Sun June 11 -- Sat June 17, 2006
Staff Biographies

Séamus Connolly (Irish fiddle) is one of the world's most respected master Irish musicians. A native of Killaloe, County Clare, Ireland, he now resides in Groton, Massachusetts. Séamus won the Irish National Fiddle Championship 10 times, a feat unequalled by any other musician. He was also the winner of the internationally acclaimed "Fiddler of Dooney" Competition. Séamus has performed at most major festivals in the United States and has appeared frequently on radio and television. Séamus has numerous recordings to his credit; His two solo CDs, Notes from my Mind and Here and There were released on Green Linnet Records, as were Banks of the Shannon and Warming Up. Séamus is Director of The Boston College Irish Studies Music, Song and Dance Program. He is an Adjunct Professor in the Music Department and is Director of the Gaelic Roots Summer School and Festival.

Melissa Emmons (Cape Breton piano accompaniment) left her home and dance community in southern Vermont 11 years ago to immerse herself in Cape Breton music and dance traditions.She currently teaches Cape Breton fiddle and piano accompaniment 30 hours a week in Inverness County, on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia. An instructor in piano for the past three summers as St. Ann.s Gaelic College, she has done several concert/dance/workshops with Brenda Stubbert in Maine and P.E.I., and a New England tour with Jerry Holland. She has preformed on fiddle and piano at venues throughout the island, and is the house pianist at Cape Breton's weekly session in North Sydney. She is currently working with Brenda Stubbert, on the chording for her 2nd Collection, a project of Cranford Publications.

Sarah Hotchkiss (Novice Fiddle Program) A native Vermonter, Sarah is a licensed music teacher and splits her time teaching strings of all ages at the Northfield Public Schools and at her private studio, Woodbury Strings, in Montpelier, Vermont. She is the conductor of The Vermont Fiddle Orchestra and also plays fiddle and banjo with the Damn Yankee String Band. She has also taught at numerous fiddle camps, workshops, and weekly fiddle groups in Northern Vermont and New Hampshire. Because of her varied musical and teaching background, along with exposure to a wide range of fiddle styles, she has developed a special expertise in teaching fiddle technique to beginning and intermediate level fiddlers of all ages and backgrounds.
Web site: woodburystrings.home.att.net

Alan Jabbour (Appalachian fiddle) Alan Jabbour is a Floridian by birth and a violinist by early training. The folk revival drew him into studying folklore and folk music as a graduate student at Duke University in the 1960s, when he documented and apprenticed with oldtime fiddlers in the Upper South. His albums fiddling with the Hollow Rock String Band became benchmarks of the oldtime music revival from the 1960s on, and the documentary albums and Library of Congress websites he has edited have likewise become benchmarks. Recently, he retired from the Federal government and is devoting more time to oldtime music again. Alan and NHMC co-Director Ken Perlman have recently released a joint CD of fiddle and banjo duets entitled Southern Summits.

David Kaynor (caller and New England style fiddle) David Kaynor began playing fiddle in 1974, and started calling local contra dances in Western Massacussetts around 1980. Over the last two decades, he has become increasingly involved as both fiddler and caller in the New England and national contra dance scenes. He has been on staff at Northern Week at Ashokan 22 times, and at Contra Dance Musicians' Week at the John C. Campbell Folk School 8 times. He has also played for and taught dancing at Pinewoods, Buffalo Gap, Mendocino, the Lady of the Lake, Ogontz, Summer Acoustic Music Week, Suttle Lake, Wannadance Uptown and a myriad of other camps, workshops and music events around the country. He is also involved in playing and teaching Sweedish fiddle-music and folk-dancing.

Peter Langston (standard-tuned guitar) Peter seems to play anything with strings on it, and is equally adept at backup and hot improvisation. He has played in bands on both the East Coast (Metropolitan Opry, Wretched Refuse String Band) and the West Coast (Puddle City, Entropy Service, Portland Zoo), and has performed with such notables as Doc Watson, Reverend Gary Davis, Tony Trischka, Peter Rowan, Alison Brown, and Mike Seeger. Peter has led a double life as a musician and a computer whiz and has taught both audio recording and computer science at the college level. He has been a frequent member of the staff of various music and dance camps, including the California Coast Music Camp, Sierra Swing, the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, Alta Sierra, Sierra Swing, the American Banjo Camp, and the Puget Sound Guitar Workshop (he helps run the latter two camps).
Web site: www.langston.com

Grey Larsen (whistle, flute and piano accompaniment) Multi-instrumentalist Grey Larsen has been playing and studying traditional Irish and old-time music for over 30 years. The author of the definitive Essential Guide to Irish Flute and Tin Whistle, he is acclaimed worldwide as one of the foremost players and teachers of Irish flute and tin whistle. Also since the 1970s, he has steeped himself in the fiddle music of Appalachia and his native Midwest, especially the southern Indiana repertoire of Joe Dawson and Lotus Dickey. Grey is a gifted and compassionate teacher. In addition to Irish flute, tin whistle, and old-time fiddle, he teaches piano accompaniment in the contra-dance tradition. Grey has made a dozen highly acclaimed recordings with Andre Marchand, Paddy League, Malcolm Dalglish, Metamora and others. He is also a record producer, mastering engineer, and since 1989 has been the music editor of Sing Out! magazine.

