This weekend I had a ‘thankful’ moment as I looked around and marveled at that which surrounded us.
Every weekend we do one outing to experience beautiful Britain. This weekend we headed to Windsor for the Windsor festival and a children’s classical concert.

The concert itself was amazing. The elastic band was a full orchestra with oboes, flutes, violins, cellos, a bass section and on …. The conductor was suitably wacky for the kids interjecting humor and fun into Strauss, Mozart and one of my personal favorites Souza (and he spoke of the marches he wrote which I fondly remember playing as a kid). Souza had quite the interesting childhood:

John was born in Washington, D.C., to John António de Sousa and Maria Elisabeth Trinkhaus. His parents were of Portuguese, Spanish and Bavarian (German) descent; his grandparents were Portuguese refugees. Sousa started his music education, playing the violin, as a pupil of John Esputa and G. F. Benkert for harmony and musical composition at the age of six. He was found to have absolute pitch. When John reached the age of 13, his father, a trombonist in the Marine Band, enlisted his son in the United States Marine Corps as an apprentice. John served his apprenticeship for seven years, until 1875, and apparently learned to play all the wind instruments while honing his mettle with the violin.

And what topped it off was that it was held in a minor hall (think old, small performance room with tiered seating for perhaps 200) at Eton, one of the most prestigious boys schools in the world (Founded in the 1400s). My moment came as the music played and I looked out the window at the church … Amazing.

Sorry, no pictures from me. I forgot the camera in the kitchen (smile).