By Jeremy D. Wells
Carter County Times
Standing outside the classroom, after the first meeting of the Olive Hill Community Orchestra, violinist Elaine Swinney Brunelle talked with a student about all the places that music can take them, and the opportunities it can provide.
“I mean, I know people all over the country. I’ve played a lot of places. And there’s no way I would’ve had the experiences, outside of music, that I’ve had,” Brunelle noted. “I mean it’s amazing!”
But Brunelle – who has played with Kansas, YES, the Moody Blues, and the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, among others in the pop and classical world over the course of her career – said she, like many others, started playing music just to spend time with friends.
“I started just like everyone else,” she remembered. “I was just a little nine-year-old fourth grader. I didn’t even know what a violin was. I come from a very athletic family. My father said he played the radio. That was his music.”
Her mother and the rest of the family were similarly inclined, she explained. So, when her best friend said she wanted to play, Elaine’s first response was a question.
“What? Why do you want to do that?” she remembered asking.
“But,” she continued, “if she was going to do it, I was going to do it. She wasn’t doing something that I wasn’t doing. That’s how it started, and I just kept it going.”
She said until that point she had been “pretty scattered” as a child. Playing violin, though, “was the first time for me, anyway, that I could focus.”
And even before it became her career, it gave her an opportunity to travel, to compete, to collaborate, and to make new friends.
Those are the sorts of opportunities she said she hopes to offer her private class students as well as the members of the newly formed community orchestra, which meets every Saturday, at the Olive Hill Center for Arts & Heritage (OHCFAH).
She understands that the folks participating in the orchestra – the group is open to anyone age nine or older – will all come with different levels of experience, from advanced students to complete beginners. But she believes the orchestra can be fun and rewarding for all participants, regardless of their background or experience level. Some might make music their career someday, like she has. But, she noted, she has had several students who went on to work in different fields.
“One is a computer scientist who works for Google. Another one is a physician. There are several of them. They’ve gone into different fields. But guess what? They play in an orchestra! They play in their community orchestra, or they’re semi-pro. Music is still a big part of their lives.”
That kind of fulfillment, and the ability to convey both beauty and heartache without the use of words, is something that can be rewarding for anyone, no matter their age or station in life, Brunelle explained.
“That’s why this orchestra is open to anybody, with or without experience,” Brunelle said. “We’re starting fresh. It’s going to take a little time. There’s going to be some bumps, and it’s going to take a little bit of time to get to where we need to be to call ourselves a community orchestra.”
But, she added, “You’ve just got to start somewhere, right?”
For Brunelle and the OHCFAH, that somewhere is here, and the time is now.
The community string orchestra meets on Saturday mornings at 10 a.m. at the OHCFAH, 120 Comet Drive in Olive Hill. Positions are available for violin, viola, cello, and bass players. While participants are responsible for their own instruments, a limited number of beginner instruments are available thanks to a donation from Old Town Violin in Lexington. For more information, email EStudioViolin@yahoo.com or call the Center at (606)207-1480.
Contact the writer at editor@cartercountytimes.com
