For musician Susan Spaulding, organizing the Sept. 12 French horn concert at St. John’s Church is not only a way to celebrate her professional instrument, but also a means to shed light upon her affliction - multiple sclerosis.

Spaulding is the principal French horn for the Greater Bridgeport Symphony Orchestra and is a member of the Hartford and New Haven Symphony Orchestras. Spaulding also teaches music at Central Connecticut State University and Hartford’s Hartt School of Music.

Spaulding was diagnosed in spring 2005 with MS, a serious autoimmune disease for which the cause and cure remain unknown.

The North Haven French horn player said that at first she did not spread the news. “There was no need,” she said, adding that her onset symptoms were mild enough to remain undetectable to others.

“I’m lucky,” she said. “I really didn’t have to modify my life too much. I kept on my regular schedule of playing and teaching.”

However, years later, Spaulding wants everybody to know that she is handling the disease with ease. “It’s my coming out concert,” Spaulding said of the event. “The drugs are going very well for me. It’s a good time to let everybody know. They will see me dealing with MS with success. I want them to know that they don’t have to treat me any differently.”

Additionally, the French horn player thought the concert could be an opportunity to benefit MS research. All proceeds will go toward the National MS Society - Spaulding is looking to raise $4,000 to $5,000.

“I felt capable of raising a little money to give back to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society for research,” she said. “Recent research has been very optimistic. They are starting to target newer drugs that might be able to determine things that might later turn out to be the cause. It would be great one day for there to be a cure.”

The upcoming two-hour concert will feature ensembles of up to 32 French horns, in addition to “the best tuba player in the state” and two percussionists, Spaulding said, with one of the drummers being her husband Anthony DeQuattro.

Spaulding hoped that the concert, on which she began work last spring, would demonstrate that MS does not necessarily debilitate a victim’s life.

“Historically, what you see of MS patients are those who are incapacitated,” she said. “But there are those who go on with their daily lives who you don’t see. I am one of those.”

Spaulding discovered that she had MS four years ago in “an exaggerated fashion.”

“I fell down my stairs while carrying laundry,” she said. “And then I could not stand up. I thought it was my back. I went to a chiropractor and he treated it. After I fell, I started to get numbness on my right side. My chiropractor said it was something different and sent me to a neurologist.”

Dr. Adam Mednick of North Haven did blood work on Spaulding and had to deliver the bad news.

“He said my symptoms were ‘as classic as classic can be,’” Spaulding said. “In a matter of months, I had a spinal tap and got a conclusive diagnosis very quickly.”

“It was very scary,” she added.

Spaulding considers herself fortunate to have been correctly diagnosed so swiftly. The symptoms of MS vary from person to person, and Spaulding said that some patients incur many rounds of painful tests before MS is pinpointed as their ailment.

After being diagnosed, Spaulding had to select her method of treatment. She explained that there are two forms of MS – recurring remitting and non-recurring. The latter is rarer and includes fewer flare-ups, or exacerbations, of symptoms. Non-recurring necessitates easier treatments. Recurring remitting is the more common form, and entails more frequent exacerbations of symptoms, which will eventually become permanent and debilitating. Recurring remitting also necessitates more difficult treatments.

Spaulding and her doctor chose to begin recurring remitting treatment, partially because Spaulding and her husband were about to adopt a son and did not want to chance her health.

“We had just been approved for an adoption,” Spaulding said. “They had just sent us a referral picture. When you’re assigned a child, they send you their referral picture.”

“Dr. Mednick said ‘this is why you are going to start treatment,’” Spaulding continued, “‘we need to ensure your longevity.’” Today, Spaulding sings instructions to her toddler son Frank to close the back door while she sits in her house for the interview. Frank harmonizes back.

Spaulding’s MS flare ups have up to now remained mild. “They’ve been sensory only,” she said. “So far they haven’t affected any of my functions.”

Spaulding added that she occasionally suffers body numbness, as well as a slight blurriness in the right eye. “The mild numbness is now more entertaining than debilitating,” she said. Spaulding has lost a little bit of vision in her right eye, but not enough to affect her ability to read music.

