Hello PRS members and friends!

It has been a whirlwind summer of travel, workshops, playing sessions with friends and a beautiful season here in Portland. Thank you all for talking to the weathers Gods to let me experience a beautiful PNW summer!

I hope to see all of you next Friday, September 12th as we welcome in the 8th season of PRS. We can gather together to play some fantastic music on recorders of all sizes, capped double reeds, sackbuts and the beloved viola da gamba. Come share your talents and summer stories with your friends of PRS.

I will have music ranging from some of my most favorite renaissance tunes to amusing contemporary selections. There will be parts for those wanting a few notes to those ready to take in as much as they can handle! If memory serves me right, you might consider a battery operated stand light, too! So don't delay, put the date on your calendar, grab a friend or two and come out and play!

Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or concerns. I am looking forward to working with all of you.

Laura Kuhlman
 

THERE ARE THOSE occasions that arise that allow us to contemplate how truly good we have it.  This last Member Play and Potluck Night was strikingly one of those events.  I was entertained to amazement by the talent many of you so warmly shared with us.  Talk about impressive.  

 

You all hear me say my motto often enough:  "Good company, good food, and good music, is a good time."  And our members' playing night this year lived up to all expectations of that axiom.

 

We had a viol consort bowing delightfully.  Boyd, Carol and Judy tooting up a good time.  Susan and Ted at their exceptional best with a swinging Libertango on recorder and guitar.  Los Grillos can and did again entertain with both grand music and delightful humor - something swell about a goose and a cow - you had to love them.  Vicki showed that with a dainty recorder she could keep up with and stay on top of Bill and Laura on flourishing saxophones.  That accordion player too, whoever he was, let us all know we don't have to play perfectly to fanfare a love for the music within us.  The "Baroque" Trio, what a lot of fun Sophie, Zoe, and Susan - certainly you played richly and proved you weren't "broke."  Then that Purcell thing, not only was that unusual piece played to the utmost, you had to be entertained with Laura jazzing up a fine pose in her utmost high heels, with Vicki bopping it out, Susan swaying to the music, and even Judy getting a little groove on.  Then Gwyneth and Bruce - now I don't know where that talent has been hiding out but what a contribution - they sure made those crumhorns sound like preeminent instruments, and are dandy storytellers too.  Then what an end, with Tony playing a fabulous drum while being faithfully accompanied by Laura on bagpipes and Vicki on sopranino (you just had to have been there).  It all just could not have gotten any better!

 

Oh, and of course, the victuals - I love eating well.  And we were graciously fed as we gathered at the end and so enjoyed each other's company.

 

Through all the trials and tussles of daily life, we occasionally have those moments to remind us that life is truly worthwhile.  That was again so well done through all y'all giving of yourselves.  All who participated, just by the beauty and pleasure voiced in their performance, left us understanding that there is truly an inspiration of Godliness in each of us.  There is no other explanation.

 

No exaggeration - What a good time!  A challenge for someone perhaps to consider for next time, if possible, could it be for somebody to come up with a musical rendition of what Patsy Cline may have sounded like if she had actually composed in the Renaissance?  I'm all geared up for next year!