By Mia Wugol
AN event in Bunbury which raised $4,300 for charity on 3 April was not only a musical affair, but also an ecumenical one.
The money was raised at the Rhapsody Concert; a part of Busselton parish’s 125th anniversary celebrations with over 250 people in attendance.
Held at the Busselton Uniting Church Performance Centre, funds raised will go to the Busselton Vinnies and the Busselton Uniting Church Outreach programme.
Pianist Mark Coughlan, who has performed throughout Europe, was the main event, supported by special quest violinist Stephanie Dean, Busselton Choral Society’s Janet Depiazzi and MacKillop Catholic College student Mathew Ho who started piano lessons in Hong Kong at age three.
Mathew, 15, studying Grade 7 piano, is a member of the youth group in the Busselton Catholic parish and plays piano for Sunday Masses. He gained first place in the Under 16 Classical period section at the 2010 Bunbury Eisteddfod.
The afternoon’s programme, which included works by Mozart, Beethoven, Handel, Chopin, Cesar Franck, Kurt Weill and George Gershwin, was compiled to reflect the many nationalities that have comprised the community over the years.
Uniting Church minister Wes Hartley offered some insights into the establishment of the parish and the importance music played in the Catholic and Uniting Church communities throughout history.
Catholic life has existed in Busselton since the earliest days of settlement. The Abbey family of Newtown and the McCourt family of Wonnerup were among the prominent Catholic pioneers of the district throughout the 19th century.
Bishop Rosendo Salvado from New Norcia was one of the early visiting priests who, in 1854, compiled a list of 71 Catholics in the Vasse district out of at total population of 100.
The first St Joseph’s Church was built in 1868 but it was not until 1886 that Busselton became a parish with its own full time priest.
The first Catholic school in the area opened in 1903, and in 1906 Villa Carlotta in Adelaide Street was purchased and became a convent and boarding school run by the Sisters of Our Lady of the Mission.
Following their departure in the 1920s, it was taken over by the Sisters of Joseph and remained a convent until the 1960s. A new and bigger St Joseph’s Church was built on Kent Street in 1933.
The parish currently supports three churches and three schools in Bussleton, Cloisters and Dunsborough and is the home of a diverse Catholic community coming from all over Australia, as well as Britain, Ireland, Italy, Poland and Philippines.