The Score | Clearing the Air with Music

During the pandemic, most of us have gotten accustomed to concerts popping up—on porches and sidewalks, in storefronts and parks. One unusual concert took place this February in Marsha Jackson’s backyard in the south Dallas neighborhood of Floral Farms. Jackson’s home is adjacent to a property that had become a dumping ground for discarded roof shingles by a recycling company, and after three years the pile had grown so large it was referred to as shingle mountain. The toxic waste brought high levels of air pollution to the neighborhood and numerous health issues for Jackson. Quincy Roberts, a classically trained singer and board member of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, is president of Roberts Trucking Company, which was awarded the contract to raze shingle mountain, and in celebration of the mountain’s removal, Roberts arranged a surprise concert, just for Jackson and her neighbors. The concert featured Dallas Symphony Orchestra violinist Bruce Wittrig and violist Dan Wang as well as tenor Lawrence Brownlee performing from the Dallas Symphony’s Concert Truck, which has been traveling throughout Dallas during the pandemic with neighborhood concerts.