SRO in Morgantown

     The phone rang this past Saturday.  It was my friend Tim.  Tim's a trumpet player in the Morgantown Community Orchestra and he was inviting me to tag along to the concert they were giving at the CAC at West Virginia University on Sunday night.  I eagerly accepted his offer and patiently waited until the appointed time when they arrived to pick me up.  I don't own a car so transportation is a chore, but Tim's wife Chris is a good driver and we had a pleasant enough trip to Morgantown.  The theater itself was small, seating maybe 100 people and soon filled up to overflowing.  Chairs were brought in, and more chairs, and then more chairs as it soon became apparent they had grossly underestimated the following the Orchestra would draw.  


     The conductor,  Alejandro Pinzon,  was gracious if soft spoken.  When the featured pianist Rafael Smith failed to show, maestro Pinzon quickly and apologetically  rearranged the program and we were underway with  a short piece by a wind ensemble.   Then the meat of the evening, and a bravo performance it was.  Latin American in theme it showed off the talents of our community musicians.  From a pre-teen violinist to a septuagenarian flautist, who had taken up the flute just two years prior, they all played with gusto and verve.  The  highlight for me was "Habanera" from the opera "Carmen" by Bizet, which is the one and only opera I've listened too and really enjoyed.  The orchestra hasn't been together very long, nor have they had many practice sessions, but you couldn't tell it from the music they produced. 


      It was a thoroughly wonderful evening of music,,,topped off by a stop  at the Red Lobster and the cruel murder of a couple of Maine's best lobsters.  What a person will go through to eat some butter.