Pasadena Symphony replaces musical instruments lost to fire

By

NathanAndElishaChoHorns Nathan and Elisha Cho had to evacuate from La Cañada because of the Eaton Fire. Their French horns were most important to them to save. Photo courtesy of Grace Cho.

As musician Russel Mark tells it, when he first bought a trumpet at a garage sale back in high school and tried to play it, he thought it was broken.

“I could get a note or two out of it, but not much more than that,” he says. When he let a friend give it a go, he realized “it wasn’t the trumpet that was broken.” 

Now, he says, “I have finally decided, 30 years later, it's time for the trumpet to go to a better cause.”

That cause is a donation drive for students who lost their musical instruments to the Eaton or Palisades Fires, sponsored by the Pasadena Symphony

The group played its first concert after the fires on Saturday. Tickets were free for first responders and those impacted by the destruction.

Before the performances, guests gathered in the lobby around a desk where instrument cases were stacked up. 


Musicians brought cellos, violins, flutes, a bassoon, trumpets, and guitars to the instrument drive for students who lost theirs in the Eaton or Pasadena Fires. Photo courtesy of Kerstin Zilm.

Sarah Weber, executive director of the Association of California Symphony Orchestras, brought a violin that she had spruced up with new strings and a new bow before taking it to the Symphony. 

“It's my first full-size student violin,” she says as she hands the instrument over to Alex Chu, director of education at the Pasadena Symphony. “I haven't played it in a long time and thought it should go to someone who needs it rather than just sit in my home collecting dust.”


Sarah Weber hands over her beloved first full-size student violin so it can go to a student who lost theirs in the flames. Photo courtesy of Kerstin Zilm.

Dozens of musicians stopped at the desk to donate instruments. The Symphony can use them all, explains Alex Chu, because students not only left their instruments behind when they evacuated, several schools in Altadena also lost their whole instrument libraries. 

Fortunately, 12-year-old Elisha Cho, who participates in the Symphony’s youth program and came for the concert, was able to save her French horn when her family evacuated from La Cañada. She grabbed her stuffed animals first, then her instrument. 

“A French horn is like another organ in your body,” she says. “If I had lost my French horn in the fire, I don't know what I would have done.” 

Her 17-year-old brother Nathan plays the French horn in the Pasadena Youth Symphony Orchestra. He was happy to be back at rehearsals. They couldn’t play while the family stayed in a hotel. 

“I came to miss a part of myself,” he says. “Practicing, which a lot of kids hate, is really heartbreaking for me to not be able to do.”


Nathan Cho plays French horn with the Pasadena Youth Symphony Orchestra. Photo courtesy of Grace Cho.

Pasadena Symphony violinist Irina Voloshina has used music to heal from community pain before. During the pandemic, she organized more than 65 free concerts in the driveway of her Altadena home on Mariposa Street. She even founded a nonprofit: Melodia Mariposa

Now, she’s turning to music as a balm once again. While she still has her most precious instrument — a violin — the musician lost everything else in the Eaton Fire, including a second violin built in the 18th century. 

Voloshina was out of town when the Eaton Fire raced through Altadena. She directed a friend to enter her house, told him where the violin was, and he grabbed it – and nothing else. 

Around 4 a.m. her alarm company called the musician. 

“I looked on my phone, and I saw window by window how they were triggered,” she recounts in the lobby of the Pasadena Symphony. The alarm app alerted her to intruders breaking glass at her den window, then the office, one bedroom, and another bedroom. “It was like watching someone dying. I saw how my house was dying,” she says.


Violinist Irina Voloshina's house burned down in the Eaton Fire. She poses with friend and fellow violinist Laurie Niles in the lobby of the Pasadena Symphony before the concert. Photo courtesy of Laurie Niles.

On Saturday, Voloshina performed with her violin for the first time since the fire. Afterwards, she said she had barely played the first bars of Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings when tears started flowing down her cheeks. 

“Every note is so beautiful,” she says. “I played this music before, but I just lost it.” 

By the end of the piece, she stopped crying: “I felt like there's hope. We can rebuild. We can move on. And it's beautiful.” 

The Pasadena Symphony will be accepting gently used instruments for young musicians affected by the fires until further notice.

Credits

Reporter:

Kerstin Zilm