So tonight, the Vancouver Inter-Cultural Orchestra is having their “Music of the Whole World: The ABCs of Intercultural Music” event that I mentioned in a previous post.
The performances details:
Thursday March 3, 2011 at 7 pm
Vancouver Public Library Central Branch
350 Georgia St.
Alice MacKay Hall (Lower Level)
FREE Admission
But what really sold me to this group–other than the fact they are doing what I would love to be doing with an ensemble, is this:
For the third presentation in the 2010-2011 edition of our educational series Music of the Whole World, the VICO is proud to feature the future of intercultural music, in the making: student composers from Seycove Secondary School in North Vancouver will present new pieces they have written for tar, oud and santur, performed by VICO musicians. This event is part of VICO in the Schools, an innovative workshop program through which VICO musicians and instructors introduce students to a selection of non-Western instruments and impart techniques for composing intercultural music.
This is something I can stand behind and fully support. The type of outreach, especially for such an “unorthodox” ensemble that I would think should be part and parcel of any performing groups’ activities. If anyone reading is on the left coast and near the border of Canada I would highly recommend this concert just out of principle!
Eric Edberg has an insightful blog post about Education and Outreach and I think this description of Adrian Ellis’ (Executive Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center) talk at an event he attended last month says it all:
He elaborated on a variety of topics, outreach being perhaps the most critical. With much of country “two to three generations beyond routine arts education,” the task falls to arts organizations. Jazz at Lincoln Center, he said, is “basically an education machine with programming.”
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