In fact, MS has been more of a nuisance than an impediment to Spaulding’s musical career. “One exacerbation came while I was playing in the July 4 concert for the Hartford Symphony,” she said. “It felt like the face was itching from the inside out. I wanted to scratch the inside of my face.”

“It doesn’t affect my playing, but it’s distracting,” she added.

Spaulding said that her musical peers, all of which are now cognizant of her disease from the announcement of the Sept. 12 concert, have been “very loving and supportive,” and have also opened up to her about their own health issues. “Many have shared the fact that they’re dealing with illnesses too,” Spaulding said. “A couple of women were breast cancer survivors. A couple men were prostrate cancer survivors. One player told me that his father was a long term MS survivor. Another one had a mother who had Parkinson’s disease.”

“It’s hard to know when to tell people what,” Spaulding said of alerting people to her infliction. “But when you do, people will open up personally. I guess people appreciate the common link and the assurance.”

The French horn player said that her entire family has been supportive – her sister-in-law has participated in several MS Walks. Additionally, Spaulding’s students and former students have been supportive. “Several of my former students said that they admired how I was dealing with everything,” she said.

Spaulding added that she hopes that young musicians will attend the concert to learn about fortitude and friendship. “Any students who see me will see someone dealing with adversity and going on as usual,” she said. “Also, if they go to the concert, they will see horn players working together. It will take the competitive edge away – I think that’s a positive thing to do for kids.”

Such messages purported by the concert have already been spread through media coverage of the concert, and Spaulding has found herself recognized locally and on the Internet.

“People around town say they saw my picture in the paper,” Spaulding said. “They say ‘Hey, aren’t you that lady?’”

Additionally, Spaulding’s cause has entered the digital blogosphere. A friend sent a link to her of a blog written by another horn player who suffers from MS. The blogger, based out of the Washington, D.C. area, had come across a recent article on Spaulding and posted it on the Web site. One Web surfer even wrote of Spaulding in the comment section underneath the posted article, “I knew this woman, and I would be at her concert except I’m living in Alaska. So I’m sending my family.” Spaulding recognized the poster as a former student.

The French horn player added that the blog, her posted article, and the comments helped make her feel like her cause was spreading and was shared by many. “It’s very nice to feel like you’re part of a group,” she said.

Spaulding’s condition and concert has also brought together another group of which she is a part – the state’s French horn players.

“I think it’s been a really good thing as far as the horn world in Connecticut is concerned,” she said of the concert’s practices. “It’s bringing together a large group of horn players that don’t get to interact frequently. It’s allowing us all to connect on a personal level based on our professional level.”

Spaulding said that she felt uniquely qualified to organize such a French horn concert, as she is involved with so many musical organizations in Connecticut that she knows just about every French horn professional in the state. She added that additional motivation to organize the concert was derived from a recent proliferation in professional CDs featuring French horn ensembles, including the London Horn’s Symphony Orchestra and the Vienna Horns.

Additionally, Spaulding said that there has not been a strictly French horn concert in Connecticut since the International Horn Symposium at the Hartt School in 1977.

The French horn player said that the concert should be a great chance to show off the instrument’s many sounds. “The horn can have so many characteristics,” Spaulding said. “That’s why we’re playing so many types of music.”

Accordingly, the show will include the Egmont Overture and other music by Beethoven, as well as the theme from the movie “Titanic,” the prayer from Hansel and Gretel, the Brazilian choro piece Tico-Tico, movements of Handel’s Water Music, and the compositions of Rimsky-Korsakov and Gabrieli.

“There will be something for everybody,” Spaulding said. “That was the goal.”

Of course, the central aim for the performance is to raise money and awareness for MS, as well as positively make light of Spaulding’s MS.

“It’s easier to explain something with fun rather than when you’re in the throes of the problem,” Spaulding said.

The concert will take place from 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. There will be a meet-the-artists reception after the show.

Tickets for the approximately 200-seat show are $20 each. “We might be able to squeeze in a few more seats,” Spaulding said. “Tickets are selling very fast.”

Spaulding added that there are donation and sponsorship opportunities available.

St. John’s Church is located at 3 Trumbull Place.

For more information or to purchase tickets, call (203) 239-0156, e-mail stjohnsmsbenefits@yahoo.com, or visit www.ctfightsMS.org.