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Inside the students' chamber
They come to play, but fall for the food
BY CHARLES GARRATT • STAFF WRITER
 | | Students gather before lunch after a morning of rehearsal to begin their last week at Garth Newel Music Center. Pictured are (l-r) front row: Dina Neglia, Rosalind Soltow, Julia Glenn, Dan Colston, Jeni Herrera, Levena Johanson; back row: Bethany Pietroniro, Mikiko Fujiwara, Ji-Yun Jeong, Hannah Johnson, Joelle Arnhold, Alex Fortes. (Recorder photo by Charles Garratt) |
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HOT SPRINGS - Dull and dreary they are not. Talented and hard working they definitely are. When asked why they came to Garth Newel Music Center to spend the summer playing chamber music they said, "It's the food."
While Chef Randy would be glad to know students appreciate the good cooking they enjoy while studying at Garth Newel, the reputation Garth Newel has earned over the years as one of the country's premier venues for chamber music and the top notch instruction the students receive certainly are the forces driving the young performers to the mountains of Virginia.
A dozen fellowship musicians join Garth Newel resident musicians and other regional professionals to form the chamber orchestra this Saturday and Sunday for performances. The orchestra is under the direction of Robbie Merfeld, who guided students the past five weeks.
All of the student fellowships are underwritten by sponsors (see sidebar). This allows Garth Newel to choose students based solely on talent and ability. Each student pays just $100 plus providing transportation to and from Garth Newel.
"They even provide laundry detergent," said violinist Jeni Herrera of the accommodations. Herrera is finishing her fourth summer at Garth Newel.
"I love it so much," Herrera said of Garth Newel, "I wish I could live here." She noted it would be depressing to return to Baltimore where she is completing her master's degree with plans to pursue her doctorate in violin performance.
Not all the students were so anxious to stay. While she enjoyed the summer and "liked my group," Joelle Arnhold said she was "ready to go home." The Virginia weather was rather hot for the Seattle native though she did admit she liked drying out from notoriously wet coastal Washington.
Executive director Jacob Yarrow includes the students in his assessment of the summer season as "remarkable." Each summer since he took the director's job Yarrow thought the season just couldn't get better. And this summer, like the others, he said the performances reach "a whole new place … the level continues to improve."
The number of student fellowships is limited each year and Yarrow notes positions are highly competitive. Many applications come by word of mouth from previous students and musicians who have performed at Garth Newel. The music center also sends brochures to top colleges and conservatories.
Artistic director Evelyn Grau agrees with Yarrow's appraisal of the students. A number are only 18, barely out of high school, and already playing at an exceptional level, she said. She described them as "an amazingly talented group of students."
Dan Colston, like Herrera, is in his fourth summer. This is his first year here as a violist. The previous three years he played the violin. Colston has a master's degree in violin performance and is one year into a second master's in viola. When he applied for the summer as a violinist, Grau told him he would have better chance of acceptance with the viola. Grau, herself a violist, joked, "There aren't as many violists in Mitchelltown."
Colston, who stands out in any group, quips without being asked that he played basketball in high school, a rather obvious assumption most people would make. In addition to being handy with the round ball, talented with bow on violin and viola, Colston has the gift of humor. The other students credit him with keeping laughter in the air.
Merfeld, chamber music teacher, performer and parttime farmer, carried the primary responsibility for shepherding the students through the summer. "What I love about Garth Newel," he said, "is the total sense of community." He noted students are "wonderfully gifted" and "very stimulating."
Instructing students at Garth Newel, Merfeld said, is "to make an invitation." The students may accept his guidance or they may respond with ideas of their own. "Chamber music is like that," he adds - a process of give and take, collaboration.
Merfeld picks up the added duty this week of preparing the chamber orchestra for two performances this weekend. The 22 members of the orchestra first played together on Tuesday at the beginning of rehearsals. They will practice together, and as individuals, long hours each day right up to the moment of each performance.
The rehearsal process is not a simple matter of learning notes on a page and keeping pace with a conductor. As rehearsal began Tuesday morning, Merfeld realized his orchestra was falling prey to an old cliché - not all the musicians were playing off the same score.
Merfeld said he had two different scores himself and asked section leaders to try to mark up various copies of music so each section - violin, viola, cello, bass - was playing from the same music.
As the orchestra started and stopped in what seemed like random order, Merfeld tweaked, listening for just that presentation of the composer's work that sounds right to him. "I will try to reveal what I am interested in," he told the musicians. And then consistent with his vision, he added, "Then we'll talk about it."
Last Friday night, the students gave their final concert in the small chamber groups formed during the five-week study period. The applause brought each group, from the piano trio to viola quintet, back to the stage multiple times to take bows.
Garth Newel Music Center is located between Hot Springs and Warm Springs on U.S. 220. The Saturday concert begins at 5 p.m. The Sunday concert starts at 3 p.m. More information is available by calling (540) 839- 5018 or online at www.garthnewel.org.
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