Down in the Valley

In 1987, the local Orff Chapter hosted a weekend “Mini-Conference” event at a marvelous retreat center called Hidden Valley Music Seminars. The headliner was my teacher Avon Gillespie. There I met the head of the Seminar, a lovely man named Peter Meckel. The Mini-Conference continued to be held there every two years for the next 25 plus years and I always enjoyed my brief contact with Peter. 

In 2011, a time when construction at my school meant I had to look for a new site for our summer Orff course for the following year, I was at yet another Mini-conference and suddenly had the thought, “We should do it here!” I met with Peter in his office and explained the situation, he asked me for the dates I needed, opened a book, erased something and said, “Let’s do it!” I asked him for his contract and he stuck out his hand and said, “Here’s the contract. And save the e-mails between us.” We shook hands and the deal was sealed and our first SF International Orff Course meeting at Hidden Valley took place in the summer of 2012. 

After the first week, I met with the staff and told them that we could return the course to the SF School or… and they all interrupted at once and said, “Here!!!” And so we have had ten glorious years in this remarkable piece of heaven in Carmel Valley and the opportunity to hang out yet more with Peter. At 80 years old, he is still going strong.  A Board Member suggested we write our congratulations to him today on the occasion of the  60^th (!!!!) anniversary of the site. And so I did. 

 

 

TO PETER MECKEL ON THE OCCASION OF HIDDEN VALLEY’S 60^TH ANNIVERSARY

 

Dear Peter,

 

When my beloved teacher Avon Gillespie threw open the doors at the end of his Easter Cantata at the first Orff Mini-conference in 1987, little did I realize that he was opening the doors to my future. With such fanfare! The light streaming in and the choir of voices singing “Hallelujah!!” There could be no better description of what Hidden Valley has meant, not only to me personally, but more importantly, to both a local and international Orff community. Ten years of hundreds of inspired souls who will always connect the memorable heights and depths of both their professional life and personal epiphanies with this little piece of heaven in Carmel Valley. I’m thinking of an old Doc Watson song (with one word changed):

 

As I went down in the valley to pray
Studyin' about that good old way
And who shall wear the starry crown
Good Lord, show me the way
Oh teachers let's go down
Let's go down come on down
Oh teachers let's go down
Down in the valley to pray.

 

The valley is Hidden Valley, hidden to those who just go about their business without thought of the beauty and divine Spirit lying within and without them, but revealed to the seekers willing to do the work and make the time to study the good old ways. Those timeless traditions that harmonize the chaos within through the prayerful power of song and dance and music-making. And so every year we gather and witness the moments when the starry crown appears on our heads as we become the kings and queens we were born to be, the conduit between heaven and earth.

 

And behind it all is a humble, hard-working, affable, generous, dedicated, spirit-filled man who had his own epiphany some 60 (?!!) years ago envisioning the glories to come and doing whatever it took to make them come to life. To give them a space and a place to stretch their angelic wings and feel the freedom of flying through glorious music, year after year after year after year. A man who doesn’t flaunt his golden crown and multi-colored robe, but for those with eyes to see and ears to hear, it’s clearly visible. A man who sits so many evenings on his humble throne in the corner of the theater, observing, smiling, celebrating and offering his blessing to us with the full measure of his bounteous spirit. A man important to so many and here I can only add my testimony of all that he has meant to me. Offering me a refuge from those in power who don’t understand me, encouragement in my own inches of growth, fellowship and companionship as we move from our congenial professional relationship to the deeper waters of true friendship. It means the world to me.

 

And so Peter Meckel, my heartiest congratulations to you in this milestone moment and as Billy Strayhorn liked to say, “Onward and upward!!”

 

All my love,

 

Doug Goodkin

Director of the SF International Orff Course