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VIDEO: Violin and Piano duo rock MSU's Botanical Garden

August 12, 2015

Michigan State's W.J. Beal Botanical Garden hosted its third concert of the summer on Friday, Aug 7, when Oleg and Natalia Bezuglova performed their duet at lunchtime. 

The Bezuglova's are both graduate students here at MSU and their performance is exactly what organizers of the event had in mind when setting up the Music in the Garden program. 

"This is exactly what we were shooting for on this sort of event," Botanical Technician Pete Murray said. "The whole thing about getting the music school involved with the garden and the garden involved with the music school, and it couldn't have gone more perfect." 

Steve Troost, a campus planner at MSU said it was his first concert he had attended and would definitely recommend people check it out. 

"It was absolutely fabulous," Troost said. "It's a great thing to do out in the garden to be able to mix what the music school is doing across the way with the mission of the garden, bringing people together for community, it's awesome."

Murray said the most challenging part of these concerts has been trying to have a nice and quiet environment, since there is so much construction occurring on North Campus, including right outside of the main entrance to the Garden. 

Murray said despite the difficulty, the staff has been able to get the construction crews to not do work in that area directly by the Garden during the noon to 1:00 p.m. hour the concerts take place. 

Oleg (Violin) and Natalia (Piano) performed for a good-sized crowd of both older and younger residents for just under one hour, and when they were finished, Murray he simply wanted more. 

"When the even was all over, all we wanted was more," Murray said. "And to me, that's the sign of perfection, and Oleg and Natalia were my description of perfection today." 

Murray said the Garden has one more scheduled musical event on Friday, Aug, 21, and they are hoping to potentially do one more concert after that once the students return to campus. 

Carolyn Miller, a plant recorder here at MSU said she hopes that they are able to continue the Music in the Garden program because it offers people good music and a nice atmosphere. 

"People can to some classical music and a beautiful setting, I really hope that they will continue," Miller said.

Murray said while the organizers are unsure if they will be able to have the concert series next summer, he doesn't think they would have any problem finding talent to perform. 

"We actually ended up getting a lot more people that wanted to do this than we had time slots for," Murray said. "That's a good thing, that's what you want and there are some of them that looked so good that we said 'Gee, we don't have any time slots for you this year, but how about next year?'

Murray said the event organizers are meeting with member of the College of Music as well as members of MSU's Infrastructure Planning and Facilities to discuss the future of the event, and how to better promote it. 

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