Abreu Fellows visit

CMW recently hosted a visit by the newest class of the Abreu Fellows Program at the New England Conservatory. There will be more interaction between the two fellowship programs (CMW & Abreu) this year, and CMW musicians have already traveled up to Boston to participate in a professional development workshop for educators interested in El Sistema.

As Sebastian noted, since founding CMW in 1997, it is exciting to have so many new colleagues joining us in recent years to explore the possibilities of transforming lives through community-based music education. To paraphrase Erik Holmgren, Education Director for the Abreu Program, our collective challenge is to "unlearn hundreds of years of classical music culture" and become less rigid, embody the joy that is (at least in other cultures) such a natural part of a child's experience of learning and performing music.

Some of the new Abreu Fellows are blogging about their experience. Follow them here, here, and here.

-Heath Marlow, Managing Director