Orchestras Canada/Orchestres Canada

Author: Boran Zaza

Chaakapesh: collaborations, language and voice

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OSM musicians performing a concert
Photo Credit: Jean-Marc Abella

In September 2018, the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (OSM) and Music Director Kent Nagano toured to Indigenous communities across Northern Quebec. The featured work on this tour was a new chamber opera entitled Chaakapesh, the Trickster’s Quest.

The opera tells the story of Chaakapesh, a trickster who sets out to stop the massacre of his people by white settlers through teaching these settlers to laugh. The OSM engaged renowned Cree writer Tomson Highway as librettist, and Matthew Ricketts, a young Canadian living in New York, as composer. The work features narrators in one of five languages (Cree, Innu, Inuktitut, French or English, depending on the place of performance), and two singers to tell this story of the founder of the Innu people. Funded in part by a New Chapter grant from the Canada Council for the Arts, the collaboration began with discussions in 2016 and culminated two years later with the tour. 45 OSM musicians participated in this tour, marking the first time in ten years that the orchestra has visited Nunavik, and the first time ever in Cree and Innu territory.

Film-makers Roger Frappier and Justin Kingsley created a documentary about the multiplicity of collaborations brought about from this project, also titled Chaakapesh. The documentary, which premiered in Montreal in December 2019, includes extended sequences of performances, rehearsals, and interviews with people involved in the project, including the creative team, Maestro Nagano, the narrators and singers who performed the work, and OSM staff and musicians.

Indigenous Voices and Indigenous Performers

“There’s a difference between sharing and stealing”

Inuktitut performer playing the traditional drum
Photo Credit: Jean-Marc Abella

Chaakapesh gives significant space to Indigenous voices and performers. With the opera translated into five different languages, different narrators are needed for each performance. In the documentary, each of the Indigenous narrators gets extended interview time to delve deep into their experiences as artists and people, inside and outside of this specific collaboration.

We also see Indigenous community members throughout the creation and rehearsal process, involved in conversations and making creative decisions. The collaborative aspect of this project continues into the tour itself, where we see a range of Indigenous performers on stage, including an advanced local cello student playing a Bach suite, a traditional fiddler and throat singers. Their performances were built into the opera, and were different at each presentation depending on which musicians the OSM had access to in each community. As Cree narrator Ernest Webb says, “there’s a difference between sharing and stealing”. In Chaakapesh, we see the OSM sharing the stage with Indigenous performers and sharing the rehearsal process with Indigenous artists.

Stories and Language

“So that our children can inherit something other than prejudice”

Young child conducts a string quartet of OSM musicians
Photo Credit: Jean-Marc Abella

There is a strong story-telling element to many of the interviews in the documentary. Innu narrator Florent Vollant speaks of being taken from his home in Labrador to a residential school when he was only five years old. Inuktitut narrator Akinisie Sivuarapik reminds us that tuberculosis is still present in some Indigenous communities. Though there is a hopefulness to Chaakapesh, the film also reminds us that these stories of trauma are not problems of the past, but issues that are still very present to this day.

Language takes pride of place in both the opera and the documentary. The fact that the opera is presented in no fewer than three Indigenous languages is testament to this. The geography of this project is also significant: in a province where the struggle between French and English can be so strongly felt and politicized, it is easy to forget that there are a number of languages that existed here long before either of Canada’s official languages.

What now?

This project is an important step in furthering collaborative partnerships between arts organizations and Indigenous communities. It was an enormous, successful, very public collaboration, but the real test of this kind work is what sort of ongoing partnerships can be made between these groups. Sustained funding is needed to help orchestras and other arts organizations create meaningful, lasting partnerships that are beneficial to Indigenous communities and enable these communities to celebrate their own art forms, cultural experiences and traditions.

