Collected Instruments Will Benefit Schools
10/08/2014
By David Perry
Over two days in September, UMass Lowell music students and members of the popular, university-rooted Party Band collected more than two dozen instruments, making it possible for budding young Lowell musicians to practice and play.
In collaboration with the university’s chapter of the National Association for Music Educators, 30 donated instruments were collected, cleaned, repaired and readied for distribution to students in Lowell public schools.
Drop spots were set up on Sept. 17 at Fox Hall, the largest living space on campus, and the following day at Durgin Hall, where the music program is based.
“We were incredibly successful,” said event organizer and Party Band percussionist Savannah Marshall (’13, music studies, psychology), now a graduate student studying community music.
Blair Bettencourt, an adjunct music department faculty member, was also on board, and as the retired music director of Westford Academy, he knows well the need for help with music in the public schools. Undergraduate music students Patricia Langenberg and Kelsey Olden helped clean, repair and assess the instruments, which included band and orchestra instruments, guitars, keyboards and drums.
“For our first drive, we really wanted to keep it simple and get donations from the campus community,” said Marshall. “We also posted on Facebook and to our families, but this way it was more of a campus event.”
Eighteen of the orchestral instruments, including trumpets, trombones, a French horn and clarinet will be distributed to Lowell schools “to afford many students access to a musical path for years to come,” said Marshall.
Instruments such as guitar, electric bass, drums and a keyboard will head to the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Lowell, whose Lowell Music Clubhouse is co-directed by Seth Bailin, also leader of Party Band.
Two orchestral instruments will be donated to the UMass Lowell String Project, and the rest will be used as repair projects for UMass Lowell undergraduate music pedagogy classes. University Music donated cleaning and instrument maintenance supplies.
Marshall, whose award-winning DifferenceMaker project Fresh Beets – which simultaneously encourages nutrition and music – is still in development, will have a presence at this year’s Homecoming on Oct. 25 from 2-6 p.m.