Daniel Lemieux (Quebecois fiddle) was born in Mont-Louis in the Gaspe region of Quebec, the eldest of five musical children. He vividly remembers evenings at home when his grandfather and uncles played the fiddle. His first musical interests were playing guitar and singing in the village church choir; he took up the fiddle at 16. When Daniel was about 17, he and his brother began playing professionally -- at first in the Gaspe region, and later in and around Quebec City when his family moved there at the beginning of the 1980s. Around that time he began concentrating on fiddling, studying with such masters as Andre Alain from St-Basile de Portneuf, and Lisa Ornstein from the United States, and helped along by the Laporte brothers from Joliette. He has toured throughout Canada and the United States, and he has also toured in Europe with groups such Manigance and Le Reve du Diable (Devil's Dream). He has been on staff at Ashokan Music Camp and the Gaelic Roots Festival in Boston.

Sandy MacIntyre (Cape Breton fiddle) is one of today's most prominent players and teachers of Cape Breton fiddling; he has also composed well over a hundred tunes, many of which have become classics of the style. He grew up in Inverness, Cape Breton; his mother Cassie was a well-known fiddler in her own right, while his father Ronald was a well-known singer of Gaelic songs. Nowadays, Sandy performs and conducts workshops throughout the US, Canada, and abroad. He is a frequent staff member at the American Festival of Fiddle Tunes (Port Townsend, Washington), and at the Rocky Mountain Fiddle Camp (Estes Park, Colorado). For the past fifteen years he has been director of the fiddle program at the Gaelic College in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, and he has performed for the last several years at Cape Breton's famed Celtic Colours Festival. His most recent CD is "Steeped in Tradition."
Web site: www.sandymacintyre.com

Normand Miron (Quebecois accordion) was born into a family where music was a part of all gatherings, and became interested in traditional Quebecois vocal and instrumental music at an early age. For the last 25 years, he has toured with numerous bands across the United States, Europe, Scandinavia and Canada. He was a former member of Guignolée, Marchand-Ornstein-Miron and Les Frères Labri. He currently plays with the well-known band, Les Charbonniers de l'Enfer (Firemen of Hell). Normand appears as backup musician on the CDs of several noted Canadian artists and groups, including Gilles Vigneault, Loco Locass, Angèle Arsenault, Le Rêve du Diable, Gwazigan, not to mention Alain Chatry (France) and Linda Breitag (USA).

Ken Perlman (clawhammer style banjo) Perhaps the best-known exponent of the "melodic" clawhammer style, Ken is known where-ever banjos are played as a master of clawhammer technique and an expert teacher of clawhammer mechanics. He has been a Banjo Newsletter columnist for 20 years; he has written several books on clawhammer instruction including the well known works Melodic Clawhammer Banjo and Clawhammer Style Banjo, he has recorded several series of audio and video banjo instruction. He spent over a decade collecting tunes and oral histories from traditional fiddle players on Prince Edward Island in eastern Canada, and his book, The Fiddle Music of Prince Edward Island is considered a classic in its field. His most recent recordings are Northern Banjo, Island Boy, and a collaboration with fiddlear Alan Jabbour entitled Southern Summits.
Web site: www.kenperlman.com/

Pete Sutherland (New England Style Fiddle) Vermont's own Pete Sutherland is a master of fiddling styles from both the Southern and Northern US. A touring musician and composer since the mid-70s, Pete has played at concerts, dances, and major festivals across North America and Europe, both as a soloist and as a member of such well-known ensembles as Metamora, the Woodshed All-stars, the Clayfoot Strutters, and the Arm and Hammer String Band. He has composed dozens of vocal and instrumental pieces, and over one hundred different artists have performed or recorded his works. A noted record producer in the folk field, he has overseen the development of over seventy CDs and other recording projects. Pete has been on staff at numerous music teaching festivals, notably the Augusta Heritage Workshops, Ashokan Fiddle and Dance Camps and Pinewoods Folk Music Camps. There are two CDs of his own playing in print at the moment - "A Clayfoot's Tale" and "Streak o' Lean" - both available on his own Epact label.