Asbury United Methodist Church, Kankakee

Time flies. This coming Sunday, April 30, at 3:00 we will be performing again. Though it's been a while since our last performance, a lot has gone on for us. One thing worth mentioning is our visit with local composer Rob Ryndak. He comes from a jazzy kind of space. Mindy took it in stride, I was less comfortable. Sooner or later we'll devise a program that includes a couple of his pieces. It would help if our cellist got some improvising chops. Speaking as that cellist, I can only offer, by way of excuse making, that we classical musicians - orchestra musicians in particular - live in horror of making discordant sounds. Rather than do that we, I, will freeze like a deer in headlights. Not a good thing to do in music, which is, after all, a time art. Stay frozen long enough and even a violist will notice that something's amiss.

Back to our coming performance. As I said already, the date is Sunday April 30. The time is 3:00. Admission is free. (But we do hope you'll consider dropping a bit of the old spendable encouragement into our donation box.) For me the exciting bit is the venue. We will be playing at historic Asbury United Methodist Church in Kankakee.

As you can see, it's a very beautiful place. Having played there before in chamber orchestra and chamber music concerts, I can tell you it's a great place for music.

Another reason I'm excited is due to the fact that I have been the strings coach for the Kankakee Valley Youth Symphony for quite a long time, and I may - if they show up - get a chance to play for those young musicians. (They just finished another successful season this last Sunday.) While I've grabbed someone's cello to demonstrate something many times, and have done sectionals where I played along with or for them, I've always felt it was important that they hear me playing for real. I feel that these young musicians should get the chance to see whether or not I try to practice that which they've all heard me preach. This Sunday is the day.

Our program is the same one we played in March at the Southbridge Church. Faure, Ravel, Debussy, and Ropartz. In March we played the big work first and the short works after intermission, the way they did back in the old days. This time we are trying it the other way, saving the Ropartz sonata for the second half. We'll see how it goes. The short pieces are samples of what was in the air at a point in time, and the sonata shows a thoroughly professional composer of the era making a larger work from the same things in that air. At least that's how I'm thinking right now.

Please consider coming.

DEF

PS

Here's a sample of what's on the first half. A song by Faure.

Au bord de l'eau