Spotlight on the Vermont Youth Orchestra's 2024 - 2025 Senior Soloists
For their 2024 - 2025 season, the Vermont Youth Orchestra presents a quartet (a 'Fab Four' if you will) of Senior Soloists, who will be highlighted at concerts in October and December 2024, and February and May 2025. Ahead of each concert, we'll be bringing you interviews with these talented young women, beginning with Ariel Toohey, a senior at Champlain Valley Union High School. She will be performing Camille Saint-Saens Cello Concerto No. 1 on Sunday, October 20, 2024 at 3pm at the Flynn in Burlington, conducted by Dr. Mark Alpízar. For more information about the Vermont Youth Orchestra and their upcoming season, go to vyo.org
TRANSCRIPT
ARIEL TOOHEY: Kind of the moment I think I fell in love with the orchestra and the sound that it can make, it was at the VYOA summer symphony camp and we played Jupiter from Holst’s ‘The Planets.’ I just remember having that moment of kind of getting chills when I'm playing with the ensemble. And that kind of feeling is what really just drives me to keep going, and keep going to the VYO and trying out for all the music festivals.
My name is Ariel Toohey, I go to Champlain Valley Union High School in Hinesburg, Vermont and I play the cello. I've been with the Vermont Youth Orchestra Association 11 years.
HELEN LYONS: Ariel Toohey is the first of this year's Vermont Youth Orchestra’s senior soloists. She'll be performing Camille Saint-Saens Cello Concerto No. 1 this Sunday at the Flynn. She was a winner of the 2024 Vermont All-State String Scholarship. And in 2023 she was named an Honor Musician at the New England Music Camp. A multi-instrumentalist with wide musical interests, Ariel also plays the trombone in CVU’s Symphonic Winds and in the Green Mountain Brass Band.
So, how did you come to play two instruments at such a high level?
TOOHEY: I started the cello when I was four. My mom loved the cello and she kind of passed that on to me. And so she signed me up for cello lessons when I was little. And there were times when I wanted to switch to violin, but then in the end I just stuck with cello because, obviously it's the best. And then the trombone in fifth grade, I picked that. My dad played the trombone when he was a kid. So that was part of why I picked that.
LYONS: And I understand your family has its own band. Do you play both the cello and trombone in that?
TOOHEY: My dad, he is the one who writes the songs and he also plays guitar and sings and he has some acoustic sets where I'll play cello and that actually fits in really well. I've played trombone in a couple of tunes before. So there's a lot of music around. I mean, honestly, it's been going on for generations, his father, I think, was a fiddler and my grandfather was a middle school band director - he plays all the instruments! And that was kind of passed on to my dad and his sister.
LYONS: Let's talk about Sunday's concert. Tell us why you chose the Saint-Saens Cello Concerto. What drew you to it?
TOOHEY: I just kept coming back to Saint-Saens. I just love Saint-Saens so much. I've always loved his music. I remember listening to the ‘Carnival of the Animals’ when I was little and just loving the way that he represented the different animals with the different instruments and sounds. And I think his cello concerto covers all the different kinds of ranges and moods that the cello can produce. I think it's just a perfect concerto piece.
LYONS: Do you get nervous before a performance?
TOOHEY: I'm pretty chill with orchestra performances or large ensemble performances because I know the drill, I know how it's gonna go and it's really not all on me. But this senior solo definitely brings up a different kind of anxiety just being by yourself in front of the whole orchestra and everyone's kinda watching you. One thing I really try to do is just breathe and it's really important to take a big breath in for me and just it really calms me down right before I enter with the orchestra when I'm playing my solo.
LYONS: Not just content to perform, Ariel is also an ambassador for classical music, serving as the regional director for Back to Bach, a program which introduces elementary students to classical music.
Tell us about your work with Back to Bach.
TOOHEY: Yeah. So basically what the Back to Bach Project is, groups of high school classical musicians get together, we’lll create a program and we’ll try to weave in some educational aspects like, what does a dynamic mean? How do you tell what an emotion sounds like in a piece? What's minor or major? We'll reach out to local elementary schools and we'll go and play for them and we'll try and keep it interactive with the kids. Then we have like a wheel of fortune at the end. So kids will raise their hand, come up and spin it and it will land on a question. For example, what is the musical term for loud? And then if they know that it’s forte say, then they get a sticker or a pencil or a piece of candy or something. So it's just a great way to kind of expose them to classical music at a young age.
One thing that I've definitely learned is that motivation really comes from within. You can't just do something because your parents tell you to do it, you have to really want it. And so that's something that's been really important for me. And I think kids who are just, you know, thrown into music lessons by their parents and have nothing in it for them, it's hard to keep that motivation going. But we tell all the kids that they should really love what they do and they should pick something that they love to do. And if that's not music, like, that's ok. But if that is music, then it's great to just keep up that love and enjoyment of what you're doing
LYONS: And what are your plans for the future, do you think you'll major in music in college?
TOOHEY: I'm planning to do a more science-y major like chemistry or something along those lines. But I'm definitely looking at schools where the music program is prevalent and open to non-majors to participate in.
LYONS: As you embark on your final year in the Vermont Youth Orchestra, what is something you'll take away from your time with the VYOA?
TOOHEY: Well, I think one thing about the VYOA that's really special is just how great of a community it is. And I've just met so many wonderful people who are gonna be lifelong friends of mine and that's just such a cool thing to have in high school. Not every activity builds a community as close as that. And I just really think it's special and everybody should come to the concert and support the program so that can keep going and keep building relationships for years to come.
LYONS: My thanks to Ariel Toohey for chatting with me. You can hear her perform Camille Saint-Saens Cello Concerto No. 1 as part of the Vermont Youth Orchestras Fall Concert, Terror and Triumph, conducted by Dr. Mark Alpízar this Sunday October 20th at 3 p.m. at the Flynn in Burlington. For more information, head to vyo.org
