EDITORIAL
Rehearsing Community for a Better Tomorrow
“There is no better place to learn the art of loving than in community.” — bell hooks
In a time when young people, especially, witness daily examples of division and discord, we in the field of music and social impact hold a profound responsibility to model the community and collaboration we strive to bring into the world.
This responsibility has always been there, of course. As Executive Director Liz Moulthrop remarked during El Sistema USA’s East Coast Regional Gathering, “Community is our power.” Yet too often, programs operate in isolation, brilliant islands of musical striving that rarely connect with the broader archipelago of creative youth development work happening across the world. This siloing, while understandable given resource constraints and logistical challenges, represents a missed opportunity to address our urgent need for unity.
In fact, we must double down on gathering—the practice of community.
Modeling Intentional Assembly
For the past decade, the El Sistema Residency, in the eastern United States, has brought together hundreds of young people from diverse programs each year. Through a partnership between Project Music and the King School, this event has become the largest grassroots gathering of creative youth development organizations in the U.S., welcoming over 225 young people and teaching artists from seven states this year. Project Music produces the event while the King School hosts; both organizations operate in Stamford, Connecticut.
Garrett Mendez, founding Artistic Director of Project Music and Director of Performing Arts at the King School, had the initial vision and continues to spearhead the gathering. In reflecting on its success, he says: “It almost doesn’t matter what music you pick, genre-wise… We’re just getting people together and working together, and that alone is one of the most important things we can be doing, given today’s climate, where we don’t seem to understand each other enough.”
Pedro Falcón, Project Music educator and El Sistema Venezuela alumnus, connects this process directly to social change: “[Social change] is not changing somebody’s economic background…it’s [how] we react to the small things…You’ll see a student who didn’t do well with a skill try to fix it [with peers]—those small moments are what we actually call music for social change.”
This framing serves as a useful model for modern times. Traditional music festivals and competitions, while valuable, often replicate existing hierarchies and reward individual achievement over collective growth. What I’m advocating for goes deeper: gatherings designed specifically to break down barriers, create new relationships, and foster a more inclusive society.
Collective Composition as Praxis
When young musicians from different backgrounds come together, the results extend beyond music. The experience of being stand partners or circling up with strangers, striving together in pursuit of a common goal, is not only beautiful. It is the practice of community.
This practice has never been more critical. American philosopher John Dewey argued that democracy is not merely a political system but a way of life that must be actively practiced through “cooperative experience.” In a political moment when many feel overwhelmed by forces beyond their control, our musical gatherings provide precisely this kind of experience for young people—but only when we design them with community-building at their center. While many adults are modeling fear, division, and retreat, our young musicians learn to lean into uncertainty alongside peers they barely know.
In fact, collective composition—wherein groups of musicians from different programs create original music together—might be the most powerful model that has emerged from this work. Unlike traditional repertoire-based gatherings, it requires constant communication, negotiation, and, in the words of Dan Trahey, Founder of Tuned-In at Peabody Conservatory, “taking safe risks.”
“When we’re composing music in this group style, the adult must take on a beginner’s mindset. In the creation moments, we adults do not know more than the students. The first days are the best; walking into the rehearsal space, there are so many questions being asked by the adults, as opposed to adults spewing facts or statements. Think about what that does for the kids—adults asking them stuff like, ‘What do you think about this? How do you feel? What do you want to do next?’ Asking questions and simply saying: ‘What you say/sing/play is meaningful and matters to me and the ensemble.’”
Once students become co-creators rather than passive recipients, community forms. They aren’t just making music—they’re practicing the skills of democratic engagement: listening deeply, contributing their unique perspective, negotiating differences, and committing to a shared vision.
Addressing Practical Challenges
We know that organizing any gathering requires significant resources and planning. The logistics alone can feel overwhelming, particularly for smaller programs already stretched thin. But the path forward doesn’t require us all to host 225 students. It starts much smaller and more locally. As Trahey advises: “I’d call the person in a program that is closest geographically and personally to me…and ask them if they’d like to do an exchange with a small number of kids.”
Mendez agrees: “You most likely have connections, whether from Sistema conferences, regional things, or just knowing some of the other programs around… We started with eight students from Baltimore. We didn’t even know what we wanted it to look like yet.”
Homestays can replace hotel costs. Local businesses often donate food when presented with compelling stories about youth development. School partners can provide facilities. Your students’ parents lead the charge, as volunteers. More than money, the initial investment is a commitment to community-building.
Your students, staff, and organization will benefit. Programs have consistently reported to us that students who participate in these gatherings return home with increased motivation, expanded musical horizons, and deeper commitment to their artistic communities. The benefits compound over time as these students become peer leaders who help create more inclusive and collaborative program cultures.
As CHIME & Young Leaders Director Zoë Auerbach notes, “I’m always blown away by how easily music students from all over can fit seamlessly together… it makes me hopeful for society at large.”
Building Tomorrow–Now
The question is not whether your program has the resources to host hundreds of students. The question is: What gathering could you organize with the resources you have right now?
Could you partner with one nearby program for a day-long collaborative workshop? Could you invite musicians from different cultural traditions to create music with your students? What would you need to organize a weekend exchange between urban and rural programs?
The young people in our programs will inherit a world shaped by our choices today. We can prepare them with technical musical skills alone, or we can prepare them as artist-citizens capable of building the inclusive, creative communities our world requires.
Start with one phone call, or an email. Start with one partnership. Start with the resources you have. But start.
We will all be better because of it.
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