Six down, countless more to go!
So that’s another year of Music Camp in the books! This June Chelsea Buyalos and myself had the opportunity to participate in our sixth year at the All Saints Anglican Church Music Camp in Fayetteville, GA where we spent the past week leading labs (I taught the Orchestral Strings lab and Chelsea the Vocal lab), performing with the Praise Band, and putting together a mid-week recital featuring other musicians within the church.
In her vocal lab, Chelsea focused on teaching the campers the words to the praise songs that were performed for the parents on Friday and on giving the kids an overview of some musical basics through a game geared towards dynamics and a matching game to teach musical symbols. In my orchestral strings lab the campers were exposed some of the different stringed instruments in the orchestra and they had the chance to get some hands-on experience with a violin, a viola, and a cello. We also played a game of musical jeopardy and built off of some of the musical principles that the campers learned in Chelsea’s lab.
The Wednesday evening recital went off with out a hitch and featured the talents of Kelly Abrams, Emma Bryan, and Gavin Bryan, some of the young up and coming musicians at All Saints. The program was largely sacred music and included some arrangements by Kelly and myself. The centerpiece of the program was Bach’s First Cello Suite, in which Emma and I split up the six movements to give the audience the chance to hear both the original cello composition and the guitar arrangement.
Now, of course, it wasn’t only work, work, work, all the time, we also went to see the Atlanta United FC take on the Colorado Rapids as part of their inaugural season (and on a personal note: I got to see Tim Howard play!!). And it was a 1-0 victory for the home team!!
All-in-all it was yet another successful and enriching Music Camp at All Saints and Chelsea and I can’t wait to be back next year!
