In a lifetime filled with music and medicine, I have made many memories, but my experiences in Aberdeen, Scotland, remain among the most important.
My parents were great opera lovers and took me to opera performances from the tender age of 2. When I was about 3 years old, I could sing opera arias. On a beautiful summer evening on a Sunday, I was with my parents in the Central Park in Cluj, my home town in Romania. I was playing with other kids. A few people happened to pass by and stopped to listen to me. They were singers from the local Opera House. They immediately spoke to my parents and strongly advised them to enroll me in a music kindergarten and then to arts school.
They commented that I had enormous talent for music. After musical kindergarten, I was admitted to The Arts School, Division of Music, where I studied violin, piano and trombone. By the time I got my degree, I was mastering those three instruments quite well. However afterwards, I decided to study medicine and completed my six-year training with a perfect 10.
Back to the musical training in Cluj — at age 17 I was selected into The Romanian Youth Orchestra, which was to participate in the inaugural “International Festival of Youth Orchestras” (IFYO) in Aberdeen Scotland in August 1973.
There were 20 participant countries from around the world (Denmark, England, Scotland, Canada, USA, Hong Kong, West Germany, Czechoslovakia, Australia, Romania, and a few others.) Each youth orchestra performed a concert on consecutive nights. During the day, a commission was evaluating the musicians of each country and selected the best of them to create The World Youth Orchestra. I was lucky enough to be selected (along with four other Romanians) into this “Dream Orchestra.” We were flown to London and had a reception at the Mayor’s Office.
Romania and West Germany were evaluated to be the best orchestras of the Festival and on a Saturday night we performed a concert in Kenwood Park with 10,000 people in attendance. We ended the concert with the famous 1812 Overture by Tchaykowski with fireworks. lt was unreal!
The next day on a glorious Sunday, the World Youth Orchestra performed two concerts in Hyde Park in the morning and in the afternoon, and another concert in the world famous Royal Albert Hall under legendary conductor Leopold Stokowski. That festival was probably the most joyous event in my lifetime and I wrote about it.
When I defected to Canada in 1985, I wanted to continue both my medical career and my musical one. It was excruciatingly difficult to get my degrees but I managed to succeed. In 1997, I was elected as a member of the Board of Directors “Orchestras Canada.”
I specifically requested to take charge of the youth orchestras across the country. In 2003, 30 years after the inaugural Festival in Aberdeen I led the National Youth Orchestra of Canada to Aberdeen for the same festival. I was declared a “red carpet” guest with a Jaguar car at my disposition at any time. It was unforgettable.
I exhibited musical ability from a young age, singing well-known opera songs of the day when I was just four years old. By the time I was a teenager studying music in Romania, I was selected in 1973 to attend the inaugural “International Festival of Youth Orchestras” in Aberdeen, Scotland.
Growing up in the oppressive atmosphere of totalitarian Communist Romania, where travel to other countries was not allowed, I remember that the experience showed me a world full of possibility.
There were many human rights abuses in Romania at that time. People weren’t allowed to travel. But I loved geography with all my heart. I always had a map in my hand. Therefore it was even more difficult for me to live in communist Romania.
Youth orchestras from all over the world participated in the competition, but my playing stood out enough that I was selected to advance.
I was one of the lucky students selected for the World’s Youth Orchestra, which performed several concerts in London. I vividly remember performing to thousands of people at these concerts, on both trombone and percussion. The concert at Royal Albert Hall was special to me.
I still have the posters from those concerts.
We finished the Royal Albert concert with the 1812 Overture and fireworks. We were conducted by Leopold Stokowski, a very important conductor at that time who was 91 years old. It was a magnificent day.
Even after I defected to Canada in 1985 and continued my career in medicine, I never left music behind. I always recalled the memory of that experience in Aberdeen.
In Canada, I became a member of the Board of Directors for Youth Orchestras of Canada. Soon after, I requested the role of presiding over the country’s own youth orchestra festival.
I remembered so well what the experience in Aberdeen had meant for me, and I wanted to do something for the youngsters.
In 2003, I returned to Aberdeen, this time as leader of Youth Orchestra Canada. Almost exactly three decades after Aberdeen widened my perceptions of the world, I could now do the same thing for promising young Canadian musicians.
As a former performer at the Aberdeen festival, I was also a “red carpet guest” and treated very well by the local media, who wrote some nice things about me.
In 2019, after 25 years as a musician, I retired from my trombone chair in the award-winning Timmins Symphony Orchestra. I also retired from the Timmins All Star Big Band, where I played both trombone and saxophone.
In 2005, I received an Award of Appreciation for 10 years of dedicated and valuable contribution to the orchestra.
I have done many other things in my life as well, but Aberdeen will always hold a special place.