Who can participate?
If you master some basic skills like chords, strumming, maybe a bit of fingerpicking and do have a solid basic knowledge of Guitar playing, you should do just fine. Whatever level of experience you have, we promise, that you will not be disappointed, there will be always plenty of challenges in further developing your skills.
The idea of this 1 week workshop is to give you some new fundamental, important "tools" to take home with you, so you will be able to improve on your techniques, composing, improvisation and get some inspiration to experiment with new approaches to percusive and Fingerstyle Guitar playing.
Our Teachers for this year:
Clive Caroll
Clive Carroll was born into a musical family that quickly recognised and nurtured his exceptional talent. From an early age, he was exposed to a wide variety of musical styles, ranging from traditional Irish music to rock, pop, soul, and classical music. After completing his music studies, he had the opportunity to perform alongside the renowned English guitar virtuoso John Renbourn, who soon became both a mentor and close friend. Deeply impressed by Clive Carroll’s extraordinary musicianship, Renbourn encouraged him to record his own album. His debut release, Sixth Sense, was praised by critics as a refreshing new voice in the world of acoustic guitar music.
Clive then spent two years touring throughout Europe and America with John Renbourn before joining legendary guitarist Tommy Emmanuel on international tours for another two years. Eventually, he chose to fully dedicate himself to his solo career.
Today, Clive Carroll is regarded as one of the leading virtuosos of the acoustic guitar scene. His remarkable versatility allows him to move effortlessly between blues, jazz, Irish folk, and classical music. Adding a deeply personal touch to his performances are his own soulful compositions, which perfectly showcase both his technical brilliance and musical sensitivity.
Shane Hennessy
Shane Hennessy is a virtuoso fingerstyle guitarist, singer/songwriter, and composer. With an upbringing in the world of Irish traditional music, Shane has been captivating audiences globally for the past few years, with sell-out solo tours in Europe and North America under his belt, as well as regular appearances at major international music festivals including MerleFest (NC), Walnut Valley Bluegrass Festival (Winfield, KS), Sound of Europe Festival (Düsseldorf, Germany), and Milwaukee Irish Fest (WI). He has released four albums of original music, and his most recent studio album ‘Rain Dance’ was hailed as “a triumphant reaffirmation of his virtuosity and compositional excellence” by Irish Music Magazine. Shane has collaborated with Tommy Emmanuel, worked with Grammy-winner Bill Whelan (composer of Riverdance), and made his début on the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee in March 2023.
His live shows are known for their energy and variety - anything from Bach to Beyoncé! Irish Music Magazine have called him “one of the most exciting live performers of his generation”, and attest to his “virtuosity and compositional excellence”. Shane is a firm favourite on the festival scene in the United States, appearing at prestigious roots festivals such as MerleFest (NC), Walnut Valley (KS), Appaloosa (VA), MusikFest (PA), and Philadelphia Folk Fest (virtual edition), as well as numerous Irish and Celtic Festivals including Milwaukee Irish Fest, Kansas City Irish Fest, Irish Fest Chicago, Michigan Irish Music Fest, Music City Irish Fest (Nashville, TN), Iowa Irish Fest, and many more.
Heiko Bloemers
Heiko Bloemers was born in 1987 and grew up in Rheinberg, Germany. At the age of 8 he started taking piano lessons. After seven years he felt “technically limited” so he began playing electric guitar and formed his first band. About one year later he was suddenly drawn to the acoustic guitar after he had seen youtube videos of Tommy Emmanuel, Andy McKee, Jon Gomm and others.
He started teaching himself more than 100 songs until he eventually began writing his own compositions. At this point in time he knew he’d like to become a full-time musician and started diving deeper into the adventurous world of music, discovering all kinds of techniques and artists along the way.
Heiko has shared the stage with artists like Don Ross, Stefano Barone, Amrit Sond and others. He’s a regular attendant of Thomas Leeb’s Guitar Bootcamp in Austria and performed in cities like Berlin, Paris and London. His debut album Sentiment EP was released April 2016.