Music to our ears . . .
Music is one of those rare activities that both the
parents and the children support. We really hope
that it
continues to be heard in our home.
For his 15th birthday Tom finally received the guitar
he'd been asking for for quite a while. On the left, here he is on that very
day, sharing the feeling with Alex. This first guitar came from Costco, because
we wanted to make sure that his urgent desire was not just some adolescent
foible.
Tom was inseparable from that guitar, and in 2007 remained inseparable from
this and his other guitars.
The photo below shows him in 2007, working on it or
with it, perhaps restringing it.
Alex has
been playing violin for years, since 2003 (there's another photo of him doing so
here). The below photo was taken when he was starting to
get into it, in 2004.
He was taught for years by a local mother named Lisa, who taught many, many
would-be violinists from Happy Valley School,
both as part of the school's extracurricular arts program and privately. She has
since moved on to other things, which those lucky children's parents of course
understand. What she did for our children lasts.
On the left she is leading her young charges at a concert in June 2007. Alex
is looking straight at her. She taught the Suzuki method, giving her pupils at
even the earliest levels something to play coherently.
On the right, Tom playing in a bar in Paris in 2008. He started performing regularly
there, in bars and jazz clubs, sometimes even getting paid. Wish we
could see one of those gigs!
