The Food Of Love At Park Terrace

On Maundy Thursday, Chuck Jay, director of the Villa Park, California High School Orchestra, brought his musicians to Rancho Santa Margarita to perform a concert for residents at Park Terrace, an assisting living community. Organized by Cheryl Dunn and Joan Haneishi, over a dozen adults and young people from St. John's went along to assist with refreshments and get to know some of the residents. I met a woman of 100 ("I was an Army brat; we lived everywhere," she said) and an Episcopalian (she's in search of a church!) who had helped do some programming for the ENIAC project -- the first computer -- around the time it was transferred from the University of Pennsylvania to the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland after World War II.

Chuck and his skilled young musicians ran through an hour of spirited orchestra favorites. A highlight was a performance of "Casey at the Bat" narrated by Villa Park's gifted dramatic arts teacher, Stacy Castiglione. When Chuck called for a volunteer for a percussion part, one of our acolytes, Adam Lang, got the nod; that's Adam above, getting a quick lesson from the maestro. His dad, nationally noted trumpet player Buddy Lang, was in the audience and watched Adam's performance carefully. He got a thumb's up, as did the young man on the water bottles. All good work on the day in Holy Week when the church gives special attention to Christ's command that we love one another.