Village Harmony Teen World Music Ensemble To Perform at York Street Meeting House August 12

A select ensemble of ten talented singers and instrumentalists from five states, led by Village Harmony founder and director Larry Gordon, assisted by Avery Book and Sinead O'Mahoney, will perform at the York Street Meeting House, 153 York Street, Lyndon at 7:00 pm on Thursday, August 12. Village Harmony, a non-profit, umbrella organization based in Marshfield, promotes the study and performance of ethnic singing traditions from around the world. For more than thirty years, they have organized teen ensembles each summer in New England and ensembles for mixed-age and adult singers in numerous foreign countries.

In a normal summer Village Harmony has three different teen ensembles like this which perform throughout New England, but in this pandemic year they have a much reduced program. This is one of ten concerts being held in New York State and Vermont.

The concert program features a remarkable variety of world harmony singing traditions: South African songs and dances, traditional songs from Caucasus Georgia, Corsica, and the Balkans, American shape-note songs, songs of social struggle, and a set of renaissance pieces. Some numbers are accompanied by a band of fiddles, accordion and percussion.

Larry Gordon, of Marshfield, founded Village Harmony in 1989 and is a vital figure in New England shape-note singing. He has a unique knack of pulling together interesting combinations of singers and letting them shine. Sinead O'Mahoney, a native of Montpelier, has been avidly singing with Village Harmony for over a decade, traveling abroad with Village Harmony to Corsica, France, Switzerland, Germany, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and has taken three separate trips to Caucasus Georgia, including an intensive Georgian language and culture course. Avery Book, of Burlington, has an eclectic musical interest that spans the gamut from early music to traditional world folk to the music of social movements. Avery will be teaching songs from the Republic of Georgia, Sardinia, Bosnia, and North American social movements. He has traveled and studied in Sardinia, Georgia, Bosnia, Bulgaria, and the British Isles.

This is the third Village Harmony visit to York Street Meeting House; these ensembles never fail to thrill their audiences with their powerful and heartfelt singing and joyous presentation.

Admission by donation. If you are unvaccinated, please wear a mask. Others are encouraged to wear masks.