For a unique combination of music and holiday activities in the stunning surroundings of the Austrian Tyrol, there is the Berwang Holiday Music Course (BHMC) each August, full details of which can be found by clicking here or in the left-hand border; details of the specific BHMC courses can be found by following the BHMC music activity links in the BHMC website or directly by clicking the appropriate link in the left border.  This course is organised by Kerry Camden, bassoonist and freelance music professional, more about whom can be found by clicking here or in the top border.  Kerry is also organising a fourth Berwang Winter Music Holiday for January 2009 - please click on this link to further information.   Also, after the great success of our earlier 'Bach to Bacchus' Weekends, we are running further Weekends during 16th-19th May 2008 and 24th-27th October 2008.  These are extended weekends of music-making (and wine education!) amongst the vineyards of Trittenheim in the Mosel valley.

Other music courses include:

at Benslow [info@benslow.org](Hitchin, Herts): three times per year, a residential weekend course based on nine wind quintets (flute, oboe, clarinet, horn and bassoon).  These three courses provide opportunities to cover a very wide range of the wind repertoire from duos and trios to quartets, quintets, sextets, octets right through to the major large-scale works of Mozart and Richard Strauss.  Each course features a workshop session, with the visiting tutors, for each of the five instruments.  The workshops provide time to explore technique, tone production and the finer points associated with each instrument, as well as same-instrument ensembles, such as bassoon trios and quartets;

at Sherborne, Dorset [canfordsummersch@co.uk]: a residential, week-long, wind chamber music course at the end of each July.  Originally based at Canford, Sherborne school now provides a wonderful, spacious setting for a week of ensemble playing, based around the wind quintet.  This course enables participants both to experience a structured timetable of detailed study on specific works, and to meet new music in repertoire sessions for a variety of  combinations of instruments.  Members of this course also join up with members of the concurrent string chamber music course to play from the marvellous mixed wind and string repertoire.  A piano accompaniment course is also held at the same time, which affords opportunities to work at the solo repertoire for each instrument;

a 'Spring Music' residential course (location varies; Essex/Surrey, usually April) comprises mixed strings and winds, usually of three days' duration.  Numbers are limited to four or five per wind instrument with a couple of string quartets plus double bass.  The piano and wind, and piano and string repertoire are also covered in these few days.  Given the small number of course members per instrument, all the ensembles have sessions devoted to trios, quartets and so on, as well as the large-scale works;

at Windfest (in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, in June): a three week festival for woodwind, horns and piano, organised by Nina Brickman, a professional horn player and teacher.  The same players attend for the full three weeks, and they prepare a different programme of music each week, culminating in two public concert performances of each programme.  Each student also receives a weekly private lesson.  The repertoire is structured to include the great octet serenades of Mozart and Beethoven; works for piano and wind by Mozart, Beethoven and Poulenc; and wind quintets by Ibert, Damase, Nielsen etc.  Time is also set aside to play through repertoire new to the players.  There are also social events and a visit to Toronto to hear the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.   Details of the next Windfest are available from nbrickman@look.ca.

Kerry Camden also coaches the wind sections of county youth orchestras in Wiltshire and Lancashire during their residential courses in the school holidays.

If you can not find the type of course you are looking for or such is not available in your location and/or on your preferred date(s), why not see if we can provide one for you?  In particular, Kerry Camden is available to take part in or organise or direct other music courses, whether along the lines of those mentioned above or not and whether currently in existence or not, in the UK and abroad.  He can bring a wide variety of suitable music for such courses from his extensive wind music library, including some of his own arrangements for wind chamber groups.  For further details or to discuss ideas/your requirements, please telephone Kerry on +44 (0)1923-263715 or e-mail info@musicholiday.com.   

Details of music activities  other than courses/holidays, particularly those involving wind instruments (including bassoon lessons, competition/festival adjudication and music arrangements for chamber groups) can also be found by clicking here or in the top border.