If there is one quality that sums up musician and teacher Rosalind Watlington, OBE it is ‘Determination'. Whatever hiccup she has encountered in pursuing her goals, she has simply found another way around and, like the Energizer bunny, just keeps going and going.

Although she is 77, her passion for life, and music in particular, is undiminished. So much so, in fact, that she recently fought back from a serious illness to reclaim her seat among the violins in the Bermuda Philharmonic Society Orchestra - a seat she has proudly occupied for 42 years.

Although she grew up listening to her brother practising the violin, it was hearing its beautiful sounds on the radio that actually inspired her to learn the instrument herself. An early example of her lifelong determination was the manner in which she went about buying a violin and paying for lessons.

“We had no money. My mother had to go to work, and I had to look after my little brother. It was extremely hard. The violin cost $10 and each lesson cost $1, so I babysat to pay for both,” she recalls.

When it came time to go to college, Mrs. Watlington chose Maryville College in Tennessee, where she was a liberal-arts major and her electives were violin, piano, music appreciation and music theory. Graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1946, she then went to work for Eastman Kodak in Rochester, New York. On Saturdays she took violin lessons with Professor Effie Knauss of the Eastman School of Music, a top conservatory. Again it was determination that kept her focussed. Living in the YWCA and with no money to spare, she walked the considerable distance to and from her lessons, and also to practice.

Then along came romance in the form of Bermudian Frank Watlington, then a Bermuda Telephone Company engineer who was in Rochester on a course. The couple married in New York City and returned to Bermuda in 1948.

“I was 23 and he was 31 and we were going to live in Bermuda for a year, or two at the most, and then I was going to continue my music,” Mrs. Watlington said.

But with the arrival of their two children, Bill and Diana, the family settled down to island life, and although she was a busy wife and mother, she was also determined to continue with her music, so she put herself through the Royal School of Music Grades V to VIII violin examinations, and also gained extra help from a succession of professional violinists who played at the Elbow Beach hotel.

It took a recital at Trinity Hall to open the door on a lifetime of public performances.

“I met an organist from the United States Naval Air Station who was looking for musicians to play Handel's ‘Messiah' so, since I had played that in college, I was invited to join the small orchestra, and I was the young one of the group,” Mrs. Watlington says.

Next she joined a chamber group which played regularly at the home of Mr. Brian Turner, and from this evolved the Bermuda Musical and Dramatic Society orchestra conducted by Dr. Drummond Wolf, who was also the organist at the Anglican Cathedral. Subsequent differences of opinion led to Dr. Drummond Wolf quitting BMDS to form the Bermuda Oratorio Society with Mr. Terry Brannon. When this, in turn, evolved into the Bermuda Philharmonic Society Mrs. Watlington was once again in the orchestral line-up.

Since her son was in the boys choir at the Anglican Cathedral, also directed by Dr. Drummond Wolf, she joined the adult choir as an alto since this would help her with the RSM oral examinations.

Meanwhile, Dr. Stanley Ratteray, who was both a member of the Philharmonic and Education Minister, recognised the importance of having music programmes in the schools and persuaded Government to buy a number of woodwind, string and brass instruments for its maintained secondary schools. It also hired Canadian George Fox to head the programme, but according to the violinist the “string programme never got started”. It would be some years before an exciting new programme led by the Menuhin Foundation came into being.

Once her children were grown up and leading their own lives, and with her husband constantly travelling, Mrs. Watlington decided it was time to “do her own thing”, so for the next 28 years she attended summer chamber music workshops at the Vermont Music and Arts Centre, and for 17of those years studied violin with its director, Samuel Flor, who was also a concert violinist and instruction book author.

Back home, regular sessions of playing sonatas with fellow musician Marjorie Pettit led her into teaching.

“Marjorie introduced me to Shane Skelton, a primary school music teacher, who was asked to conduct the Bermuda Youth Orchestra, but it had no strings section, so they pushed me into teaching. I started with 12 eight-year-old students from the Bermuda High School and Saltus Grammar School, and I found I was good at it. That was in 1973 and I've been teaching ever since,” Mrs. Watlington says.

In fact, she used Flor's books and many of her students did extremely well, earning merits and distinctions in their examinations. For a few years, she was the only strings teacher, but she had stipulated that, if the initial efforts proved successful, the Arts Council should bring in another strings teacher. Sure enough, her workload increased to such an extent that Mrs. Watlington needed help. Not only was she teaching adults at her home during the day, but many children after school, and also on Saturdays. In addition, she had weekly orchestral rehearsals to attend.

“I hardly had enough time to practice and get on myself,” she says.

A talk with Mr. John Campbell ultimately led to the Arts Council, of which he was a member, agreeing to fund another strings teacher, and the position was duly advertised. It so happened that world-renowned violinist Sir Yehudi Menuhin was in Bermuda with the Bath Orchestra to give a concert. When Sir Yehudi, who was a personal friend of then-Governor Sir Edwin Leather, learned of this he came up with his own proposal.

“He decided we should have a resident string quartet and he said he would audition in England for us,” Mrs. Watlington says. “When he returned to perform in the first Bermuda Festival series, which Sir Edward had started and at which Sir Yehudi's sister, Hepzibah, also played, I was invited to a special meeting. There Sir Yehudi announced to the group that he wished to set up the Menuhin Foundation with John Campbell as the first chairman. What an experience that was! Hepzibah and I were the only women present. Out of that meeting the trustees, including myself, were chosen.”

Twenty-six years later, Mrs. Watlington is still a trustee, and filled with admiration for Mr. Campbell's involvement.

“He is a very organised man and a wonderful chairman, and I don't know what we would do without him,” she says.

Well, there are many people who apparently say the same about Mrs. Watlington, for in this year's Queen's birthday honours, to her surprise and delight, she became a member of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) - awarded for her services to music.

There is no doubt that, among her many accomplishments, the sterling work done by the Menuhin Foundation teachers is something very dear to her heart.

“We now have six teachers who go into all the primary schools on the Island, both private and public, as well as the middle schools. As a trustee I am very proud of how many children are studying string instruments and playing in ensembles at school or in the Menuhin Foundation and Philharmonic orchestras,” she said.

She is also proud to have been associated with the Philharmonic for 42 years, and believes strongly in its role.

“I have played under every one of its conductors, and I value a community orchestra very highly,” she says.

“It was one of the reasons I was persuaded to start teaching. I thought maybe we could have a community orchestra with young people in it. Becoming a trustee of the Menuhin Foundation was another reason because then we would have more string teachers.”

Although she makes playing the violin look easy, Mrs. Watlington is quick to dispel any myths.

“People don't realise how much training you have to do in order to play well. You have to have good technique, time values, be a good sight reader and have good ears. You also have to good teachers from the very beginning. If I had had Samuel Flor earlier in my life I might have been a professional.”

Despite her long musical career, which also includes playing for 17 years with Gilbert & Sullivan Society productions, as well as in Mrs. Pettit's annual Heritage concerts, and the Daylesford Sinfonia, the sharp-witted septuagenarian, who is now widowed, is not planning to hang up her bow any time soon. She not only practices every day, but also retains a few private students, and is in rehearsal for the next orchestral concert. And that is music to her admirers' ears!