Marcus Gee
Thomas Wilkins & Gustavo Dudamel
John Malveaux of
writes:
Based
on a past League of American Orchestras survey, nearly
90% of orchestra players are White, 3% percent are African-American or
Latino,
and most of the remaining 7% are Asian. On July 22, 2017, I attended the
Los Angeles Philharmonic Association closing event of the NATIONAL TAKE A STAND FESTIVAL at Disney Concert featuring the NATIONAL TAKE A STAND FESTIVAL ORCHESTRA.
The concert and El Sistema concept represent the most powerful
vehicle for diversity and inclusion in American Orchestras that I have ever witnessed to date.. Please see NATIONAL TAKE A STAND FESTIVAL http://www.laphil.com/educatio
Hollywood Bowl Orchestra principal Conductor Thomas Wilkins opened
the concert with Coleridge-Taylor “Danse Negre”, Berlioz “Hungarian March from
the Damnation of Faust” and Elgar “Nimrod” from Enigma Variations. LA Phil
Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel closed with Tchaikovsky “Slavonic
March”, and Bernstein “Mambo”, from West Side Story. I sat next to a gentleman
who is producing a documentary about Maestro Dudamel. Before the concert, I asked if he knew anything
about the composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. He quickly said NO. I shared two
brief comments and hoped he would read the paragraph in the program about the
Afro-European composer.
In
2013, i missed the screening of a Samuel Coleridge-Taylor documentary
followed by a discussion with the producer Charlie Kaufman. However, I
was successful in contacting Mr. Kaufman and he agreed to meet with me
on his way to the airport. Mr. Kaufman had invested all his assets in
the documentary without a distribution deal. He graciously shared a copy
of the documentary with me. Please see one of several trailers to his
documentary SAMUEL COLERIDGE-TAYLOR and His Music in America, 1900-1912
on Youtube. I selected the following trailer because the first person
speaking is Francis Walker, sister of the Pulitzer Prize composer George
Walker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nU3uOodTEh8. The entire documentary is also on Youtube.
As
the high school musicians between the ages of 12-18 walked
on staged, I starting counting the number of African Americans players. I
was
momentarily distracted and they were coming so frequently, I lost count
and
could not recover to get an accurate count. Sitting in the front row, I
gave close attention to the skillful techniques and confidence by the
principal cellist Marcus Gee. See pic 1 Marcus Gee.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s first date with his future wife Coretta was a concert
of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. After witnessing their lives and the NATIONAL TAKE A STAND ORCHESTRA, I know for sure YES WE CAN. see pic 2 Maestros Wilkins and Dudamel
No comments:
Post a Comment