Welcome to the Traveling Notes 2008 blog. This blog was created on a Mac. In Windows there may be large white spaces between text and pictures. Make sure to keep scrolling down. Also don't forget to click on "Older Posts" at the bottom of the first page to see the next one.
Enjoy!
Arrival and start of the festival
The long awaited moment is finally there. The first participants are arriving at Jorge Chavez International Airport in Lima.
The faculty, comprised of Pavel Ilyashov, Jorge Aguirre, Ellen Brager, Matt Kraemer and Jeff Phelps, is ready and eager to start.
But first we need to absorb the culture with our first (virgin) pisco sour!
We are very grateful to Newton College for inviting our festival on their beautiful campus in La Planicie. Newton College is a British-Peruvian school with a strong focus on the arts and a clear understanding of how music supports many other academic activities. They have an impressive music department and it was a pleasure to work closely together with their faculty.
The faculty, comprised of Pavel Ilyashov, Jorge Aguirre, Ellen Brager, Matt Kraemer and Jeff Phelps, is ready and eager to start.
But first we need to absorb the culture with our first (virgin) pisco sour!
We are very grateful to Newton College for inviting our festival on their beautiful campus in La Planicie. Newton College is a British-Peruvian school with a strong focus on the arts and a clear understanding of how music supports many other academic activities. They have an impressive music department and it was a pleasure to work closely together with their faculty.
Music, music, music!
The focus of the Traveling Notes festivals is on music education. Our musicians partake in private coaching sessions, master classes, sectionals, and chamber music workshops, in addition to the rehearsals for the many concerts. The repertoire always includes music that is representative of the different nationalities that are present in the group.
In Peru our students - and faculty - also learned to play the zampoña, a typical instrument from the Andes mountains.
As seen below, the girls took it a bit more seriously than the boys ...
Concerts in Colegio Alfonso Ugarte and in the Hogar Santa María
Our first concert took place in the Colegio Alfonso Ugarte, a large public school in Lima. The event was organized in partnership with the US Embassy and the Ministry of Education who had just adopted a new pilot program to introduce more art in the public school curriculum.
Our second concert took us to the Hogar Santa María, an orphanage near Newton College. In the afternoon our faculty taught their music students, after which our musicians joined the group for a joint concert.
A reporter from NAPA.com.pe followed us at both concerts and interviewed our musicians, as well as the students of the public school and the orphans of the Hogar. NAPA stands for No Apto Para Adultos or Not Suited for Adults and is a news program geared towards an adolescent audience.
The result can be seen in the video below.
Our second concert took us to the Hogar Santa María, an orphanage near Newton College. In the afternoon our faculty taught their music students, after which our musicians joined the group for a joint concert.A reporter from NAPA.com.pe followed us at both concerts and interviewed our musicians, as well as the students of the public school and the orphans of the Hogar. NAPA stands for No Apto Para Adultos or Not Suited for Adults and is a news program geared towards an adolescent audience.
The result can be seen in the video below.
Concert in Manchay
Manchay is a settlement of campesinos from the mountains around Ayacucho, who fled the brutality of the Shining Path insurgency of the 1980s and early '90s. It is a shantytown that sprouted up in an old sand quarry at the outskirts of Lima. It is a desolate, dry and dusty place where people live in extreme poverty and a great many of its residents do not have access to water and electricity. Towering over the settlement is the church of Manchay, built in Ayacucho style to give the people a sense of home. The parrish of Manchay is lead by Padre José who swore to put his life at the service of the people of Manchay after having escaped his own execution by the Shining Path.
Next to the church is a school with a remarkable music program that was made possible thanks to a private donation of instruments.
When we visited it happened to be "teacher's day" and our musicians were invited to play a concert in honor of all the teachers of the settlement, more than 600.
At the end of the concert each musician received a typical Peruvian hat and the school band gave a concert in our honor in return. For many of our musicians this was the most powerful and moving concert of the festival.
Concert at the Country Club Hotel
With the cooperation of a local non-profit called Caritas Graciosas, four chamber music ensembles played works of Beethoven, Haydn, Mendelssohn and Shostakovich at the elegant Country Club Hotel to help them raise money to provide training in modern teaching methods to elementary teachers in underserved rural areas.
Closing Concert at Newton College
Video clip - Ashokan Farewell
Our last concert was another benefit concert, this time organized with the cooperation of Grupo Vida, a local charity. The concert took place in the theater of Newton College.
Our young musicians played beautifully and received a well-deserved standing ovation and an applause that kept going on and on. Thanks to the proceeds of the concert, Grupo Vida was able to continue their work of assisting adolescent mothers from poor economic backgrounds, helping them to learn a trade to support themselves and their young children.
As a token of their gratitude they presented our group with a beautiful show of folklore dances and rhythms.
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