Laguna Beach students experience classical music up close
With the Laguna Beach Music Festival back in town, Laguna Beach middle and high school students had an opportunity to listen to and learn from the professionals.
Pianist Jeremy Denk, the artistic director of the 21st annual festival, and violinist Stefan Jackiw performed select compositions for the students, leaving many in awe.
The duo played music from Johann Sebastian Bach, Charles Ives, Igor Stravinsky and others, educating the audience about each composer and the pieces they played.
Denk and Jackiw also fielded questions from the students, the queries ranging from their time spent working on their craft to tests of their knowledge about specific pieces such as Antonio Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons: Summer.”
“All these guys are super professional,” said Grayson Carr, who was among dozens of seventh-grade students in attendance at the Thurston Middle School event Thursday. “I think one of them said that they’ve been doing this for 40 years.”
Jackiw, 37, revealed that he had played the violin since the age of 4. Students marveled at the longevity for both musicians, as Denk said he had been a piano player for 47 years.
Fiona McCormick, 13, among the onlookers Thursday morning, said she played piano and cello in elementary school. The experience may lead her to pick up music again.
“Honestly, a little bit,” McCormick said when asked if she caught the urge to sit in front of the keys again. “It was really cool to see them play. It was really fun.”
Dani Kang, 13, who is Korean American, lit up watching Jackiw perform. The New York native had shared with the audience his Korean heritage during their hour together.
“It was really nice to see that there’s diversity in music because there’s not a lot of different communities that are like that,” said Kang, a trombone player. “It’s really cool to see different musicians. I perform in the jazz band and concert bands in the school, and I find it really cool that they were able to adapt to so many different styles of music.”
The Laguna Beach Music Festival will include three concerts at Laguna Playhouse Friday through Sunday, with Denk performing every night. Jackiw will be among the featured performers on Friday and Sunday.
Forrest Greenbaum, 12, a violin player himself, said he would go home and ask his parents to take him to one of the concerts. He said he is the concertmaster at Thurston, a designation normally given to the most accomplished performer in the violins.
“I was very impressed with their interest, the natural kind of inquisitiveness, and the fact that the music captivated their attention,” Steven Wade, the music director at Thurston Middle School and the jazz band director at Laguna Beach High, said in observing the students’ engagement. “They’re generally very good students anyway, they’re pretty bright, but I was just pleased that the music reached out to them that way, that they wanted to pay attention.”
Wade added that the musical programs are on the upswing coming out of the coronavirus pandemic. He said the middle school has four ensembles, while the high school has a jazz band, a marching band, an orchestra and a concert band.
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