The sound unlocks memories as the bow caresses the strings and the deep sound resonates from deep within its dark, wooden body.
It’s been three years since Wendy Hooke, 91, was able to play her cello. She had to stop when she damaged her arm hiking the Enderby Cliffs.
Now a resident of one of the care cottages at Heron Grove in Vernon, who was riding horses up until recently, Hooke has lovingly passed the instrument she practised on since she was a young girl, and played in the Okanagan Symphony, to the next generation.
On loan to a student at the Vernon Community Music School, the estimated 200-year-old restored cello, worth approximately $20,000, is now in good hands.
It was Hooke’s former cello instructor, George Kiraly, who has taught on and off at the VCMS since the mid-’70s and is the principal cellist with the Okanagan Symphony, who connected the instrument with its current player. And her name may be familiar to those who studied voice or performed in the Scott Singers.
Elizabeth Scott decided to take up the cello after she retired from teaching, and has been studying with Kiraly ever since.
“I felt the cello I was learning on was too big for me,” said Scott. “George has a cello group, Caelestis, with 10 cellos and one double bass, and we just a gave a recital and Wendy came. She said her cello was gathering dust and she thought that maybe someone would need it. She really wanted it to be played.”
Performing on a student instrument before, Scott says Hooke’s cello fit her hands like a glove.
“This is rich and responsive,” she said, applying the bow to the strings. “It’s also thinner than a normal cello — the neck is thinner and my hand finds the fingerings easier. I haven’t had to adjust at all.”
Although the cello’s origins are unknown to the family, Hooke was given the instrument by her aunt when she was a young girl. Born near Telkwa, she continued to play the instrument upon moving to Dawson Creek and then to Vernon, where she had a long association as a member of the Okanagan Symphony.
Hooke was also involved with the move of the VCMS, which was originally located in a building at the Vernon Army Camp, to its current home in the historical Smith House on East Hill.
“It’s being passed from one heritage to another,” said Scott.
Hooke’s daughter-in-law Gillian Browning, who with her husband Steve Hooke, runs a horse ranch on Creighton Valley Road, says the family is grateful the cello is being played again.
“No one in our family plays, so we thought if we loaned it, then it could be played by students,” said Browning, adding Steve and his three other brothers were contacted to make sure they were OK with their mother’s cello being loaned out.
“Wendy’s been wanting something like this to happen since she couldn’t play it herself.”
For Hooke’s part, the smile on her face says it all as she listens to the instrument fill the air with its deep resonance once again.
