Victor and Debby Vargas, Storytellers

VICTOR AND DEBBY VARGAS
Victor, Network Architect
Debby, Assistant Director of Institutional Giving, Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center

We went to a benefit concert in Baltimore at The Peabody for the Baltimore Animal Rescue and Care Shelter. Leon Fleisher and his wife were playing; they are animal lovers so they did the concert for free. Leon Fleisher played just a few songs, and his wife played several really fast pieces – amazingly difficult and wonderfully performed.

He played with such emotion that I just lost it.

But his songs were more memorable to me, especially when he stated from the stage that “Anyone who is here knows how much an animal has touched their lives.” He played with such emotion that I lost it. I just could not get it together. The highlight for me, Bach’s “Sheep May Safely Graze,” is now irrevocably linked to my dog Jasper. I loved the song so much that we played it at our wedding last summer. That concert — the experience meant the world to me.