Art in Community among the Poor

Violin

In the fall of 2000 I was with some friends in Iasi, a university town in northern Romania, the historic ‘Rome’ of the Romanian Orthodox church. As we wondered around the city the first evening we noticed some old theater buildings in the center of the city. As we got closer, the huge cracks in the structure looked worse, broken windows, and little life except a sun worn sign. To our delight there was to be a concert that evening. We wandered back to the building later that evening to find doors open and a ticket lady through the tiny little metal hinged window she gave tickets through.

Sitting in the balcony we had a nice angle on the concert given by the Romanian orchestra along with a guest director, cellist, and violinist from Japan. Since I listen better with a pencil, I did some sketches through the evening. This particular sketch was during the violin solo of the Paganini piece.

Some six years later through a strange twist of circumstances I have started to play violin; mainly my wife and I decided to see if we could teach our son Suzuki violin, which required a parent to be learning. Starting into the second Suzuki book, at thirty one, I am now somewhere at the level of the average three or four year old Suzuki student. My thought as I got serious about starting violin was, ‘I want my kids to experience something beautiful’.