REMEMBERING ANDY
A true gentleman of music, Maestro Andrew McMullan, passed away last week, but the legacy his determination created, the Atlantic Classical Orchestra, will keep his spirit alive for generations of music lovers on the Treasure Coast.
My first interview with Andy aired March 17, 1998, on Arts Spotlight on radio station WQCS. The Atlantic Classical Orchestra was still in its youth at that point, less than ten years from its inaugural season.
Sadly, that interview was not preserved, but over the years we talked fairly often. In a later conversation, Andy told me he had been a conductor and music director for the Maine Opera and a professional French horn player, but "quit that in 1976 and began to play the stick instead,” a talent he brought with him when he and his wife, Jean, moved full time to Vero Beach.
Andy had a dream he was determined to fulfill, and he did it by surrounding himself with others who shared his belief that the Treasure Coast was ready for a classical orchestra. One of those was Raz Allen, who, with Jean, wrote grants, collected mail from the post office, stored boxes under beds, and used their own condos and private phones for the business side of the Atlantic Classical Orchestra.
Allen was on the ACO board and the keyboard player for the orchestra for many years. She founded the Friends of the ACO in Vero Beach and said, “I can look back with so much pride and admiration for the loyal people who have helped to make this organization a success.”
ACO’s music director and conductor, David Amado, remembers Andy’s pure joy. “His love of music, and his desire to share that love, was powerful and infectious.” Amado said the spirit that brought the ACO to be “is still with us, reminding us with every rehearsal and every concert, of Andy’s vision, passion, and humanity. … Our music will always speak with Andy’s voice.”
