Working with students from Oberlin College
When I joined this group I understood that my “job” would be a pretty diverse one. During my trial week I took part in chamber music coachings, masterclasses for composers and performers, panel discussions, and performances.
If anything, things have become more wild and wonderful. Here is a list compiled from work we have done in the past two weeks. There is certainly nothing out of the ordinary about this range of activities:
- Four-day workshop (for multimedia theatrical extravaganza, Slide, with Rinde Eckert and Steve Mackey)
- eighth blackbird concerts (at the improbably-named Institute for Advanced Study, and in St Cloud MN)
- Collaborative, “super-ensemble” rehearsals and concerts with current Oberlin students (in San Francisco and Seattle)
- Outreach work at public high schools, both inner city and suburban
- Performance/discussion for a humanities group at a seniors center
- University masterclasses
- University composer sight-reading session
- Lecture/demonstration at a public library
- Open rehearsals
Writing down our activities in a list reminds me how much educational work we do. In the craziness of concert preparation, it can be very easy to forget that a huge amount of our work is in universities, high schools, libraries, old-folks homes… And this range is certainly not unique in the world of American chamber music.
We need this diverse work to survive financially; we need it to have the opportunity to bend ears, both young and old, to our unique work; we need it to get better at presenting this bizarre music to general audiences from ALL walks of life; we need it simply to keep things interesting.
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