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Violinabox. A Redwood Violin Project Spinoff
Taking another angle on the Made Local theme, a group of ten violinmakers in 9 countries across the world are building a single violin. The violin is being passed from maker to maker with each completing the next stage of construction. This collaborative violin building project has three distinctive features People following the project will…
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Caprice for the Redwood Violin preformed at TEDx Sonoma
I was invited to give a presentation about the Redwood Violin Project to TEDx Sonoma. In the spirit of the project I invited a local composer and a local musician to collaborate in the presentation. Felix Herbst’s “Caprice for the Redwood Violin” was performed by 12 year old violinist Henry Miller Hear it here:
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The Redwood Violin Donated to YPCO
The Redwood Violin has been donated to the Santa Rosa Young People’s Chamber Orchestra The official handover occurred at a YPCO concert at the Phoenix Theatre, Petaluma where Clair Wu Claire played the solo in Amy Beach’s “A Hermit Thrush at Eve” The Redwood Violin will be loaned out on an annual basis to a…
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Interview with Composer Gwendolyn Przyjazna
Gwendolyn Przyjazna [pshi-YAH-znah] is the 17 year old composer of “Concertina for violin and strings”, which was performed by the Young Peoples Chamber Orchestra in May of this year. The performance was the first public performance of any of Gwendolyn’s work and, in addition, was the public debut performance of the Redwood Violin. Gwendolyn also…
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First public appearance. Dancing the sun up on May Morning
At Dawn on May Morning we took the Redwood Violin to Sebastopol to see the Apple Tree Morris Dance the sun up. Morris dance is an English folk dance tradition, usually danced with a team of six. The costumes, dances and dates for dancing varies between local teams. The Morris tradition has spread across the…
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Jon Berger Plays an Original Country Dance
Sebastopol fiddler Jon Berger composed this tune the style of an English Country Dance. He is joined here by Rebecca King on piano; Jon and Rebecca are two thirds of the band Persons of Quality. Jon’s wife Kalia Kliban, who made the pegs on the Redwood Violin, is a prominent English Country Dance caller. She…
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New Theme Tune for the Redwood Violin Videos
I’m very excited to be able to add a theme tune to the Redwood Violin videos. High school Junior, Gwendolyn Thalia Przyjazna, composed this musical signature which I feel captures the optimistic and exploratory essence of the Redwood Violin Project. Gwendolyn is deeply in music composition and is seriously considering the possibility of music school…
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Young People’s Chamber Orchestra Rehearsal
The Young Peoples Chamber Orchestra is a group sponsored by the Education Department of the Santa Rosa Symphony. It has around twenty members and, because they are all string players and are able to wear masks, their rehearsals for the spring season are going ahead. They didn’t have an approved site for their first rehearsal…