How about some really good news? We are thrilled to let you know that on February 28th, 2021, OICMF Founding Board Member Emeritus and Festival Matriarch Laila Storch celebrated her 100th birthday!
Laila is a delightful person and a trailblazing musician. She was the first female oboist to graduate from the Curtis Institute of Music, where she studied with the world-renowned oboist Marcel Tabuteau. She was chosen by Pablo Casals to be professor of oboe at his Conservatory of Music of Puerto Rico and was a longtime member of the Soni Ventorum Wind Quintet, which Casals organized. She was principal oboist of the Houston Symphony and was professor of oboe at the University of Washington. Laila published a biography of Tabuteau in 2008, Marcel Tabuteau: How Do You Expect to Play the Oboe If You Can’t Peel a Mushroom?
Congratulatory messages can be sent via Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, here, or mailed to her:
Laila Storch
c/o OICMF
PO Box 646
Eastsound WA 98245
Please enjoy this beautiful recording of JS Bach’s Concerto for Oboe and Violin, movement 2, performed by Laila Storch and Martin Friedmann, OICMF Artistic Director Aloysia Friedmann’s parents.
