The String Orchestra -- Rhiannon's Concert

The Strings Orchestra
Rhiannon is just a little left of centre.
Turquoise dress.

Today was Rhiannon's Christmas Concernt

I leaned over to Mary when the string orchestra was practising “Dona Nobis Pacem”.

 I told Mary that I sang that melody first in my first year university class.

I associated it with Catholic literugy and I felt as though I had somehow failed my church, letting even one note of that song come out of my mouth.

My first experience with heresy.

I had to sing it in a concert to pass the course.

My youth was a place of consistent naivety.

Mary and I went into the auditorium and watched the dress rehearsal for the concert, since Leo and Rhiannon had to be there early.

... Rhiannon, hard at work, plahing one of the songs ...

As well, there was a family pot luck after the concert, so Mary made a beautiful pot of home made beans to go along with the bread I had baked.

Everyone was generous, as they are at potlucks.

Big bowls of quinoa salad, mararoni salads, rice krispie squares which are a hit at any potluck but at Christmas some of the boxes of Rice Krispie have small piece of rice in brilliant red and green colours.

That makes the taste of the squares much different.

This little girl adores her violin
in a way that I never loved my piano.

I am always curious when I watch her practise
She really wants to play this instrument.

Rhiannon was mouthing to her dad during the concert.

Her E string had come unwound and there just wasn’t time between songs to get that fixed.

How disappointing since she has been practising for months for this concert.

She just missed playing that string, which makes her performance much more difficult than that experience by other people who had a full set of strings to play on.

Arta