On Dec 16, 2010, our town of Bay had an orchestra playing in public for the first time—-and the orchestra was the Goducate orchestra! We were invited by the mayor to play Christmas carols for the town.
Our musicians and their parents were excited but also worried. Since it was the first time an orchestra was playing in the town, we did not know how many people would turn up. About 300 people came to enjoy the music.
Not only did our orchestra perform. So did 34 selected students from those attending our music and feeding programme in neighbouring villages; they formed a band playing the recorder. Most of these students had started to learn to play the recorder only about a month ago. Denver, who accompanied the recorder band on the keyboard, is only 10 years old.
After the mayor’s speech I was invited to introduce the orchestra and to explain why we started music tutorials. At the end of the concert, we were given a token of appreciation. Unexpectedly, the mayor also announced that he would commit 5000 pesos (USD 112) to our orchestra, and he invited us to play again on Sat Dec 18. In addition, one of the town councillors promised to donate uniforms for our recorder players because she noticed that they were wearing their own school uniforms. We plan to use the 5000 pesos from the mayor to get uniforms for the members of our orchestra.
The concert scheduled for Dec 18 did not materialize because of the rain. We took shelter in the town hall until 8 pm, taking photographs with Santa Claus. Later we took the children sightseeing around the town, which they enjoyed very much.