“I’ll be playing the Carillon at Arlington Cemetery in Washington.”
Julianne Vanden Wyngaard is Grand Valley State University carillonneur.
“I’m really happy to be going there. I’ve played there before. It’s a wonderful setting. I can look out one window and see the Iwo Jima Memorial and I can look out another window and see the Pentagon.”
In observance of the Netherlands’ Slavery Memorial Year, the Freedom Concert celebrates the abolition of slavery.
“I’ll begin with a piece by an American composer, Festive Fanfare for Carillon (by John Courter). There’s a spiritual Kumbaya, actually African.”
Vanden Wyngaard has been climbing the stairs and rehearsing at GVSU’s downtown Grand Rapids campus Beckering Family Carillon Tower.
It’s 14 stories tall housing 48 French, bronze cast bells.
“This carillon has two manuals for your hands. And the technique is totally different. It’s not like playing the piano. One just has to look at the handles I’ll call them on the keyboard to see that we can’t play them with our fingers, you play them with a loosely closed fist. And that’s both hands."
"I want it to be expressive and I want the person on the ground to say, ‘yeah, I enjoyed that.’ They may not know what it is. They may not really care what it is, but they enjoyed it.”