October 2018

Do you think of yourself as a teaching artist? Many teachers in the global Sistema use that term to describe what they do. Sometimes, though, there can be a lack of clarity about what it means – and a lack of awareness that there is, in fact, a powerful and growing global movement for Teaching Artistry, just as there is for El Sistema.

The creation of the forty-member Junior String Ensemble for this year’s Take a Stand Festival was a new step for the TAS Festival – and its success was beyond all expectations. The student musicians came wonderfully prepared. Our curriculum for them went beyond learning the concert repertoire to include leadership skills, chamber music skills, and interaction with a living composer.

For El Sistema students with aspirations to pursue music as a career, the idea of becoming a professional orchestral musician can seem daunting. It can be a tough, competitive journey, and for Black and Latinx musicians, who currently represent less than 5% of musicians in American orchestras, the journey can present challenges not readily understood or acknowledged by others in the field. To address these challenges, three organizations are working together to support musicians of color in achieving success.

Students from Ghetto Classics in Nairobi have created a new music video that you can view below. For this video, students partnered with SAWA, an organization that partners with local Kenyan women to make beaded decorations for technology like headphones (which can be seen in the film). 

The 12th annual Festival of Books and Culture  was recently held in Medellín, Colombia.

El Sistema is excited to announce the appointment of Maestro David Ascanio as the new Director of the Simón Bolívar Conservatory of Music.

The Massachusetts Cultural Council (MCC) with The Klarman Family Foundation kick off the second cohort of the META Fellowship this month.  The term stands for Music Educators and Teaching Artists, and it is a two year professional development program for about 60 Fellows, including faculty from Sistema-inspired programs in the state.

Each Saturday, nearly one hundred young people from all corners of the Philippines come together for a day of music-making with the Orchestra for Filipino Youth (OFY) at the Rockwell Business Center in Metro Manila. Even though some students have to catch early morning boats in order to get there—as early as 5 o’clock sometimes—the musicians are prepared and attentive come the downbeat at 10.

“For the National Batuta Foundation in Colombia, the international exchange of its participants in different music training programs around the world represents a unique opportunity to provide new knowledge, break mental boundaries, and generate hope for a better future within the brightest young musicians of Batuta.  It is, therefore, a mechanism that promotes meaningful social mobility and generates fully cultural citizens,” commented Para María Claudia Parias Durán, Executive President of the National Batuta Foundation.

Read an inspiring interview with Joseph Jones.  He’s a multi-instrumental musician, composer, conductor, and the founder of the Orchestra Amadeus, whose mission is to promote social justice through classical music.