By Daniel Buckwalter

The soft sounds and bouncy rhythms of Sergei Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf was a soothing antidote to the chaos of the outside world on a recent late Friday afternoon.

From the second floor of the Eugene Public Library’s main branch downtown at 100 W. 10th Ave., a small audience of toddlers, their parents and older folks — as well as library patrons who just happened to show up to read or do homework — listened attentively to children’s music, and several of the small kids got to dancing.

The occasion on Feb. 7 was the restarting of the Jeffrey Eaton Chamber Series. Whimsical Tales: A Concert Inspired by Children’s Stories was the first of three performances the chamber ensemble will take on this season.

The chamber series originally was the brainchild of Jeffrey Eaton, a founding member and cellist of the Oregon Mozart Players who served two tenures as OMP‘s executive director and one as general manager and was much beloved in the Willamette Valley’s music community. He died of cancer in January 2015 at age 63.

Eaton also performed with the Eugene Symphony, the Eugene Opera and the Oregon Bach Festival, among others.

OMP notes on its website that “it was his idea to create a chamber music series featuring OMP musicians. By imagining, creating and performing in small ensembles, they would have fun engaging listeners up close and honing the skills necessary for the uniquely soloist demands of every OMP concert.”

In her remarks before the Feb. 7 concert, Jenny Jonak, an Oregon Mozart Players board member as well as a personal friend of Eaton’s, said “he saw opportunities as children do, not limitations.”

After a several-year, pandemic-related hiatus, OMP’s musicians relaunched the chamber series this season and renamed it the Jeffrey Eaton Chamber Series. The Eugene Public Library was the perfect starting point for this new venture.

Jonak narrated Peter and the Wolf, and musician Sharon Schuman narrated segments of five other children’s tales. A quintet featuring Jill Pauls (flute), Cheryl Wefler (oboe), Carol Robe (clarinet), Jonathan Kuhns-Obana (French horn) and Joseph Hartman (bassoon) carried the music, ending with a wonderful rendition of Henry Mancini’s The Pink Panther. 

The kids enjoyed it and loved being able to see the instruments up close afterward. 

Next in the series will be a 3 p.m. performance on March 2 at a donor’s home in the Spyglass neighborhood of Eugene — ticket holders will be informed of the location a week before the show — followed by the finale, a March 9 performance at 3 p.m. at United Lutheran Church.

The March 2 concert — Voices of the New World | A Journey of Inspiration — will have a string quartet featuring violinists Hannah Willard and Sophie Yang, violist Arnaud Ghillebaert and cellist Dale Bradley.

The March 9 concert — Exploring Music Across Styles and Eras by American Composers — features Alexis Evers (flute), Cheryl Wefler (oboe), Holly Hang (clarinet), Ben Greanya (bassoon) and Jonathan Kuhns-Obana (French horn).

More information about Oregon Mozart Players, the Jeffrey Eaton Chamber Series, and ticketing is available online at OregonMozartPlayers.org.