February 22, 2005 at 4:08 PM

It's been a long and interesting, exciting week!

There's just something about hundreds of kids popping out of their seats in a hall when you hit those sforzandos and fortes in the Marraige of Figaro that is really amusing, hard to not be distracted by, but the whole time remaining inspiring. These are kids who are experiencing classical music and loving it!

Between Tuesday and Thursday of last week I played 7 shortened educational programs as part of a school concert tour. It was dubbed "Mozart on the Move." It was a little much Mozart for my taste, but the kids seemed to love it and despite the lack of sleep and long hours of driving to and from different venues, each time I sat down to play and saw all these kids filing their way off school buses into the hall there was this infectious quality that makes you just really want to play your best.

The conductor, a guest conductor was a lot of fun. Excellent with the kids and very interactive. At one concert a couple kids had their hands held up to ask questions, and even though that wasn't part of the program, he asked them what their questions were and answered them with taste and skill. He made the whole event highly interactive, having some of the kids getting to come up and play with the orchestra at one point (percussion for the "Toy Symphony" finale) and requesting different things of the kids and making it fun for them.

It really was a lot of fun and I wish that it was something we could do more often. Maybe the fact that we are doing Peter and the Wolf in March is a clue that this might be something we start to do more often. The kids enjoy it, and the orchestra enjoys it. The cheering, claps, and the bug eyed looks from the kids as you walk past them with your instrument should be enough to make this a more regular thing. We need to make classical music fun and exciting for kids and these type of programs are just the way to do it.

"Is anyone here good at video-games?" *hands shoot up across the hall..." "Well Mozart was good at composing!"

From Scott 68
Posted on February 22, 2005 at 6:44 PM

Isnt is amazing how Mozart appeals to the masses more than any other composer?

One can only imaging the kind of success he must have had!

From Kelsey Z.
Posted on February 23, 2005 at 1:12 AM

Scott, I don't think it's because it was Mozart, I think it was because of how it was presented and because of the personal contact that the conductor had with the students and that the musicians had as well.

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February 22, 2005 at 4:08 PM

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