Music garden outside library expected to harvest interest

Posted By: VenangoExtra.com April 11, 2021

By LAURA O’NEIL

Staff writer

It’s spring, and the Oil City Library has just put in a new garden.

However, it doesn’t contain vegetables or flowers; it’s full of musical instruments that can be played by the community.

Dan Flaherty, executive director of the Oil Region Library Association, said the music garden is available to everyone.

“This is here for you to use, whenever you want, however you want,” he said.

The library would like to use the music garden for children’s programming as soon as COVID-19 restrictions lift, Flaherty said. He hopes the music garden will naturally play into community activity.

“I’ll let anyone who wants to, do anything with it minus destroying it,” he said. “More often than not, saying ‘yes’ leads to some cool things.”

The garden is on the Front Street side of the library. It features three xylophones, emperor chimes and several drums, as well as a songbook for one of the xylophones.

The instruments are spaced at least 3 feet apart, making the space handicap-accessible.

The instruments are weather-resistent, many of which are made of stainless steel.

“These are supposed to last a long time, double-digit years at the minimum,” Flaherty said.

The idea started a couple of years ago.

“We thought this would be pretty unique to the area,” Flaherty said.

However, he said, there were several roadblocks to work through, such as where to find the money to pay for the project.

With a recommendation from Bridge Builders Community Foundation, the library received a $20,000 grant from the PNC Foundation to build the music garden.

A PNC Foundation spokesperson said the hope is the music garden will bring “a unique and effective educational opportunity to children in this region.”

Another of the hurdles the idea faced was a gas line in the area that originally had been planned for the music garden. With the help of Integrity Construction of Claysville, the library was able to build the garden closer to the ramp and work around the gas line.

After a new design was drawn up, Integrity Construction spent three days on the project, finishing the music garden on Thursday.

Flaherty called the project a product of “random, awesome collaboration” and he is excited to see how the community uses the garden.

“I’m interested to see what it leads to,” he said.