Our Visiting Artists Outreach program connects world-class ensembles with local schools, where they give interactive lecture-demonstrations about their instruments, repertoire, and rehearsal process. Students get to hear chamber music performed at the highest level while learning firsthand about our performers’ careers as professional musicians.
The Visiting Artists Outreach program now serves over 300 schoolchildren each year, many of them students who would not ordinarily have the opportunity to hear chamber music or to talk with performers one-on-one.
Our school visits support teachers’ instructional goals and offer students an exciting educational and artistic experience. As one student put it, “I think I’ll give [classical music] a try.” Another told us that a Visiting Artists Outreach presentation “inspired me and my friends so much, we started playing [music] together.” And, with condolences to Mickey & Donald, a newly minted young fan of the Miró Quartet said to her mother, “Mom…it was better than Disneyland!”
When given the chance to listen, young people like chamber music. So do the young at heart—which is why, in addition to school presentations, the Visiting Artists Outreach program brings chamber music to assisted-living facilities, where we serve those who can no longer attend our regular performances. We also hold informal concerts at libraries and other community venues, reaching audiences who have never before been exposed to live, professional-quality chamber music.