TEC and SASS Violin Students play for Irvine City Council Meeting

For most students it was the first day of school but for SASS violin students from  OCCTAC  in Santa Ana and their Suzuki  friends from the Talent Education Center in Irvine,  it was the day they played together for Mayor Kang and his City Council Meeting at the Irvine Civic Center.

My biggest worry was whether everyone would make it there on time with the extra craziness of the first week of school.   But everybody was there ready and tuned for the sound check.    I want to thank all of the parents that got them there calm and ready to play.

Even Dr. Jimenez made it back from her office at OCCTAC to see us play.   She was very pleased to see all of the children and parents working together for such a great purpose.

We got an applause from members of the audience just for doing a sound check.  There’s nothing like a little applause to calm down the butterflies in our stomachs.  Then they put us back in the green room for the longest 10 min. we ever had to sit through, while they started the meeting.    Everyone was so quiet with anticipation.   Finally we were led back into the hall with all of the students from age 4 and up.

It was our first time letting someone else run the volume controls on the sound system.   I don’t think they realized how big our tone was going to be so we restarted the Humoresque after they adjusted the sound levels.    When my students could hear the piano part they quickly regained their confidence and opened up their tone again.    The ensemble playing on the video is best after the first few lines  of music when we finally all begin to synchronize, including the sound guy.   Its not every day that he gets practice adjusting the sound for violins at a City Council Meeting.   Not to worry.  He picked up the violin sound with microphones so he could ballance it later.

The audience was very appreciative.   We got a wonderful applause.   The Mayor  was really great with the children.

Link to Irvine City TV Media page:

http://irvine.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=22&clip_id=2111

Look for the    Jump To . . . . . .  drop down box below the screen and go to the line where it says:

 Musical Presentation just above   .2  and just below Moment of Silence  in the jump to menu

The meeting was broadcast live within the city of Irvine on Cox Communications Channel 30.   And will continue to be available on demand using the ICTV menu:   http://cityofirvine.org/cityhall/citymanager/pio/ictv/city_council_meetings.asp

We played :

America the Beautiful,  Humoresque – by Dvorak and Twinkle A 

We finished Twinkle with our traditional game of  ‘Up like a Rocket’ with our Gummy Life Savers on the tip of our bows.    It was one more chance to make the Mayor laugh.    Then we all took some pictures with  Mayor Kang.    With all of those parents in the auditorium taking pictures this took almost as long as the music.

SASS and TEC Suzuki Students with Irvine Mayor Kang and his City Council Members

Councilmember Beth Krom  was right.  It would be really cool if Mayor Kang picked up his bow again to play Twinkle with us.   Maybe next time he’ll remember to bring his violin.  He has a standing invitation to join us for any of our sessions.    Group  Lesson is every Saturday at 3pm @ OCCTAC and our next joint public performance with the TEC students is going to be at the Irvine Global Village Festival on Sat. Oct. 3rd.

It all went by very fast.   And the children had such a wonderful experience.   They were so excited when we got back to the green room to put everything away.   What a wonderful story they have to tell their friends and family members.   It was even more wonderful to see children from both the Irvine Suzuki program and the Santa Ana Suzuki program playing together for such an audience.   I think they are all  fired up to do it again some time soon.

You may wonder . . .  How did we get an invitation to play for such an auspicious occasion as the first City City Council meeting of the school year?

Last April our Suzuki Studio participated the Irvine Day In the Park.    It was early in the morning and it wasn’t very crowded yet.   Only two Twinklers, Jacob and Sophie were there to help me with our booth which we moved under a tree.    That was because my advanced students were all at orchestra rehearsal and some people were on Spring Break.

Mayor Kang was expected to open the event and afterward he always circles the booths and visits with everyone.   When he got to our tree he saw the children playing their violins and asked if he could play on my  violin.   How could I couldn’t resist?   Before you know it he and the kids were playing all the Suzuki songs that they knew.   

 My students discovered that this Mayor was not only an education mayor and a culture mayor.   He  was also a Suzuki Violin kid at heart.     We are very lucky to have a Mayor of Irvine in Orange County who grew up playing the violin.

I want to thank Mayor Kang for inviting us, as well as  the City Council Members and everyone that  came to hear the children play.   You were a wonderful audience.   Thank you for giving our students so much encouragement and allowing them to share their abilities and enthusiasm with the local community at your meeting and on your media service.   It was a privilege.

Mayor Kang is always welcome to come by and borrow my violin anytime he needs a break from the office.     TEC is just down the block from the Civic Center between the District and the Diamond Malls.

Ms. Cynthia

A New Suzuki Program for Santa Ana

 

Getting started

Finding our Violin Feet

In the Fall of 2005 Ms. Cynthia approached Dr. Ana Jimenez, the Executive director and founder of OCCTAC with the idea of starting a Suzuki program at the Center in Santa Ana.    During the Spring of 2006 they began writing grants and searching for ways to fund the program.   It  was not easy to find funding for such an idea.   Very few people understand why you would want to start a string program for children as young as preschool in an urban at risk community.    But Ms. Cynthia wanted to start her Suzuki program so that it could reach children before the age when other more negative elements in their environment influenced the children and their families.

First Classes

Even though they did not receive any funds for instrument or equipment they decided to start the first classes that summer for the beggining students.   They had 3 classes for children from ages 3-4 and 5-7 with their parents.    One class was also provided for students who had come from other violin classes.

Children playing musical foot charts

That summer Ms. Cynthia met some of the first families that would make a commitment to practice at home with their children and stay in the program.   There was so much for both parents and children to learn.    Envolving parents in the process of learning at home is very different that traditional forms of music study.   Ms. Cynthia began to realize that she needed to find translations of Suzuki Materials in Spanish and spend more time with the students.

Parents also began to plan how they would raise funds together to get the instruments that where needed so that every child could have a good quality instrument to study on as they progressed.   In addition we were able to find an intern with a background in the Suzuki Method to help with the program.    Kelly helped a great deal with creating a video record of those first classes.

Violin Hand / Bow hand

We were not able to find grant money for all of the violins we were going to need but one organization provided us with a small seed grant which we were able to double.    The parents held raffles and other activities to match those funds.    When we approached the violin maker we had choosen they helped extend those funds a little farther with a very nice discount.    I will tell you more about these sponsors in the next blog.

By Fall 06 we continued with more PreTwinkle Violin classes.  With the help of Kelly Wright we started a few more classes for older students.   She was teaching a full evening of classes after school on another night as well as working with special needs students.  Having open house and demonstration recitals slowly became more routine as the year progressed.  

Group Lessons

PreTwinkler with Box Violin

By the end of the year Ms. Cynthia was able to convince everyone that meeting only one day a week was not enough to make effective progress.   She was finally able to start adding Group Lessons on Saturdays so that the younger children could see what the more advanced students were doing.   In addition she was also able to combine the students from her TEC studio in Irvine so all of the children could learn from each other.   This is making things much easier for everyone.

In 2007-08 more and more families have heard about the program.   Little by little we are finding better materials in Spanish for parents including a copy of the video Nurtured by Love in with captions Spanish.    Ms. Cynthia was able to contact a collegue of hers from Chile whom she met in Matsumoto while they both studied with Dr. Suzuki.   He was able to send her another volume of Suzuki publication that has been translated into Spanish.   This will help untill more items become available in Spanish.

We are also looking for experienced young string players and students who would like to mentor students under the direction of Ms Cynthia.   Already several of her students have volunteered to help with the classes.