie Norwood

  • Rehearsal locations:
    Église Ste Élisabeth-de-Hongrie/La Caravane, North Hatley, Quebec, Canada

  • Price:
    - $700 commuter tuition
    - $550 reduced rate offered to local singers who can offer beds to non-local singers

    This is a non-residential program.

    Homestays with local singers are an option for non-local participants. There are also many B+Bs and local inns for those who prefer this option. 

    Lunches and suppers will be provided.

    Enrollment is limited to 40 singers.

Apply online NOW

 

Village Harmony is pleased to offer a non-residential adult singing week in the Eastern Townships of Quebec, in the picturesque village of North Hatley.  This camp aims to connect singers from the vibrant local singing community with visitors from the broader Village Harmony network. 

We will kick the week off with a soirée of music and dancing with the internationally renowned québécois folk trio Genticorum on Sunday June 21st, and will culminate with a concert in Église Ste-Élisabeth on Saturday June 27th. 

The week will feature as leaders: Nicholas Williams, who will teach traditional songs from Québec, as well as English and Occitan harmony singing;  Mary Cay Brass, who will offer a potpourri of songs from Bosnia, Croatia and Macedonia as well as from the traditional New England shape note tradition;  and Lonnie Norwood, who will bring his knowledge of African American, Caribbean, and continental African folk music.

Our daytime workshops (and lunches) will take place in the beautiful Église Ste Élisabeth-de-Hongrie. Afternoon rehearsals will end around 4pm, to leave ample time to explore North Hatley’s charms, take a dip in Lac Massawippi, and explore the nearby walking and biking trails. 

Supper and evening activities with be held at La Caravane Arts Café, just down the road from the church.

Founded in 1897, the village of North Hatley is known as one of the most beautiful small towns of Quebec. A village of 675 people located at the north end of Lake Massawippi, it is part of the Memphrémagog Regional County Municipality in the Eastern Townships region of Quebec, Canada, also known as Estrie or Cantons de l'Est in French.

Apply online now

The leaders

  • Nicholas Williams

    Nicholas Williams has developed a reputation as a versatile and sought-after musician in the traditional music scenes of Québec and New England.  He is a member of the groups Genticorum (with Pascal Gemme and Yann Falquet), Traverse (with Laura Risk and Rachel Aucoin), and the Kehler - Williams duo (with Alex Kehler). 

    A graduate of York University’s Fine Arts program, where he studied world music, composition, and improvisation, Nicholas has been deeply immersed in the traditional music of Québec, Ireland, Scotland, and Sweden for the last 20 years, especially interested in the intersection of song, music, and dance. 

    More recently, he has turned his attention to his love of harmony singing, developing a reputation as a dynamic teacher, who easily taps into music’s power to connect and uplift.  Les Voix du Village, his thriving local singing community in the Eastern Townships of Quebec, now counts upwards of 200 weekly singers. 

  • Mary Cay Brass

    Mary Cay Brass of Athens, Vermont is a long time veteran of the earliest years of Village Harmony camps. She directed the 80 -voice Greenfield Harmony for 25 years and continues to direct the wildly popular 70-voice River Singers in southern Vermont. She is also co-director of the Hallowell Hospice Singers. Mary Cay is also a dynamic contra-dance keyboardist and accordion player who focuses on Scandinavian, French Canadian and Balkan traditions. 

    She spent two and a half years in the former Yugoslavia on a Fulbright Scholarship in ethnomusicology researching regional vocal traditions in Croatia and Serbia. She has published two book/CD collections of music from that region, Village Harmony, Songs of the Balkans and Balkan Bridges.

    Mary Cay has also organized and led six Village Harmony trips in the Republic of North Macedonia, four in Bosnia and Hercegovina and co-led camps in Quebec and Lithuania.

  • Lonnie Norwood

    Chicago native Lonnie Norwood, Jr. is an in-demand Africana vocal music clinician with emphasis in Black American sacred traditions. Lonnie collaborates frequently with continental African and diasporic tradition bearers. Through his teaching philosophy of music, movement, and memory, Lonnie invites communal experiences through the traditions of African American, Caribbean, and Continental African folk music.

    Lonnie is Director of Africana Studies and a conductor at Uniting Voices Chicago. He recently joined the Leo Catholic High School Lion family as the new choir director.

    During the COVID-19 pandemic, Lonnie shared gospel music through his online ChicaGO REACH Gospel Workshop, with singers from the U.S., Africa, and Canada. Lonnie's EP entitled Rooted, a spiritual and emotional journey of Trans-Atlantic African ancestry, was released in 2021. He was lauded by Chicago Reader as Best Music Teacher in 2023.

“As I watched… I was struck even more than ever before by the extent of the impact Village Harmony has had on so many people all over the world. The influence your work has on helping people of all kinds meet, learn about one another, resolve their differences and become one through the joy of singing cannot be overstated. The ripple effect on all involved—participants and audiences alike—is profound, and gives us great hope for the possibilities of worldwide peace. Meeting person to person and singing together works in a way nothing else does.”