Deep Roots and Deep Connection
The band
Aod Belloc’h | Farther Shore
Traditional Breton Music and Dance
The members of Aod Belloc’h have built and sustained a vibrant fest-noz scene on the West Coast, sharing Breton music and dance far beyond its home region. Their name, “Aod Belloc’h” (“Farther Shore” in Breton), reflects the deep connection between Brittany and communities across the ocean. The group brings together a unique mix of musicians and dancers with deep roots in traditional music, from early and folk traditions to Breton repertoire.
Aod Belloc’h features Shira Kammen (multi-instrumentalist), Jim Oakden (accordion, guitar, winds), Ronan Keryell (bombarde and Breton dance leader), and Adrienne Simpson (dancer and teacher), each with deep experience in traditional music and dance. Together, they carry a deep love for Breton culture and bring energy, tradition, and passion to the dance floor. Their work has helped introduce new communities to these traditions, creating spaces where people gather, dance, and connect.
biography
shira kammen
Multi-instrumentalist Shira Kammen has spent much of her life exploring the worlds of early and traditional music of all kinds. A member for many years of the early music Ensembles Alcatraz and Project Ars Nova, she has also worked with many ensembles and collaborators, including Sequentia, Hesperion XX, the Boston Camerata, Calextone, Vajra Voices, storyteller/harpist Patrick Ball, singers Anne Azema, Azam Ali, and Joanna Newsom, poet Jane Hirshfield, Kitka, Anonymous IV, the King’s Noyse, the Newberry and Folger Consorts, The Compass of the Rose, the Oregon, California and San Francisco Shakespeare Festivals, and is the founder of Class V Music, an ensemble dedicated to providing music on river rafting trips. She has taught music in many different settings, among them teaching summer workshops in the woods, coaching students of early music in such schools as Yale University, Case Western, the University of Oregon at Eugene, and at specialized seminars at the Fondazione Cini in Venice, Italy and the Scuola Cantorum Basiliensis in Switzerland. She has played on a number of movie, television, and video game soundtracks, when weird medieval instruments were needed. She started playing for Breton dances with Jim in 1997.
jim oakden
Although Jim is comfortable on concert stages and recording studios (appearing on 30+ CDs), his true love is playing for dancers (and dancing himself). He performs on an absurd array of instruments, from accordion to zurna, in a very wide range of traditional and ethnic styles from North America, Western Europe, the Balkans, and the Eastern Mediterranean. Jim has been a long-time staff musician and teacher at major trad dance and music camps throughout the US, and has toured and performed in Britain, Australia, Canada, Italy, and Spain. As a dance organizer he ran a contra-dance series for 25 years, and has been Program Director at many weekend and week-long dance events. He was a founding member in 1997 (with Shira Kammen and friends) of one of the first dedicated Fest Noz bands in the US. His love of Breton music, and the lack of people to play it with, motivated him to start teaching Breton music at LarkCamp in 2011. He has since been developing and teaching a shared repertoire of Breton dance tunes in the Western US-helping to spread the word about Breton music, dance, and culture. In Aod Belloc’h he plays guitar, clarinet, accordion, bombarde, various bagpipes, and occasionally hurdy gurdy.
ronan keryell
Ronan was born in Brittany, and has lived sequentially in France (Limousin and Paris area), Ireland, and California. He started traditional Breton and French dancing while playing the bombarde in the 80’s in various local bands. Currently Ronan alternates between living in Brest and California, dancing and playing bombardes, crumhorn, and hautbois du Couserans at festoù-noz on both shores. Ronan is also known as an inspiring and energetic Breton dance leader. In his other life, Ronan hides as a computer scientist.
Adrienne Simpson
Adrienne Simpson has studied a diverse range of traditional and social dance styles, from Ballet Folklorico and English Country Dance to blues, belly dance, tap, hip hop, Argentine tango, and many genres in between. Mostly a social dancer noted for her energy, playfulness, and rhythmic precision, she has also competed in Balboa and performed in community musical theater. As a teacher, Adrienne takes great joy in making dance accessible to others. Vibrant and articulate, she weaves together clear instruction and nuanced detail in an inclusive, exploratory atmosphere. Adrienne has taught French, Breton, and Galician dance at Lark Camp since 2008, and has led Fest Noz and BalFolk events in California and Oregon. She had the honor of co-teaching and performing Galician dance with Javier “Xisco” Feijoo at Alasdair Fraser’s Sierra Fiddle Camp, was a guest choreographer at Mendocino College, and has taught swing, historical ballroom, Breton, French, and Galician dance at numerous weekend and week-long camps in California. Adrienne has also earned a Master Gardener certification, plays diatonic accordion and pandeireta, and sings in a Renaissance and Baroque quintet.
upcoming events
Breizh Fest
Friday, June 5th, 2026 | 5-9 PM
at the Minneapolis Cider Company
For more information and tickets:
Lark Camp Fest Noz
Sunday, August 2nd, 2026 | 9-11 PM
Part of Lark Camp in the Mendocino Woodlands, Mendocino, CA
For more information and tickets: