By DIANE GASPER-O'BRIEN

dobrien@dailynews.net

Violinists apparently are multi-taskers.

A handful of students at this week's High Plains Band and Orchestra Camp at Fort Hays State University are participating in both band and orchestra rehearsals and concerts.

Most of those play the violin in orchestras at their grade level and also play at least one other instrument in band performances.

They range from 13-year-old Roy Schmeidler from Hays to 17-year-old Gabriella Vizzutti from Seattle.

Schmeidler has played the violin in the junior high orchestra this week, as well as the trombone in the top junior high band and the piano in the jazz band.

He even was able to fit in some lessons on his electric guitar.

"I'm just glad they could find a way for me to do both," Schmeidler, who will be an eighth-grader at Kennedy Middle School this fall, said of the orchestra and band rehearsals.

This is the first year that strings lessons were added to the band camp, which was started back in 1947.

Participating in both orchestra and band took some schedule maneuvering, but most thought it was worth the effort.

"I think they learn a lot at this camp," said Liz Schmeidler, Roy's mother and a professional musician herself who has recorded three CDs of Christian music and is working on her fourth.

"With the sectionals and alternate classes," she added, "that keeps a myriad of things for the kids to do. They can't be bored."

One of those who wasn't bored at this week's camp, even though she thought she would be, was Vizzutti.

"I was kind of like, 'What could there possibly be in Kansas that would require me, or you for that matter, to go there for a week?' " she said with a laugh.

Her question was legitimate.

After all, her parents, professional musicians Allen and Laura Vizzutti who travel the world, had just returned from a two-week performance tour in Spain and Italy.

Upon their return, their youngest child asked, What's next?

"They said, 'Kansas,' " Vizzutti said, admitting "I was expecting a bunch of cowboys."

"And, there were cowboys," Vizzutti said in reference to three Whisman brothers from Palco, Rooks County farmers and ranchers who regularly wore blue jeans and cowboy hats to classes and rehearsals this week.

The Whisman trio also excels in music, as the brothers, ages 15 to 18, all earned spots in the top high school band.

"They turned out to be really good (musicians), too," Vizzutti said with a smile.

Vizzutti, who will be a senior in high school this fall, accompanied her parents to Hays but stayed on campus as one of the nearly 300 teenage campers.

A violinist in the high school orchestra, Vizzutti also is a percussionist in the top high school band and also plays drums in the jazz band.

The week-long instruction will culminate with performances that begin tonight and continue through Saturday afternoon.

"I'm wearing two hats here," pianist Laura Vizzutti said of her dual role as mother and performer this week.

Laura Vizzutti added that while this trip to the plains of Kansas provided a different view than most of their excursions, she wasn't surprised at the quality of musicians performing and teaching here this week.

"World-class musicians who travel the world often land up in these little pockets," she said.

Liz Schmeidler said she feels lucky that for a week every summer, Hays is lucky to be one of those pockets.

"If there's somebody who needs someone to nurture (their music), they have the opportunity to show people what they've got (at camp)," she said.

Even for a teenager who has studied at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y. -- and wasn't so sure at first about her first trip to Kansas.

However, Gabriella Vizzutti said she has thoroughly enjoyed her trip, especially the fact that she could participate in both orchestra and band during the same camp.

"That's the cool thing about this camp," Gabriella Vizzutti said. "Back home, it's 'Are you going to be strings or a drummer?' Here it was, 'Sweet, I get to do both.' It's fun. I like it here."