Fiddling Demystified Artists' Roster

Family members and musicians who were mentored by them gather to honor Louis and Wilfred Beaudoin in concerts, soirées and fiddling workshops full of songs, fiddle music and family stories with:

• Nina Beaudoin • Carmen Bombardier • Glenn Bombardier • Nicolle Charbonneau • Elena Alexander • Donna Hébert • George Wilson • Daniel Boucher • Liza Constable • Selma Kaplan • Andy Wallace, folklorist & presenter

Louis Beaudoin was a master of French-Canadian fiddle music and a friend to everyone he met, sharing his music with genial generosity with his family and friends at home and with national audiences at performances at the National Folk Festival at Wolf Trap and at the Jimmy Carter Inaugural celebrations. Since Mr. Beaudoin's untimely death in 1980, his spirit has inspired many others who have carried his family's joyful music into soirées, concerts, dances and living rooms around the world.

In 2005, longtime Beaudoin fiddling fans Donna Hébert and George Wilson, both fiddle masters in their own right, began looking for ways to reissue the two Beaudoin Philo recordings from the 1970s. They also began performing "Louis' tunes" together whenever they could. Beaudoin family members soon joined them in their effort to revitalize the family's musical heritage and The Beaudoin Project was launched. The Vermont Folklife Center has now established a Beaudoin Collection of Franco-American music there and is digitizing performances from family and other music archives under a recently awarded Grammy Foundation grant to convert and archive the analog recordings of family gatherings and performances.

Since 2006, family members and friends have performed for Vermont Public Radio and in concert at the Chandler Music Hall in Randolph VT, also giving an incandescent performance at the 2006 Champlain Valley Festival in Vermont. Singing the old French songs they learned from their mother are Louis and Julie Beaudoin's daughters Nina Lacourse Beaudoin and Carmen Bombardier. Playing on his grandfather's fiddle with George and Donna is Carmen's son, Glenn Bombardier, who is using this renewed interest in his family's music to expand his skills as a fiddler and a step-dancer. Glenn's sisters Nicolle Charbonneau and Elena Alexander often add their joyful step-dancing to the show. At Champlain Valley Festival in August 2006, Willie Beaudoin, Louis' 81-year old brother and guitar accompanist, Willie's wife Lillian, and Louis' widow Julie Beaudoin joined the group onstage in performance, along with Carmen's grandchildren, making four generations of Beaudoins onstage! Summer 2007 will see the group at the prestigious Lowell Folk Festival in Lowell MA, the city of Louis Beaudoin's birth.

Donna Hébert and George Wilson came under the spell of the Beaudoins' music in the 1970s when they were starting out as contradance fiddlers. Indelibly influenced by the Louis Beaudoin's music in the too-brief time spent with him and his family, Donna and George have carried "Louis' tunes," his style, and "le swing" deeply into their own playing since then. Donna is also transcribing the tune settings of Louis Beaudoin and analyzing his style and repertoire for the Beaudoin Collection at the Vermont Folklife Center.

Accompanying the group onstage are guitarist and vocalist Liza Constable, who with Donna Hébert and Josée Vachon are Franco-American heritage trio Chanterelle, and pianist Selma Kaplan, who regularly performs with George Wilson for dances, concerts and festivals.

"Fiddle Music of Louis Beaudoin" - Teaching the Franco-American fiddling style of the late Louis Beaudoin, fiddlers Donna Hébert and George Wilson demonstrate the syncopated bowing rhythms and joyful tunes from his repertoire and family music heritage. Donna and George have taught Louis' tunes at workshops and folk festivals for many years, Teaching packet includes CD sampler, sheet music transcriptions of Louis Beaudoin's tune settings.

Other Franco-American fiddling workshops with Donna Hébert- Donna featured Mr. Beaudoin's music at a January 2007 week of French-Canadian fiddling at the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown NC. She also works with Franco-American fiddling apprentices through NEA-funded Master-Apprenticeships in the Traditional Arts, applied for through the state arts councils and her latest apprentice is Glenn Bombardier, Louis' grandson. Other apprentices from RI, CT, NH and MA often join her, Chanterelle and The Beaudoin Project at concerts, as she carries on the joyful traditions of Louis Beaudoin and the other wonderful fiddlers who gave her their music.

Elena Alexander, Glenn Bombardier, Nicolle Charbonneau get airborne while aunt Nina Beaudoin and mother Carmen Bombardier cheer them on. Bill Spence photo.