Musaeus plays to educate future symphony musicians

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman - Lethbridge Herald on March 8, 2022.

Herald photo by Alejandra Pulido-Guzman The Lethbridge Symphony's Musaeus String Quartet performs an afternoon of music for an audience of children this past weekend at the Galt Museum.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

After a great turnout in October, the Galt Museum and Archives hosted the Musaeus String Quartet with Lethbridge Symphony’s principal strings once again on Sunday.
An afternoon of music for children was an opportunity to teach the elements of music in a format designed for young attendees to understand.
Associate concert master of the Lethbridge Symphony and second violinist in the Musaeus String Quartet with Lethbridge Symphony’s principal strings, Airdrie Robinson said that children’s concerts are one of her favourite things to do.
“These are the symphony members of the future, and they are our audience members of the future so it’s really nice to connect to a younger generation because often in a typical orchestra, the audience is maybe a bit older and it’s late at night,”
She said that any time they have the opportunity to do informal shows like the one on Sunday and have the opportunity to talk and interact with their audience, is great.
During the quartet performance music director of the Lethbridge Symphony Orchestra, Glenn Klassen, explained every piece played and asked questions of the audience.
They performed a waltz and Klassen explained to the children in the audience the particular rhythm of “threes”. The quartet also performed music from Harry Potter and Star Wars which was easy for those in attendance to identify.
“We purposely picked pieces that were going to demonstrate the things that we talked about, so it flowed very naturally and a lot of times when it is a younger family show there is an educational element,” said Robinson.
She said that when she goes to a symphony concert herself, she loves it when the conductor takes the time to talk about what the piece was about or the historical context in which it was written or even about their own experience with that piece of music.
The next Lethbridge Symphony Orchestra event will take place on March 21 at the Southminster United Church to celebrate their 60th anniversary.
For more information visit http://www.lethbridgesymphony.org

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