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Summer Camps for Young Sistema Musicians

Kerrigan Dougherty, Artistic and Program Operations Coordinator, OrchKids, Baltimore

06-01-2018

In the vast network of Sistema-inspired programs across the U.S., there is nearly as vast an array of summer programs. Each summer camp has distinguishing features, but all are united around a common purpose: preventing “summer learning loss.” Every executive director and program director surveyed for this article told me that summer programs are important bridges of learning between one year and the next.

The Global Challenge

Aristedes Rivas, Cellist and Strings Specialist

06-01-2018

When I was 12 years old, I was invited to join the Los Llanos Symphony Orchestra in Guanare, Venezuela. I was the youngest of a group of children who joined the orchestra that year. The first rehearsal was of Tchaikovsky’s 4th Symphony. I have never in my life felt more lost than I did in that rehearsal. Three years later, I became co-principal cellist of this orchestra, along with my former teacher.

From the Editor

Tricia Tunstall

05-01-2018

In this issue, we are taking the unprecedented (for us) step of adding a third page. We decided that a third page was necessary to honor and to mourn Draylen Mason, a young bass player and student leader in the Austin Soundwaves program who was killed last month. We also decided that the Action of the Month should be a symbolic action of mourning by all programs.

Jazzing Up Sistema Relevance

Laura Patterson, Executive Director and Matt Rhody, Lead Violin Teacher and Curriculum
Development, Make Music NOLA, New Orleans

05-01-2018

To many classically trained musicians, the El Sistema program model of learning in group classes and ensembles is very different from how we learned. However, the development of technique and discipline, and the understanding of music that comes with classical training, are just as important for playing in other genres. Classical training provides a foundation that can be used for learning any style of music. The notes, rhythms, and instrumental techniques are the same in classical music as they are in jazz. Professional brass bands may play the same notes and rhythms to Liza Jane as our students would, but in a different key, with open sections for improvisation and with a different sound.

Engaging Family

Jamie Wolf, Program Director, El Sistema Colorado

05-01-2018

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Interning Into Leadership

Sharniece Adams, Lead Site Coordinator at Lockerman-Bundy, OrchKids, Baltimore

04-01-2018

At the age of ten, I was chosen to be part of Tuned In, an El Sistema program at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore. During my eight years there, Dan Trahey, the director, gave the students opportunities to intern with other programs. As a middle school student, I was able to choose between going to band camp and interning at the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra Orchkids program. I loved Orchkids in particular, so I chose that program, and started my first summer internship there in eighth grade. Orchkids was also an El Sistema program, so it felt like home. The students were like me; we faced the same problems and challenges, we had the same interests, and we all just wanted to play music. I interned at Orchkids every summer through high school, and I learned so much not only about music but also about administration, skills I could use in the real world.

From the Editors

Tricia Tunstall

04-01-2018

On March 24th, as I worked on putting this issue together, I listened to a live stream of the rally in Washington, D.C. I heard young person after young person speaking truth to power about their lived experiences of gun violence. And another voice was suddenly present in my head, more seasoned but still resonating with the urgent aspiration of the young people’s voices. “Put a violin in the hands of a child,” said that voice, “and the child will not pick up a gun.”

Student Empowerment in Music Learning

Karen Cueva, Manager of Learning & Engagement Programs at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute

04-01-2018

Students as leaders. Increasingly, teaching artists in U.S. Sistema-inspired programs have been thinking about this important idea.

In February, a group of music teaching artists and program directors came together for a PlayUSA workshop on “Empowering Students to Lead.” PlayUSA is an initiative of Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute that supports quality instrumental instruction reaching young musicians in local communities across the country. The workshop brought together faculty from 13 PlayUSA grantee organizations, including Sistema programs and other instrumental music education organizations, to focus on student agency in musical learning.

Setting the Stage for Sistema

Ronnie Ragen, Founder/Director, Music for the Very Young

03-01-2018

Music for the Very Young (MVY), Trenton Music Makers’ early-childhood music and movement program, was created in 2000. Our goal was to serve Trenton’s pre-K children, teachers and families, not only by creating joyful and interesting early musical experiences for the children, but also by weaving music and movement into the fabric of the preschool day, and engaging the children’s families in their music learning. We worked closely with the school district and with Music Together, creators of the music resources used in MVY, to ensure we addressed district goals with high-quality materials. Weekly classes led by early childhood music specialists, PD workshops for classroom teachers, family music parties – all these create an immersive music-making opportunity that is very much aligned with Sistema practice.

From the Editor

Tricia Tunstall

03-01-2018

Many of us know by heart this quote from José Antonio Abreu’s televised TED talk in 2009: “Orchestra and chorus are much more than artistic structures; they are schools of social life, because to play and sing together means to intimately coexist toward perfection and excellence.”

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