Marilyn June Jones Cello Fund Endowment
Marilyn was born in Moose Jaw Saskatchewan. She moved with her parents to Vancouver when she was 5 years old.
Her parents noticed that at an early age she showed an interest in both music and sports. At an early age she began dance lessons and enrolled in piano lessons at age 7. In the following years, she came to enjoy both music and sports including tennis and golf.
In her early teens, while her friends were dancing, talking and singing, she would be playing the piano and feeling as if she was missing out on the fun. She began to search for another instrument that she might enjoy playing while continuing to play the piano. Luckily for us she chose the cello and after several years of lessons her cello teacher, Audrey Pigget, offered to sell Marilyn the Gagliano Cello.
Though her love of playing both cello and piano continued, she put it on hold while she completed her nurses training at St. Paul’s Hospital and raised her family. Marilyn met her husband Ray on a blind date in 1954, only to find that he had also been born in Moose Jaw and they had played together as children. With their two children they moved extensively throughout Ray’s working life from Vancouver to Calgary then back to Vancouver and finally settled in Victoria in 1972.
Once her children became more independent, Marilyn began to look for and played with small orchestral groups. She played with the Oak Bay Orchestra until its demise. She was then invited by the orchestra’s former conductor to join weekly sessions at her home. The trio continued playing on a regular basis until 2018 when Marilyn’s health declined which made to make it difficult for her to play.
Marilyn always wanted to ensure her treasured cello would be played and so she was delighted to gift it, along with an additional fund to support the care and upkeep of such fine string instruments, to support the education of young musicians.