By Daily Press staff
College students gave their gift of sound to at-risk children earlier this month, stressing the importance of music in life.
Five students from the UCLA School of Music brought their woodwind quintet to the patio of St. Joseph Center’s Infant Toddler Development Center in Venice in order to give 15 toddlers and six infants a taste of music for all ages.
Known as the Gluck Fellows, students Kendra Wittreich, oboe; Evan Geiger, French horn; Alaina Bercilla, flute; Amy Gillick, bassoon; and Bret Hembd, clarinet, played various pieces of music for the children and showed them the differences in the sounds of the individual instruments.
“They’ve played everywhere,” said Maria Alderete, coordinator of volunteer services at St. Joseph Center, of the UCLA group. “They just call up and offer to come. It’s a gift of the spirit, bringing music to inspire the children of the working mothers.”
Last year St. Joseph Center provided more than 8,000 homeless and low-income men, women and children with emergency services, child care, job training and senior services.
Also at St. Joseph’s, seven Ticktockers from the National Charity League of Los Angeles were volunteers on Mother’s Day eve, when the center held its 19th annual dinner dance and auctions at the Beverly Hills Hotel. The event help raise more than $360,000 to aid homeless and low-income men, women and children on the Westside.
The NCL is a national non-profit organization of mothers and daughters, who join together in community involvement to foster a sense of responsibility in the girls, as well as to strengthen the mother-daughter relationship.
“These 12th grade girls have volunteered at the center on the grassroots level for five years,” says Maria Alderete, SJC volunteer coordinator. “And this event gives them the opportunity to see yet another side of social services.”
Previously NCL Ticktockers, grades 8 through 12, have done child care, served meals, mentored fifth and sixth graders after school, and painted faces at the center’s annual Christmas party.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on May 24, 2004. Read the original PDF.