Learn to fiddle

“Donna is an outstanding performer and world class teacher. I consider her at the forefront of the developing field of fiddle pedagogy.” Dr. Alan Jabbour, Dir. (ret)., American Folklife Center, Library of Congress.

 

Contact me at the numbers in the right column about private lessons, group classes or a workshop for your studio, school, string or fiddle group.

Philadelphia lessons, workshop Feb 16-18 - Donna teaches at Jane Rothfield’s home in Havertown PA

Private lessons/weekly classes Sept-June at Donna Hébert’s Amherst MA studio

Apprenticeships in Franco-American Fiddling - eight since 2001

Fiddling Demystified teaching method

Workshops and residencies

Festivals - Youth performance coaching yearly at Old Songs, Philadelphia Folk, Champlain Valley Folk festivals. 2009 festivals on YouTube

Summer Camps at Old Songs – Albany NY in July/Aug. 2008 Kids week on YouTube. 

Calendar of other residencies and performances 

FREE TUNES & FIDDLE LESSONS:

• Fiddling Demystified sample pages  
• Louis Beaudoin tunes and lesson 
• Transposing fiddle music for viola and cello

 

 

Who are my students?

I teach private students and groups in Amherst MA. Amherst College students can receive college credit for lessons as I’m adjunct there, while other 5-College students study with me privately by the semester. From mid-September to mid-June, I also teach a weekly class for Adult Novice Fiddlers, currently on Tuesdays. We break from Dec. 23-Jan 6 and return Jan. 13. Most students are adult learners and many are returning to the violin after not playing for a number of years. We use postural awareness to build healthy playing skills to avoid injury. Students learn tension-free and efficient techniques to keep focused and “in the groove” when playing.  School and college workshops solo and with Max Cohen, Renata Bratt and Groovemama teach string players how to groove, improvise and find harmonies and chords. Renata and Max also co-teach Fiddling Demystified for Strings Week III again next summer at Old Songs. I’m presenting at the Atlanta ASTA conference in March 2009 and we’re planning a West-Coast tour with Max and Renata around the National ASTA conference in March 2010. 

 

 

 

Fiddling Apprenticeships

I’ve worked with Franco-American fiddling apprentices from Connecticut, Rhode island, New Hampshire and Vermont. Even after the funding period is over, I bring them onstage whenever I can. In the Beaudoin Legacy I now play with four current and former apprentices – Daniel Boucher, Nate Ouellette, and Beaudoin grandson Glenn Bombardier along with Pam Gonyer, the group’s bass player and a fiddler as well.  The NEA-funded Master-Apprenticeship program in the Folk Arts is usually administered by state arts councils, funding from six months to a year’s worth of lessons.  Master and apprentice apply together in the state where one or both live. Then we cross our fingers! It’s a great privilege and a wonderful chance to help foster a larger community of Franco-American fiddlers!  Most grandchildren of immigrants have lost our language and a lot of our heritage. Music is one shortcut back to our cultures, heritages, roots and legacies. Reclaiming these lost treasures gives a much deeper meaning to our lives today, placing us on the cultural map and giving us a broader understanding of our place in the world. Our tax dollars work to keep communities and traditions alive, enriching us all with our shared diversity.  Maybe it’s time for you to find a local master fiddler, singer, drummer, dancer or other artist to learn from and see about applying together through this program. Your state arts council will have a list of previous master grantees if you don’t know where to start. Reapply if you don’t get funded the first time. They are only able to fund a limited number each year, so don’t give up!  

 

The daughter of a banjo-playing French-Canadian cowgirl who put together her own band in the 1930s, I served my fiddle apprentice-ship as a dance musician in the early 1970s in Dudley Laufman’s Canterbury Country Dance Orchestra. I learned French-Canadian fiddling from New Brunswick native Gerry Robichaud and from Vermont’s Louis Beaudoin in the 1970s. With Tony Parkes, I produced Gerry’s 1977 ”Maritime Dance Party,” recording for Philo/Fretless. Performing in French and English since 1993 with Josée Vachon in Chanterelle, in 2006 I reconnected with the Beaudoin family and we now perform as The Beaudoin Legacy, have recorded a live CD and are listed on the NEA’s American Masterpiece Roster through the Vermont Arts Council. There are often ten or more of us onstage, with Louis’ daughters, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. I teach Louis’ fiddle music and style to his grandson, Glenn Bombardier. Now Glenn in turn is teaching his niece, the newest fiddler in the clan, who can hardly wait to climb on stage with us! We know the ancestors are smiling, and so the circle is unbroken. 

