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SATURDAY: Music for Harmony Holds Free Children’s Concert as Part of Summer Series, Taking Place in Rain Venue

By Katie Benfield 

UPDATE: The Music for Harmony free children’s concert will now be taking place in the alternate rain venue, the Boone Unitarian Universalist Fellowship on E. King St. due to the inclement weather expected. 

 

The Daniel Boone Native Gardens is a beautiful location with trees, wide expanses of grass, flowers and stunning sights for all to see. It’s the perfect venue for any kind of concert, and if you’re looking for awe-inspiring music in a gorgeous location, Music for Harmony is going to provide you with just that event.

On Saturday, June 24, at 11 a.m. Music for Harmony will be performing a free children’s music concert in the Daniel Boone Native Gardens.

“It’s really important to have events and activities for children,” Jessica Warner, Director of Music for Harmony, said. “Music for Harmony has a goal to bring the community together, and that includes children.”

Music for Harmony is a nonprofit group that uses uplifting music to bring the community together and raise money for people and charities in need. The musicians within Music for Harmony are ever-changing.

Warner stated that the musicians are rotated out, depending on what music is being played at the concert.

For the first concert, Music for Harmony will be featuring favorites from Peter, Paul and Mary: Puff the Magic Dragon, Going to the Zoo, Boa Constrictor, The Marvelous Toy and All Through the Night. There will be two vocalists and one guitarist for the children’s concert.

“It’s all going to be music that I grew up with,” Warner said. “It’s all my favorite stuff that my dad sang to me as a kid and that I sing to my children. It’s going to be very nostalgic and a lot of fun.”

At the end of the concert, there will be a raffle to raise money to put towards scholarships to the Preschool Language Classroom (the PLC) at Appalachian State University and memberships to the Children’s Playhouse. All of this is for families in need.

The raffle items include: piano lessons with the amazingly talented Laura Chu Stokes, punch card for children’s classes at the Blowing Rock Art and History Museum, pool passes, 4 day passes to Tweetsie Railroad, Appalachian Mountain Brewery gift card and an our photo session with the skilled and talented Anna Ulery (Annaulery.com).

Along with the raffle, there will be some children’s activities, such as arts and crafts and perhaps a bubble machine.

“We are going to be making a lot of kids’ crafts,” Warner said. “We are going to be making little kind and queen crowns with the kids, and we are just going to try and have some fun stuff for them to do.”

Besides making crafts, the Daniel Boone Native Gardens offers the children a lot of room to run around and play.

“It’s nice to have something that’s an open-air concert in a place where the kids can run around,” Warner said. “They are able to experience awesome music and also discover things at the same time.”

Not only this, but the Gardens are incredibly stunning and beautiful. According to Warner, it’s kind of a hidden gem in Boone.

“A lot of people don’t even know they exist here,” Warner said. “So, hopefully, this concert will bring a lot of attention to these gorgeous gardens.”

Please feel free to bring blankets or chairs, since seating is in a grassy area.

Music for Harmony will also be performing two other free concerts at the Daniel Boone Native Gardens this summer – one on July 1 and the other on July 22, so if you can’t make it to this Saturday’s, don’t worry! You have two more opportunities to come out and support the community.

The second concert, on July 1, is environmentally focused. The musicians for the Music for Harmony are going to be classically trained professional musicians who will be playing songs, such as “Flight of the Bumblebee” and “Moonlight Sonata.”

“It’s all going to be beautiful, classical music,” Warner said. “The benefits from that concert will be going towards Climate Voices U.S., which is a clean energy nonprofit in Boone.”

The third concert, on July 22, will be focusing less on music and more on art. There will be a guitarist playing classical music while local artists will be performing live art for the audience. Proceeds from this concert go towards Hospitality House and OASIS.

“The focus for this concert is on the live art and the selling of art,” Warner said. “We are going to gave an auction for the art after the concert, so people will get to watch these local artists create something and then they can try and purchase it at the end.”

Even thought these last two concerts aren’t specifically for children, it doesn’t take away from the family-friendly orientation of these events. Warner wants to pursue holding events that can be kid-friendly and for adults at the same time.

Since Warner has small children, she understands the struggle of not being able to bring kids to events, such as classical concerts, because they want to move around so much.

“This way, with these events, kids can experience things like classical music,” Warner said, “while also being able to run around and explore.”

Adults of all kinds and all walks of life can also come by and enjoy the concerts. They are free and open to everyone of all ages, but money can be raised through the raffle tickets that will be at all of the concerts.

“It’s a great event to raise money for the people who need it the most and are the most vulnerable,” Warner said. “It’s combining music and helping people, and those are two of the things I love the most.”