Unpacking Lessons from Winter Village Music Camp 2026

Winter Village music camp was a whirlwind of fiddle music instruction for me this year.

It was also a great chance to play with and greet some old friends who I don't often see.

I believe my first year at this camp was when it was split up into two different camps, "Falling Waters" and "Winter Village" and hosted at La Tourelle, the hotel on South Hill in Ithaca.

I showed up there in 2018 or 2019 with my mandolin and not necessarily a very strong grasp of what I wanted to study at the time, but an eagerness to learn.

I remember taking workshops from David Surette (RIP) and Joe K. Walsh, and being in awe of these incredible musicians.

The next year, I was way more focused on Old Time music, taking banjo and fiddle courses from Jake Blount, Travis Stuart, and Judy Hyman.

Now, all these years later, I'm still figuring out what musical path I am on.

After attending the opening concert on Thursday and getting into some late night jamming there, I went for just Saturday to actually take workshops during the day.

Because of this, I wanted to max out the amount of lessons I got, so I spent all day taking workshops, all on the fiddle.

Here's a recap of each workshop:

Texas fiddle Workshop with Natalie Padilla

• History of Texas style music and fiddle contests
• Benny Thomasson, Major Franklin, Joey McKenzie, Dick Barrett, Terry Morris
• Weiser, ID
• Katy Hill/Sally Johnson
  • Bluegrass version of katy hill
  • Old Time version of Katy Hill
  • Texas version of Sally Johnson
• Chromaticism

Old time fiddle workshop with Jake Blount

• Old time tune in G from Will Adams of Maryland
• Sounds like a version of Wild Horse at Stony Point
• Emphasized ONLY using double stops on the high part
• Emphasized specific bow directions more than other instructors

Swedish fiddle workshop with Lauri Hart

• Polska’s are odd meter Scandinavian tunes and are NOT “polkas” even the word essentially means the same thing
• D minor tune
• "Infinity bowing" bowing move in the mix called something I never quite understood (starts with an R)

Bluegrass fiddle workshop with Natalie Padilla

• The concept was, let’s focus on building a break from scratch on a random tune in a random key
• Long Journey Home in G
• So we started with her singing the melody
• Then we learned a mostly very simple, un-bluegrassified version of the melody
• Then she asked us what are some bluegrass elements we could use to make it a bit fancy within the bluegrass style
  • Intro
  • Changing rhythm, keeping notes the same
  • Keeping rhythm the same, changing notes
  • “Removing” rhythm, using longer tones, taking advantage of the fiddle’s sustain
  • Treating it like playing fills between melody notes, like you would when the singer is singing
  • Fifths double stops: used arg the beginning of phrases to grab attention
• Listen to Bobby Hicks, Kenny Baker, Stuart Duncan

Bluegrass fiddle workshop with Austin Scelzo

• Focused entirely on the music of Bobby Hicks
• Extremely fast paced
• Tunes learned
  • East Tennessee Blues
  • Cherokee Swing
• Used technology way more than the other instructors
• Licks
  • Your Love is Like a Flower, Molly and Tenbrooks
  • Cheyenne
    • Syncopated approach double stop slide
  • Contrary motion double stops