Photo courtesy of Karina Whitmarsh

     Andrea Bryant has been with the Peninsula Youth Orchestra from the very beginning, first as part of the planning committee in 1998 and then as an instructor for the beginning, junior and (now) youth orchestras.

     She has two bachelor's degrees from Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, one in violin performance and one in education with an endorsement in K-12 instrumental music. In addition to the violin, she plays the piano.

     Currently, Andrea teaches orchestra at Henry Foss High School in Tacoma as well as gives private violin lessons in her home studio. She is also a section violin player with the Tacoma Symphony Orchestra and for a time taught Suzuki violin in the community music program at the University of Puget Sound.

     "Kids can get so excited about music and they carry the excitement of creating with them," Andrea says. "If you can mold the group, you can create that right balance of learning and fun."

     Andrea especially appreciates the teaching atmosphere within the PYO. "It's a great team of people," she says. "We get along famously. We genuinely like and respect one another."

     That sense of teamwork is something she tries to pass along to her students. "Learning to play a string instrument is a monumental task, both cognitively and physically. It's not a natural thing to do. You're learning a new language," she says. "In orchestra, you learn a sense of commitment and cooperation working with one another. There is self-esteem built into playing and perfecting music."

     Andrea lives with her family in Gig Harbor.

     Little known fact: Andrea once traveled to Cleveland, Ohio, to hear her daughter debut her commissioned orchestral composition with the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra.