LIMIT: 16 Students

LEVEL: For all ages and levels, from beginning to experienced songwriter, whether you play an instrument or not.

COST: $1,395 per student. This includes three days of workshops (Thursday/Friday/Saturday), a gathering and dinner with Mary at a Nashville home to meet each other from 6:30-9:00 p.m. on Wednesday evening July 13, one-on-one time with Mary, and a closing dinner together at Thistle Cafe. (All meals that aren’t covered can be found at restaurants in walking distance.)

WHERE: Performing Songwriter is teaming up with Thistle Farms to hold the workshop in their event space at Thistle Farms Cafe, which directly supports its community programs. Thistle Farms is an organization founded to help heal, empower and employ women survivors of trafficking, prostitution and addiction. It’s comprehensive model offers women hope and healing through a holistic residential program, employment with one of our social enterprises, and a growing national and global network dedicated to changing a culture that allows human beings to be bought and sold. (Tennessean Article About Thistle Farms / The Cafe at Thistle Farms)

TRAVEL: You’ll want to arrive in Nashville by late afternoon on Wednesday, July 13 for the opening dinner together that evening at 6:30. The workshop will start each morning at 9:00 a.m. and you’ll be completely busy all day through the closing night together on Saturday, July 16.

LODGING: The Cafe at Thistle Farms is located at 5122 Charlotte Pike, Nashville, TN 37209. The closest hotels to the cafe, all less than a mile away, are on White Bridge Road (Comfort Inn, Best Western Plus, Holiday Inn Express). But it’s only 3-5 miles from West End Hotels, Vanderbilt, and Downtown if you’d rather stay in those areas. Here’s a link to a search of nearby hotels.

REFUND POLICY: Your deposit of $395 is non-refundable and will secure one of the 16 spots. You’ll be invoiced for the remaining $1,000 on May 15 that will be due no later than June 1 to keep your spot and not lose your deposit. If you are fully paid and cancel by June 15, 2022 you’ll be refunded $1000. After June 15 there is no guaranteed refund unless we fill the spot (we will have a cancellation list). If the spot is filled by July 1, 2022 then you’ll still receive your $1,000 refund. If you cancel after July 1, 2022 there are no refunds.

ALL ATTENDEES OF THIS WORKSHOP ARE REQUIRED TO HAVE HAD THEIR COVID-19 VACCINATION. 

This workshop has been filled.

Email Lydia if you’d like to be added to the cancellation list.

NOTE: All attendees of this workshop are required to have had their Covid-19 Vaccination.

About Mary Gauthier:

“Mary Gauthier has been teaching songwriting for over eight years, and has led songwriting workshops all over the world—from Australia to Ireland to Costa Rica, to cities all over the United States and Canada. She has worked with thousands of students in all genres of music and levels of experience, and has helped them connect with their truth and articulate in their songs.”

A New Orleans native who now resides in Nashville, Mary is a singer songwriter who the Associated Press named one of the best songwriters of her generation. Her sophomore release, Filth and Fire, was named “#1 Independent CD of the Year” by Jon Pareles of the New York Times. Her following three releases were listed in both the LA Times and New York Times top three releases of the year. Her record Mercy Now was listed in the “Top 5 Records of the Decade” by No Depression magazine.

Mary recently released her seventh studio album, Rifles and Rosary Beads, in February 2018, a Grammy-nominated collection of songs she’s written with veterans through the Songwriting with Soldiers program. Her songs have been recorded by dozens of artists including Jimmy Buffett, Blake Shelton, Tim McGraw, Candi Staton and Mike Farris, and have been used extensively in Film and Television all over the world, including the ABC hit show Nashville, Case Histories on Masterpiece Theater, and Showtime’s Banshee. She tours the world constantly, performing an average of over 150 dates a year, and has often been called a writer’s writer, which thrills her to no end.