A few doors down from us lives a man, originally from Turkey. He is a violin maker. He is now retired and does it for relaxation, but he has sold violins around the world, including in Hollywood for many years. In fact, I looked him up and just one site had an article from back in 1993 where one of his violins sold for $12,000. And that was quite awhile ago and just one of them. His violins sound wonderful and he is aging so my Dad felt something needed to be done. He worked with Ivan, the violin maker, and Professor Belnap of BYU. They were able to set up a concert to be held at our church. I was so happy with the attendance and they treated it like a real concert. Six violin performance majors from BYU came and played violin pieces on Ivan's instruments. Professor Belnap then performed and finally they performed two hymns together. The first is my favorite hymn, "Be Still, My Soul". At times they all played in unison and the sound was very powerful and all in tune and it was inspiring. Now, Ivan is not of our faith, nor is his family. His wife has passed and his two daughters couldn't make it, but his son and daughter-in-law came and during the first hymn his daughter-in-law was crying. Ivan was very touched as were all in attendance. I was able to bring Max and I was amazed at how good he was. He was so relaxed and had a good time. After the performances we got to go see his violins and then they had refreshments. A bunch of layer cakes. It was a nice evening and honestly, a once in a lifetime opportunity. This kind of concert could cost a lot of money elsewhere, but everyone donated their time for it. It also made me realize I should be practicing and performing my violin more so I don't lose that talent...
P.S. I found a YouTube video of someone playing a violin they bought from him.
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