Irene Thompson played the saxophone growing up in northern Iowa. She enjoyed it, but soon grew too busy with a family in rural Grafton, Iowa, to continue.

Decades later, after moving to Austin, she stumbled upon an ad for a used saxophone. She bought it, and the music came right back to her.

“I could just sit down and play it, and I’ve been playing ever since,” Thompson said.

At the time, she was in her mid-70s. That was 25 years ago.

Thompson, who likes to say she is now nearly 99-and-a-half years old, played a 35-minute solo Christmas concert on her saxophone Monday afternoon for a crowd of fellow residents in an entertainment room at The Cedars of Austin. She went through an entire book of Christmas songs, and said she wasn’t even winded.

She performs concerts every once in awhile for residents at The Cedars, but after playing a Christmas concert last year, she thought she was done. Then a few residents begged her to play this year.

“She has fans,” said Charity Lifka, Thompson’s granddaughter, who was at the concert on Monday.

Lifka, of Austin, said she was impressed by the number of songs Thompson played.

“I was only expecting several songs,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting a 30-minute concert.”

But to Lifka, the fact that she is playing doesn’t seem out of the ordinary.

“We’re so used to her acting younger,” Lifka said. “And she has a passion for music. That passion and love for music has kept her going.”

Thompson — who lives at The Cedars with her husband of 32 years, Charles Thompson — still drives a car, plants flowers in a garden at The Cedars, and generally stays active. She said she doesn’t have a secret, except that she eats light and stays busy.

“She is the busiest 99-year-old you would ever meet,” Lifka said.

Maybe it was the hard work on the farm that’s kept her in shape, Thompson said. And instilled a hard work ethic — which was evident when Thompson started to pick up and stack chairs in the entertainment room after her concert.

But Lifka assured her Cedars employees would tidy up.