Another Amazing Day in Bellingham

I am not a musician.  I suspect I have not the talent to play an instrument, and certainly, I lack the voice to be a singer.  But I do love music, and most especially, symphonic music.  And I must confess, the entire idea of orchestral music baffles me.  That those scattered, often cluttered symbols on paper can express the ideas of a composer such that a player can read them and translate them into precise movements of muscle and breath, in concert with a hundred others, to make a tapestry of sound that can bring me to tears is utterly beyond my comprehension.  Today, I watched pre-college students do exactly that, playing two pieces I know and love:  Glazunov The Seasons and Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherazade.  The first was played by a younger group, yet it was extraordinarily well done, and the second by the senior-level students, and they were magnificent.  The young concert master was dazzling and will be heading into a career with a major orchestra without a doubt.  And there were several others who played with such skill that I could not tell that they were not already well-seasoned professionals.

This is the 67^th season of the Marrowstone Music Festival.  It is a monument to the founders who had the foresight to create and sustain this amazing opportunity for young musicians to train with highly regarded professionals from great orchestras and music schools from around the country.  This afternoon, even more than last night, I witnessed the fruits of those efforts over the years and they are abundant indeed.  No billionaire could have been richer than I for these two hours.  Bellingham has been gifted by this program, as has the state and, as these students spread out to orchestras across the country, America will be as well.

Bravo, young artists, bravo.  And thank you.