Hurdy Gurdy Weekend 2026
Guaranteed to be one of Halsway’s noisiest weekends, this popular Hurdy-Gurdy Weekend runs alongside our Bagpipe Weekend with masterclasses, workshops, sessions and a Saturday night concert/dance. A frenzy of reeds, drones and buzzing things! Early booking advised.
The weekend is hosted by Claire Dugué, hurdy-gurdy maker and repairer, and she’ll be available to help people get the most out of their instruments with tips for maintenance. Our international tutor team includes:
Aline Pilon and Sébastien Tron (Intermediate/Advanced Hurdy Gurdy Workshop – one group each)
Scott Marshall (Beginner Hurdy Gurdy Workshop).
Discussions are welcome before the course to adapt the content to the students. Each tutor will dedicate themselves to a specific group for the full weekend allowing for maximum learning and progression. You will need to decide which tutor you wish to work with and tell us when booking; numbers in each group are limited. Because course places are limited, we aren’t able to take bookings from those not wishing to fully participate in one of the workshop groups (unless you’re coming as the friend or partner of a participant, and sharing a room).
Additional course notes
Aline Pilon’s workshop is suitable for both G and D tunings. Please tell us the tuning of your hurdy gurdy at the time of booking.
Sébastien Tron’s course will focus on the following: Sensitive instrumental technique workshop. Based on a few pieces of dance music, we will work on musical gestures with both hands and seek to feel the contact, touch, and pressure on our instrument. Playful bodywork through rhythm and voice exercises. Keyboard: melodic paths between pentatonic and arpeggio notes, foot-print positions, fingerings, accents, and articulations. Crank: phrasing and bow movement, set pieces, and of course wrist strokes or “coups de poignées! Group work, personalised instruction with individual feedback.
Preferred tuning: G/C. D-string hurdy-gurdy accepted. Please tell us at the time of booking.
Who is it for?
This course is for players of the hurdy-gurdy who already have their own instrument.
Beginners/Improvers Class with Scott Marshall
This class is for the complete beginner who never held an instrument and wants to spend some time to check out if the hurdy-gurdy is for him/her.
It is also for the player who has been playing for a few years but hasn’t yet progressed far, and needs to strengthen his/her ability to play tunes/use the trompette.
Intermediate/advanced classes with Aline Pilon (Fr) and Sébastien Tron (Fr)
On both these classes, we expect players who are in control of their instruments, can set them up and tune them .They need to have a repertoire of tunes under their belt and master the trumpet techniques to a coup de quatre minimum.
The Team
Aline Pilon (Fr) Intermediate/Advance Hurdy-Gurdy started playing the hurdy-gurdy around the age of 12. At the time Aline was dancing in a folk group where she was able to learn the main standards of the Nivernais / Morvan / Berry / Bourbonnais repertoire. She immediately experienced the pleasure of playing for dancers, a pleasure that is still as intense today! Aline’s favourite group is T.O.G. (The Old Guard), we play ball and concert music. She teaches the hurdy-gurdy, in its traditional Central France repertoire, and emphasises the personalisation of each musician's playing: there is no question of training clones! The idea is that she shares her musical toolbox, so that you can take it and / or be inspired by it.
Sébastien Tron (Fr) is a French artist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, performer, arranger, sound designer, artistic director, and cultural facilitator. He is particularly known for the originality of his creations and his ability to generate enveloping sonic images, poetically blending instrument and voice. He exhibits an atypical hurdy-gurdy style, influenced by the phrasing and space of Pat Metheny's synth-guitar, the sonic cosmopolitanism of Bill Frisell, and the explorations of trumpeter Jon Hassell.
Sébastien discovered participatory creations and popular education at an early age. Traditional European dances, classical piano, jazz improvisation, hurdy-gurdy, and percussion in the polyrhythms of West Africa were the cornerstones of his youth.
He founded and was co-artistic director of the multidisciplinary company Antiquarks and Coin Coin Productions from 2004 to 2022. During this prolific period (more than 800 artistic intervention in France, Europe and around the world), he worked in particular with the Native American blues singer Pura Fé and the Senegalese lyricist Souleymane Faye (Xalam), as well as with numerous African choreographers and musicians (Jahkasa, Sayouba Sigué, Famoudou Konaté, Monique Séka, M’Bemba Camara, etc.).
Since 2002, he has collaborated with accordionist Stéphane Milleret in the Mustradem collective (Djal, Illa). They co-produced two comic book concerts with Vocal 26 (Groenland Manhattan, 2015, and Le Fils de l’Ursari, 2022), stories of forced exile inspired by true events.
In 2018, with the help of Barnaby Walters (English luthier and computer scientist), he brought his hurdy-gurdy into the world of polyphonic instruments and created an augmented instrument that combines acoustic, electroacoustic, and digital (MIDI) functions.
Scott Marshall (UK) beginner hurdy-gurdy has been playing hurdy-gurdy since 2005. He has been a regular festival and workshop tutor for the last decade. In 2017 he recorded his first solo album Gurdymania, followed in 2018 by Gurdymania 2, using multiple hurdy-gurdies and effects units. He is currently recording the third and final Gurdymania album before moving onto new folk and metal projects. He will be teaching the beginners class at Halsway focusing on good habits, solid playing skills and creating musical exercises for practice.