Learn kantele songs on Friday and perform them on Saturday!

The five-string kantele is a good first instrument for players of any age. If you thought you could never learn to play a musical instrument, this workshop is for you! We will be using a color coded chord strumming technique developed by the Finnish music educator Maija Simojoki that makes playing simple for everyone. If you are a music educator, you can pick up this technique during the workshop to use with your own pupils. The kantele makes a great classroom instrument, because it is a much more suitable accompaniment for treble voices than the percussive sound of a piano, for instance. It is also a good way to learn call-and-response and simple musical improvisation. Because of its sweet tone, a wrong note or chord is no reason for embarrassment. For the first 30 minutes we will practice the strumming technique. During the second 30-minutes we will rehearse songs chosen from the Finnish Heritage Hymnbook to be performed in Saturday’s Kantele Recital Saturday at 2 pm. For the first hour, we will work on strumming techniques and rehearse songs for our recital on Saturday. After the first hour, we will join a group of 10-string kantele players for another 30 minutes of rehearsal.

ABOUT PRESENTER: Margaret Vainio got her BA in music from Northern Michigan University. She was tour manager for the NMU Arts Chorale’s Bicentennial Concert Tour to Finland and moved to Finland permanently a year later. There she got a degree as a church musician and served in the Lutheran parishes of Pylkonmäki and Saarijärvi and later in Rhodes, Greece, directing choirs of all ages. In 1992 she completed further studies in preschool music education, teaching kantele groups at the local music school, and preschool music as part of her job with the congregation. In 1999 she completed a MA in music history from the University of Jyväskylä in Finland. Vainio brought choirs from Finland to perform at FinnFest in 1996 and 2007, and has been a presenter at numerous FinnFests since then.