The ECPO’s Music Investment Project has been going for 9 years. This February was the first time since its existence that all their primary school participants had the opportunity to come together and make a musical noise!

The Raymond Mhlaba Sports Centre in Motherwell, Port Elizabeth reverberated on Friday 26 February, not with the noise of robust sports players, but with the exuberant sounds of violins, the full woodwind family, brass players and the sweet voices of a mass choir.

The Eastern Cape Philharmonic Orchestra’s Music Investment Project, now in its ninth year of existence, had a first time get-together of all the primary school participants who benefit from this Music Education Project.

The focus of this event was fun. The children who come from four different +communities in Port Elizabeth’s Northern Areas and Motherwell Township were brought in by bus. The event created an opportunity for the almost three hundred children to meet each other, play together, compete in a dance competition and of course…have a fabulous lunch!

The various instrument sections – strings, woodwind & brass – had a short rehearsal session where they met and rehearsed with the other young instrumentalists; and then performed for each other as sections. The strings started off with the ever popular The Lion sleeps Tonight and were met with tumultuous applause. The roof lifted after the woodwind group’s rendering of an arrangement of Karate Recorder; and the brass players had everyone clapping and dancing to a kwela number. The choir, numbering more than a hundred voices, was not to be outdone and ended the “concert” on a high note with Emarabini.

To crown all the fun and display of talent, some of the quite introverted learners, and many of the more extrovert learners took to the floor for a hectic dance competition. The dance steps, body contortions, impromptu splits and swank of some dancers left their music teachers and fellow aspiring young musicians in stitches of laughter and high spirits. One could almost think that the participants’ creative spirits were over stimulated!

The day was made possible by the National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund, generous sponsor of the ECPO Music Investment Project since 2001. The event ended with the youngsters munching the freshest of fresh apples and pears from Tulpieskraal and Rugby Brand farms in the Langkloof, and boarding their buses for the trip home after their exciting day.

Photo : Marthinus Hattingh