PORT ANGELES — That was so much fun, “it was better than choice time,” a first-grader told violinist James Garlick.
Choice time is a class period when Dry Creek Elementary School students get to choose their own activities. So it can be a lot of fun.
But earlier this month, Garlick, a globe-trotting musician and cofounder of Port Angeles’ Music on the Strait festival, received that high praise during his visit to the school.
In nine classes, Garlick played for and talked with Dry Creek students. They all discussed music and the way it expresses emotions, then listened to him illustrate it all through his violin.
“I have so much respect for school teachers,” Garlick said; “I was completely drained after that.”
Garlick, who grew up in Port Angeles and went on to the Juilliard School in New York City and a career in music, next got some friends together. They formed an ensemble, and last Thursday, Seattle Symphony concertmaster Noah Geller and cellist Efe Baltacigil, Minnesota Orchestra violist David Auerbach and Seattle percussionist Mari Yoshinaga went with Garlick to Dry Creek Elementary and Stevens Middle School for a pair of outdoor concerts.
“It was really wonderful, really exciting for all of us,” to play for a live audience, Geller said.
The Seattle Symphony has been giving its concerts online since last fall.
For these school performances, Garlick chose “Strum,” a piece by 40-year-old Black composer Jessie Montgomery.
With its folk and dance rhythms, “‘Strum’ allows us to actually strum our instruments, guitar style,” Garlick said.
He added that he wanted to celebrate Montgomery’s music and the fact that she’s a living composer and a woman of color.
Then came the Quartet No. 2 in A minor from Felix Mendelssohn, who created that work when he was 18. He’d been writing music since he was a pre-teen, Garlick noted.
Yoshinaga, who is Geller’s wife, played drums and “helped us keep the beat,” he said; she also played a movement of a Bach cello suite with Baltacigil, a piece “I think nobody’s ever heard before.”
Before departing, Yoshinaga also gave a mini-tutorial on percussion instruments.
“She helped everyone get in touch with their inner rhythm,” Geller said.
For these young audiences, Garlick added, “we’re not presenting a diluted or simplified version” of the music. There is no one prescribed way to appreciate it.”
Yet people of any age may feel classical music isn’t for them because they’re not “qualified” to listen to concertos or symphonies, he said.
With their playing, Garlick and friends hope to share the joy and solace of the art form.
In trying times, he said, music is for all of us.
This summer, Garlick and his Music on the Strait cofounder, Richard O’Neill, will again present the festival — this time at venues in both Clallam and Jefferson counties.
Peninsula College’s Maier Performance Hall and the former Olympic Music Festival barn in Quilcene are two of the potential settings for the concerts, which are set for the second and third weekends in August.
More information about past festival events and about Garlick and O’Neill, who won a Grammy Award in February, can be found at musiconthestrait.com.
“We’re hoping for live concerts with a virtual component,” said Garlick, who added the performers will be announced in a few weeks. “We’re really excited; we have all the artists lined up.”
With the summer season still dependent on COVID-19 case rates and vaccinations, though, “we’re staying flexible,” he said.
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Jefferson County senior reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-417-3509 or durbanidelapaz@peninsuladailynews.com.
