The first public appearance of the Farina Foundation was a huge success.  We set up our table with banner, snare drum for donations and beautiful portrait of dad with his ever present tuba, at the North Allegheny High School Auditorium during the Spring Concert. It was bittersweet for Laura, Frankie and I to be back at the place where we spent so many years performing. All the memories came flooding back, especially when Frank and I took the stage to hand out the two award scholarships in honor of our dad.

Who can forget performing with the concert bands, jazz or wind ensembles. I even remember watching Maynard Ferguson and Buddy Rich perform on that stage. Not to mention playing in the orchestra pit for countless musicals.

The 2015 NA musicians did not disappoint. They played beautifully. Todd Stefan and crew have done a wonderful job rehearsing and teaching these aspiring musicians. The music was difficult and performed with such gusto, it was truly inspiring.

A special congratulations goes to The Frank J. Farina Jr. Award Recipients:  Reed Antioch and Connor Stewart. Both plan on performing with their respective college bands.

The goal of our night was to introduce the Farina Foundation to a group of people who may have heard of our dad or had relatives learn under him but were not around during our heyday. It was to reintroduce our Foundation and mission to those who were a part of the good ole days and spread the word that we are here and working for the student musicians to carry on our father’s legacy.

To this end, I believe we took a giant step forward. Now, it’s up to all of us to spread the word. Please, if you have friends or family that were NA grads, let them know about our efforts. Return often to our website and if you can, please give a donation. We will be updating this site often.

We will be active on Facebook through our good friend, Sandy Schirra Speicher. I am also establishing a twitter account to give current updates of our activities where the Foundation is concerned. Of course, I have to have my 10 year old stepson help me set it up first. 🙂  It is our hope that through social media we will be able to accomplish our goals and hopefully expand them in the future.

Thanks for visiting!

The beat goes on…..Maria