Adam Janssen performs a sonatina by Jacques Cousteau during the Summer Concert Series at the Butler County Symphony Orchestra on a Friday in Butler. Every Friday is a different free concert that also livestreams and plays on speakers at nearby Diamond Park. Joseph Ressler/Butler Eagle

Ever since they were in the high school orchestra, Vincent and Claudette Sanzotti have not only loved playing music, but also pairing their skills on the clarinet and the piano, respectively, together in concert.

Claudette Sanzotti said getting to perform still at the age of 86 is exciting for the married couple, and they each credit the Butler County Symphony Orchestra Association with keeping their musical ability sharp.

“One of the things we have been able to experience is playing music for most of our lives,” Claudette Sanzotti said. “It doesn’t matter how old we are.”

Vincent Sanzotti played in the symphony with its founder, Ed Roncone, in the 1950s. Since then, he has seen it grow season by season, to its current iteration which has concerts featuring nearly 100 players, and also educational programs that showcase only two to four players at a time.

“It’s amazing a town the size of Butler has an orchestra, a paid orchestra, and also has an organization that supports it so well,” Vincent Sanzotti said. “We have a very high quality orchestra for a regional amateur orchestra. I think it’s 74 years that the orchestra has existed, which is amazing in itself.”

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