The music teacher in me is breathing a sigh of relief.  Ahh  We are back in bass again.  Let the music rehearsing begin.

It all began last fall when our school in Alabama was given the generous gift of a 3\4 size string bass.  I have attempted to get Joshua interested in a variety of music lessons.  He was never interested…until I brought home the bass.  I brought it home to see if I could get it in tune.  Joshua fell in love with its dark, rich voice.  As I was tuning it he exclaimed, “Wow!  Let me try that.”  and…that was that.  Music lessons began in the school’s Master’s Center and Joshua spent the rest of the school year with the wonderful Mr. Macaro as his teacher.

We left the bass with the school back home when we moved. (I do hope someone is playing it)  After we were settled here in Durham I began the search for a music store that possibly would rent us  a student double bass for the year.  After several phone calls we located the County Durham Youth Services.  They were so wonderful and very excited to have one of their instruments in the hands of an eager learner.

Thus began our journey to pick up the found string bass.

A dear friend, a fellow student in Rob’s study group, offered to pick up the bass in his car.  We were delighted.  The only problem was Joshua and I needed to go select a bass as there were four to choose from and they has all been in storage for a while.  Not a huge demand for string bass rental 😉

We could not possibly all fit in the car with the string bass, so one afternoon Meg, Joshua and I set off for a 45 minute bus ride to a neighbouring town to go meet our bass.  We took one bus there then walked two miles (cause we were told the bus didn’t go that far) and arrived in the rain at the County Durham Youth offices.  We selected a lovely instrument that we felt could be brought in tune with its existing strings.  A week or so later Rob and our sweet friend picked it up.  We did find a second bus to ride home that day so it was a shorter walk and two buses for an hour trip home.

The Lovely String Bass from County Durham Youth Services

The County Durham Youth Services offers music instrument rental and lessons through the schools here.  They have wonderful rates on instrument rental.  Since the kids are being home schooled this year we will be looking for a bass teacher in our city.  (I can not imagine transporting the bass each week back to the County offices)  Right now Joshua is practicing his songs from last year and brushing up on the notes and reading the bass clef.  We pray to find a great teacher nearby for him.  Meg and I are working on her theory and recorder sight-reading together.  Happy to have live music in my home again.  Just in time for Christmas too.  Perhaps I will go search a few easy  Christmas carols for them to try.

Cheers,

Beth