What is my Fiddling Demystified method?

We train the ear in everything we do. (See How to Learn a Tune By Ear in my fiddleblog.) If a student reads music with any dexterity, they learn to transcribe from recorded sources, refining their transcriptions with multiple listenings, keeping track of the layers in a tune. If they don’t read music (and it’s not required), they use the recorded lesson and other sources, basically the same process but without the note-writing. All students learn theory embedded in the tune – chords, substitutions, harmony and bass lines. Using a digital voice recorder with a USB connection (around $70-$100) to record lessons and classes, students can build a digital library for use with computer slow-down software, which allow the user to slow the tune down and play along, while retaining the original pitch. These tools work together as a fabulous learning aid for all players, one that I recommend highly!

 

The string world is expanding its boundaries, with classical, folk fiddle and jazz often combining in exciting and interesting new music. Folks that never played together before are now learning fiddling, jazz and improvisation as a new musical language. As a folk and contradance fiddler who crossed over from classical music in the 1970s, I’ve geared my “Fiddling Demystified for String Players” series of instructional books, CDs, DVDs and workshops toward string players in search of fiddling and particularly toward string teachers. My last three publications are also available in violin, viola and cello editions. In 2008, the Massachusetts Cultural Council certified me as a Creative Teaching Partner for public schools in the state. This allows me to collaborate with string teachers to bring fiddling into the classroom. I’m committed to helping integrate fiddling into string instruction. In addition to teaching with fiddlers Jane Rothfield and George Wilson in Groovemama at Old Songs and Philly Folk Fests every year,  I am now teaching Fiddling Demystified Workshops with California jazz/folk cellist Renata Bratt, who edited the cello settings in Fiddling Demystified. Renata and I met and performed together in July 2006 at Mark O’Connor’s San Diego Strings Conference and are teaching workshops for ASTA chapters and college string programs in the U.S. and Canada. Renata returns to the staff July 27-31, 2009 for Fiddling Demystified for Strings camp at Old Songs in Voorheesville, NY.

Where have I taught?

This is a sampler of festivals, camps, workshops and residencies. Since 1975, I have performed and taught solo and with the Beaudoin Legacy, Chanterelle, Groovemama, Max Cohen, Lilianne Labbé, Rude Girls and Yankee Ingenuity. 

 

AWARDS:              
• 2008: Massachusetts Artists’ Fellow in the Folk Arts – Mass. Cultural Council
• 2008: Creative Teaching Partner –  Mass. Cultural Council’s Creative Schools program 2008-2001: Eight Master-Apprenticeship Awards - Connecticut Cultural Heritage Arts, NH Arts Council, RI Arts Council, Vermont Folklife Center

FESTIVALS:  (U.S) American Folk Festival (ME), Philadelphia Folk Festival (PA), Old Songs (NY), Champlain Valley Folk (VT), Clearwater (NY), Falconridge (NY), Festival of American Fiddle Tunes (WA), Lowell Folk Festival (MA); (CANADA) Winnipeg Folk, Summerfolk, Home County, La grande rencontre, Festival des Memoires et Racines; (EUROPE) Tønderfest (Denmark), Salon d’été indien (France).

 

CAMPS & CONFERENCES:  Fiddle & Strings (Dir.), Fiddling Demystified (Dir.), French Accent Week (Dir.), Groove Camp (Dir.), Mark O’Connor’s Strings Conference, National & MA ASTA Conferences, Northeast Heritage Music Camp, John C. Campbell Folk School, Stringendo’s Summer Strings, Fiddle and Dance Camp, Pinewoods Camp, Festival of American Fiddle Tunes. COLLEGES & SCHOOLS:  Amherst College (adjunct fiddle instructor since 2000), Wesleyan (staff 2001-02), Hartt School Summerterm (CT), Central CT State Summer Strings, Arizona State, U of Evansville (IN), Dennis/Yarmouth School District (MA), Wayland School District (MA), Evansville HS (IN).  March 2009 – Donna Hébert

Contact me at (info@fiddlingdemystified.com) or call 413-658-4276  for more information about private lessons, group classes or a workshop for your studio, school, string or fiddle group.