Sometimes students can leave a mark on the University before they even start school.
Brittany Brouwer and Kathleen Schnerer, both freshmen in music education, helped open the Stroh Center by providing string backup for Sanctus Real at the concert Aug. 13.
Brouwer and Schnerer’s string quartet, called Four-Bow’d, was formed during their junior year at Perrysburg High School and also consists of viola player Kim Wolf and cellist Rob Myak.
The quartet became the first to perform with Sanctus Real in a live setting. The quartet performed the last few songs of the show with the band.
Schnerer, who has been playing violin since she was three, thinks playing music is a rewarding experience.
“I really enjoy the competition, and it keeps me motivated,” Schnerer said. “It helps me relate to other people that are in music. Just a lot of really cool experiences.”
Brouwer has played violin since fifth grade and found the concert to be an almost surreal experience.
“It felt like a dream the whole time,” Brouwer said. “It didn’t feel like I was actually playing in front of 4,500 people. It was so cool.”
The opportunity to play with the Toledo-based rock band came from sales representative Keith Aschliman. Both Aschliman and Brouwer sang in their church’s praise team. Brouwer mentioned that it was on her “bucket list” to perform with a rock band.
Aschliman’s son happened to be a sound engineer and the road manager for Sanctus Real. Some of the band’s studio recordings featured violin and string tracks, Aschliman said.
When Aschliman called his son, he was told the band wanted an entire string quartet.
“Pretty much from the time they walked in the stage entrance to the time the concert was over, I think they were smiling from ear-to-ear,” Aschliman said.
“When they were up there, I thought it was the best concert I had ever seen [Sanctus Real] do,” he continued. “It made it … stand out from a normal performance and made it very exclusive for BGSU.”
Brouwer said the show was “by far” the quartet’s largest show. Before that, it played at weddings and the group put on its own show in front of 50 people at the end of their senior year.
Schnerer mentioned the show was largely coordinated by the quartet.
“We put everything together; we publicized it, got programs out … rented the space, everything,” Schnerer said.
They found the Stroh concert’s material less complex than the recital’s, but Schnerer said the concert material had challenges of its own, such as learning the string tracks by ear off of the albums and writing them down.
Backing a rock band also combined the different atmospheres of playing weddings and recitals.
“Playing for weddings, we’re not really the focal point, so … dynamics don’t really matter,” Brouwer said. “If we were playing a recital, we are the main focus, so … we have to be more center stage. You have to be more enthusiastic, your music has to sound better, you have to really get into it.
“Playing with a rock band, we were kind of the background at some points, so we had to find that balance of when we were the background and when we were the focal point of everything that was going on,” she said.
Continuing to play as a quartet will also prove to be challenging, because Wolf is going to Case Western and Myak is a junior at Perrysburg. Schnerer said the quartet probably will not continue through the school year, though the quartet will probably continue throughout the summers.
Brouwer said playing with the quartet is enjoyable.
“Since we’re all friends anyway, it will just be fun for all of us to get together and just play music because that’s what we love doing, and that is like our hanging out,” Brouwer said.
