Day Two

Our first show today was for the 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders at Wilcox Elementary School. You can see it was quite a crowd, filling the entire cafeteria. We were able to find 5 adult-sized chairs and a microphone and that's all we needed to get the show going. An introduction by the school's very helpful and friendly Vice-Principal helped too.

When we perform for this age group we really try to emphasize the fun of playing an instrument and remind the students that they will soon have the opportunity to be in the middle school band. This kind of interaction can have an great impact on the numbers of students who enroll in band and that, in turn, will have an impact on them for many years to come.



Our second stop was at Kauai High School where we took time for this photo op. We had visited Kauai HS last spring and were delighted to have a student wind quintet perform for us! Those students have since graduated, but hopefully some others will also decide to give chamber music a shot. We always suggest it to band students. It's a great way for them to have some fun making music with their friends and develop their ensemble skills at the same time.



With our two school visits out of the way early we stopped by a local landmark for some lunch. Gaylord's Restaurant is located at the historic Kilohana Plantation, just outside of Lihue. It is a lovely place to enjoy a relaxing lunch. It was so relaxing we realized our plan to return to the hotel to rehearse for the afternoon was in jeopardy. With the permission of the manager and the owner, who was lunching at the same time, we set up in the enormous living room next to the restaurant and got some rehearsing done right there. it was a great room for chamber music, complete with grand piano. Maybe we'll be back to play there for a more formal event sometime.



Also on the plantation is an old sugar cane train and a horse and carriage that offer rides to visitors. We met the horse, Buddy, a sturdy Clysdale who had a taste for raw sugar from Jim's hand. The driver turned out to be a horn player from the community band that we had met Thursday night! Small world, huh?

Our evening had a little excitement too. Just as we were leaving the hotel to go to dinner the power went out. Hoping it was a local outage we headed up the road to Kapa'a only to find out that most of Kapa'a had power, except for Blossoming Lotus, the restaurant we really wanted to try. We tried to wait it outt, but ended up settling for something else. When we returned to the hotel the power was still off. Luckily there are lots of gas tiki torches around the grounds, so we hung out by the pool until the power was restored just in time for bedtime.