Last month a longtime customer of ours, Emily Caravella, contacted our shop and asked if we would be willing to do a virtual presentation for her students as part of their annual Elementary Music Festival. Ms. Caravella currently teaches elementary band and orchestra and middle school chamber music at Wethersfield Public Schools in Connecticut. She co-directs the music festival with her colleagues Steve Cofrancesco and Mike Bowles. As part of this year's music festival the kids are participating in a "build your own ukulele" unit and Ms. Caravella thought it would be fun for them to visit a luthier's workshop (virtually).

We jumped at the opportunity to do the presentation, and last week our Workshop Assistant, Marissa Faltings, gave a virtual presentation to the Wethersfield students about working on violins. During the presentation Marissa talked to the students about violin making and about what she does in the workshop and gave several demonstrations.

    

The workshop was a huge hit among the students and it got them thinking about designing and making instruments. They asked tons of questions and were excited to start building their ukuleles. Ms. Caravella told us that her colleagues, Mr. Cofranceso and Mr. Bowles, both agreed that the teachers and the students all want to work as luthiers now.

Opportunities like this virtual workshop are always such a joy for students and for the members of our staff who do the presentations. We are always looking for new opportunities to engage teachers and students in what we do, so if you are a strings teacher, or if you know a strings teacher who would be interested in having us present a workshop for their students, please don't hesitate to contact us. You can call our shop at (631)-427-3569 or email Marissa at Marissa@liviolinshop.com