MARYSVILLE — The Marysville-Pilchuck High School Music Boosters’ “For the Love of Music Auction” not only narrowly exceeded its turnout goals on Saturday, March 8, but it also bested its fundraising totals from last year.

Kirby Taylor, president of the M-PHS Music Boosters, reported that the evening’s event managed to squeeze four extra chairs into the Gleneagle Golf Course Country Club, in addition to the 84 chairs that had already been booked.

“We had people who wanted us to offer 100 or even 120 seats for this year’s auction, but I asked them, where do you think you’ll be getting those folks from?” Taylor laughed. “As for dollars, I’d guestimate that we generated about $12,000, which is 20 percent higher than last year’s amount, and simply no comparison to previous years, when we were actually losing money on this event. We spent a lot of time and effort on finding ways to curtail the costs of this year’s event, so we could keep about 90 percent of what we made.”

Taylor expressed her appreciation to the auction’s many and varied donors, from a host of local artists to a number of bakers and jewelers who incorporated treble-cleft musical symbols into their cookies and earrings to complement the cause of the night.

“Ethical Choices of Everett supplied us with a number of fair-trade items, because you don’t want to support kids by selling things that were made on the backs of other kids,” Taylor said. “And Lizzy’s Jewelry of Marysville was wonderfully supportive. We even received a heritage quilt, that had been passed down through four or five generations of a family. What made this such a great team, in part, was that anyone and everyone was willing to donate, and many hands make light work.”

The proceeds from this event will go to support the roughly 120 students in the music programs of the Marysville School District, including the M-PHS Jazz Band, Choir and Color Guard, all three of which performed that night.

“There are people who think we only serve the marching band, but we do it all,” Taylor said. “We do this for all our young Marysville musicians, who are going out and representing both their school district and their city, through performances in their hometown and as far away as San Francisco.”

Local music lovers will be able to catch Marysville students’ next musical outing for free on Tuesday, March 18, at 7 p.m. in the M-PHS auditorium, as the Marysville-Pilchuck Symphonic Band and Wind Ensemble will share the stage with Cedarcrest Middle School and Marysville Getchell High School as part of the schools’ annual festival concert.

For more information, log onto the M-PHS Music Boosters’ website at www.mpmusicboosters.my-pta.org.