By Rozanne Fuller | Volunteer and Board Member
This July, I was fortunate to be able to spend my third summer volunteering with Rock Paper Scissors Children’s Fund in Vietnam. I was really looking forward to seeing everyone again, especially the music students. The day after we arrived in the town of Cam Duc, all of the music students came to our hotel to meet with the volunteers, old and new, and to play their instruments for us. We were immediately impressed with the progress they had made since we saw them last summer, thanking them and the wonderful teachers who work with them all through the year.
Our goal for the month of July was to work with the students on some fun music and put on a concert for the community at the end of the month. At this point, I was missing my colleagues, Laurette and Hannah, who had been there the past 2 summers. (Laurette is a Suzuki violin teacher, and fellow orchestra director, and Hannah is a violin teacher and instrument repair technician extraordinaire.) I am a cellist, and not an expert on the violin, but fortunately, we had Sophie and Nicole, both college violinists, and Elissa, a high school Junior violinist and budding instrument repair technician, as well as Phoebe, who plays cello and is a junior in high school. So we had enough teachers on hand to split the students into sections, and learn some orchestra music and help them to play in small ensembles as well.
Each of our volunteer violin teachers worked with a group of students, helping them learn their orchestra music. It was challenging sometimes - trying to communicate in a different language through a student translator, with a group of students who are doing something entirely new to them! But they were intrepid and dedicated teachers. If any of them become music educators like me, they will already have had their trial by fire.
Needless to say, we were all very happy when Susan, another volunteer musician, arrived in Cam Duc. She is a professional violist in the Boston Pops Orchestra, and could not come until after their 4th of July concert. She brought great energy and expertise to our little group, as well as some fun music for the kids to play. Susan is an amazing musician and teacher. She worked with our local Vietnamese violin teachers, as well as the younger students, sharing her knowledge and her love with them.
I had chosen 3 orchestra pieces for the whole group to play together. So we had 3 different violin sections and a cello section, all playing different parts. They learned their parts in their small groups, and at the end of every day we tried putting them together. At first it is challenging to play your part when others are playing something different, but that is the beauty of an orchestra; you learn how your part fits with the rest of the group, and you experience the thrill of hearing all the parts together.
After 4 weeks, the group sounded great all together! In addition, each student also played in a small group- a duet, trio or quartet, where they learned to play their own part independently. We had an amazing final concert and art exhibit for families and friends at the end of the month.
We hope that the small Rock-Paper-Scissors Orchestra continues to play for the community in the coming year, and that more young people in the town will be able to join the program. Thanks to all of the donors who make this possible!
Rozanne
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
Support this important cause by creating a personalized fundraising page.
Start a Fundraiser
