Macedonia Camp 2025

Igor Dimovski , was born in 1987 in Dracevo, Macedonia and began playing music at 7 years of age. One of the most sought after accordionists in Macedonia and beyond, Igor leads and arranges for his band, Pauza za Rakija, with followers from all over the former Yugoslavia and diaspora. Igor has a recording studio where he produces videos of traditional Macedonian music.

Igor will present a set of his own arrangements of traditional songs from his band’s repertoire. Our final concert will be a collaboration between his band and Village Harmony.

Teodora Gjorgieva Stojanovska is an ethnologist, folklorist, and professional dancer and singer in the Macedonian National Ensemble “Tanec”. She has also been a member of the ethno group Synthesis traveling throughout Europe and Canada.

Teodora regularly teaches Macedonian folklore and dance at workshops, seminars and schools. She participated in our 2023 camp for a short time due to her busy touring schedule.

We are fortunate to have Teodora for both singing and folk dancing for the entire camp in 2025.

Mary Cay Brass of Athens, Vermont has been teaching Village Harmony camps since the earliest years. She directs two popular community choirs in Vermont and Massachusetts and is the co-musical director of Hallowell Hospice Choir. Mary Cay is also a dynamic contra-dance keyboardist and accordion player who focuses on Scandinavian, French Canadian and Balkan traditions. She spent two and a half years in the former Yugoslavia on a Fulbright Scholarship in ethnomusicology researching regional vocal traditions in Croatia and Serbia. She has published two book/CD collections of music from that region, Village Harmony, Songs of the Balkans and Balkan Bridges and has organized and led five Village Harmony trips in the Republic of North Macedonia, four in Bosnia and Hercegovina and one in Quebec. www.marycaybrass.com

Samira Merdžanić was born in 1974 in Bosnia and Hercegovina. She teaches accordion and leads several choirs in her native town including an all girls’ choir, Bugojno Vocal Ensemble, which focuses on preserving the traditional and sacred vocal traditions of ex-Yugoslavia. In 2016, 2018 and 2022 Samira taught at Village Harmony camps in Bosnia and Macedonia; she has also taught in the US twice to teach at Village Harmony camps. At this camp Samira will teach some of her arrangements of Bosnian sevdalinka as well as traditional village songs and music from the sacred traditions of her country.