Carnegie Hall

As 2024 drew to a close, the Boston String Academy celebrated the 79th Session of the United Nations General Assembly with a performance at Carnegie Hall alongside Boston Conservatory’s Venus Quartet.

National and international youth orchestra and choir festivals instill a collaborative mindset in their participants and provide all attendees with powerful, lasting memories. But they are time-consuming to organize, requiring logistical know-how and well-considered, family-flexible safeguarding policies for the children and young people. It’s not only tiring; it’s expensive. And program leaders know firsthand that students progress with or without these national or international festivals. So why bother? What do they offer to young people that their own programs can’t provide?

My answer, in a word: perspective.

Carnegie Hall’s World Orchestra Week festival in August was a week of one “WOW!” after another, as seven youth orchestras from five different continents joined forces in and around Carnegie Hall to play for and with each other, to share singular musical works and ethos from their countries, and to show us all what the next generation’s Wishes for Our World might be.

Twelve years ago, Carnegie Hall started the Lullaby Project, inviting new parents to create original lullabies for their children in an effort to promote wellness and social inclusion.

Researchers from WolfBrown spent six years studying Carnegie Hall’s NYO2 orchestra, a free orchestral program engaging musicians from historically underrepresented communities in classical music. Their resulting report, “With Freedom of Soul to Do and Be: A Longitudinal Study of Young Musicians in Carnegie Hall’s NYO2 Orchestra,” offers an insider’s look into what makes a youth orchestra truly inclusive.

Free stuff! Check out these self-paced online courses available to teaching artists worldwide:

PlayUSA, an annual grants program administered by Carnegie Hall, has just launched their latest application cycle for 2023-2024.

Your students’ music education doesn’t have to end with the school year. Carnegie Hall’s Resources for Young Musicians offers young people the chance to freely explore their creativity and musicianship over the summer.

We have included a note about Carnegie Hall’s Musical Explorers free online curriculum for early learners before, but with new material, it is better than ever.