Celebrating 40 years of free music
WATERLOO — First United Church in Waterloo has long established itself as a centre for music, offering a range of concerts throughout the year.
One series in particular, however, has become a much-loved regular event for music lovers: the free Tuesday noon-hour concert series, which this year celebrates its 40th anniversary. And what better way to mark such an occasion than a concert featuring some of the region’s best musicians.
On Tuesday, March 27, the final concert of the 2017/2018 season will feature the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony’s principal trumpet, Larry Larson and his wife Mary Jay, trumpet player with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra. They will be joined by the church’s music director, Kathleen King-Martin, playing the magnificent Gabriel Kney pipe organ and Daniel Warren on trumpet. Warren is a conductor and soloist as well as a member of the K-W Symphony.
“I booked them two years ago because I wanted something spectacular,” said the noon-hour series co-ordinator, Sharon Gowland.
Musicians such as Larson, Jay and Warren have discovered a kind of freedom with the series.
“They get to play their own repertoire,” she said. “It’s a very warm audience and the acoustics are excellent.”
With so much going for it, no wonder the musicians are always keen to perform in a series that had a rather wobbly beginning.
Organist Jan Overduin was music director at First United in 1972 when he came up with the idea of holding a series of Thursday organ concerts on the church’s small Hallman organ located in the church chancel. This was three decades before the church purchased the Gabriel Kney pipe organ, with its 2,633 pipes.
For that first musical outing only one person showed up, and left after 10 minutes.
The public just wasn’t ready so the idea sat on the back burner until 1978 when the church’s new music director, Nixon McMillan, took over from Overduin and gave it another try, this time offering a six-week concert series. The public was ready to embrace the idea and the sanctuary began to fill every week with music lovers.
“Now they come in droves,” said Gowland. “We get up to 400 people.”
Even with all the construction in uptown Waterloo and the closed roads, the concert series’ faithful continued to fill the seats every Tuesday noon hour. Being able to purchase a $7 lunch fresh made that morning by members of the 18-volunteer concert auxiliary and then eating it while listening to the music in the sanctuary is a bonus.
The money earned from these lunches is enough to cover costs and pay the musicians, which is one of the reasons the church is able to attract such accomplished artists, people such as Jerzy Kaplanek, a Laurier music professor and member of the celebrated Penderecki String Quartet.
As Gowland said “Some of our musicians are to music what Gretzky and Crosby are to hockey.”
But the series also provides opportunities for emerging musicians, particularly those coming out of Laurier’s music program who are looking to gain public recognition and professional experience.
Kathy Beynon, a retired music professor at Laurier, ran the concert series for 40 years, turning the reins over to Gowland in 2004.
“When I started, I did a lot of performing myself,” said the pianist. “We slowly progressed and when I went to Laurier, Jan came in and we started to go professional.”
Both Overduin and Beynon taught at the university and both had access to the multiple talents of music faculty and students, what Beynon calls “the cream of the crop.”
“We were happy at the beginning with 35 (audience) people,” she said, still amazed at how the program has grown.
The 22 to 24 concert series runs from the third Tuesday in September until the last Tuesday in November then again in midJanuary, wrapping up the Tuesday before Easter.
“I think they (musicians) love it at First United because it’s always so friendly and the audience is so appreciative,” she said. “We have very educated concert goers; retired teachers and professors.”
At the same time, many people with no understanding of music come to enjoy the half-hour concert which is not always classical music.
In the past, they have included contemporary, Rennaisance and even jazz thanks to the influence of Ron Shirm, a Laurier music professor and a recognized jazz musician.
She said that when the symphony musicians first started performing, there was a reluctance to talk to the audience, given their orchestral roles would rarely call for them to have such a public face.
“When we started they were very shy about speaking,” said Beynon. “They’re loosening up.”