Indigenous and OSM musicians performing a concert
Photo Credit: Antoine Saito

This project was life-changing for the OSM as well. Head of Special Artistic Projects, Marc Wieser, says, “This project was a watershed moment for the OSM in collaboration with Indigenous artists and communities. All genuine relationships begin with trust, and Chaakapesh was a catalyst that has allowed us to build relationships with a growing network of Indigenous artists in Montreal and Quebec. As an organization we learned the value of taking artistic risks and of stepping outside of our comfort zone. We have since collaborated with several of the same artists, among others, and found we were able to go straight to the music, having already established terms of mutual trust. In summer 2019 we produced a concert called Makusham, in which three OSM musicians paired with three Indigenous singer-songwriters and an arranger to collaboratively create a concert where the Indigenous musicians took the artistic lead. The concert was a huge success, and it would have been unimaginable without all the “footwork” of Chaakapesh to back it up. We now feel welcomed and well-perceived by many Indigenous communities, and have the opportunity to build on our experience and continue our collaborations.”

Chaakapesh doesn’t claim to have all the answers for reconciliation between colonizer and colonized, Indigenous and settler communities. As Florent Vollant mentions during one of his documentary interviews, it will take several generations of hard work, sustained partnerships, and thoughtful collaboration to move these conversations forward. This is an important step.

Upcoming screenings, and short clips from the Chaakapesh documentary can be found on the OSM website.

The Opera Chaakapesh will be staged again as part of the OSM’s Classical Spree Festival in August 2020. Tickets on sale from February.

Music as Medicine: Orchestras and the Social Prescribing Movement

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Guest blog post by Claire Speed and Ian Ritchie.

“Music and rhythm find their way into the secret places of the soul” Plato

In June 2019, two national conferences took place over the same two days in Ottawa. One focused on Community Health Connections, the other on the Orchestra of the 21st Century. On the surface, neither had much to do with the other. One was about health, the other about the arts. But they shared a common goal: to create healthier, more inclusive communities.

https://www.health.org.uk/infographic/what-makes-us-healthy

We have never been in doubt about the healing powers of the arts but their value has not been fully realized nor embraced. This attitude, however, may be changing. Today, there is a growing movement, in Canada and internationally, to increase awareness among politicians and the medical community about the potential of the arts to cure: “The power of music to integrate and cure…is quite fundamental. It is the profoundest nonchemical medication.” (Oliver Sacks, “Awakenings”) Funding shortages have forced some governments to think differently about how they deliver healthcare, away from hospital-centred care and over-prescribing of medications to more patient-centred self-care. As stated in a 2017 report by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing in the U.K. “up to a fifth of patients see a G.P. for a problem that requires a social solution.” To address this statistic, some primary care workers are now taking a more proactive approach to healing through social prescribing which is defined as: “a co-creative effort between a health care provider and a patient that recognizes and responds to a patient’s strengths, interests and health needs” (Social Prescribing in Ontario: Progress Report, June 2019). Social prescriptions, therefore, do not presently aim to replace the main ingredients of primary medicine but are seen to be complementary.

While good health care practitioners in Canada have been involved in this work for decades, the Social Prescribing movement has brought the terminology and associated momentum from UK to Canada and in particular Ontario with a project funded by the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care and overseen by the Alliance for Healthier Communities, a network of equity-focused community-governed primary health care organizations that include Community Health Centres (CHCs). The Alliance presented sessions on Social Prescribing at the two national conferences in Ottawa in June. In relation to orchestras, we believe it should be a natural progression for them to extend their mandates (and funding sources) to include health and wellbeing just as they have done for many years in education: this would offer new opportunities to deploy the power of music beyond those attending concert venues and places of learning to reach across the whole human spectrum, from newborns to those in palliative care. At first sight there are few obvious ways for orchestras to engage in social prescribing except in a volunteering capacity, as is currently happening, or by providing free tickets and the opportunity to be a part of the audience. If we target and treat audiences in the right way, this can form part of the current social prescription model.

During the particular session at the Orchestras Canada conference on “Social Prescribing and Orchestras”, Sonia Hsiung, who is leading the Ontario initiative at the Alliance for Healthier Communities, posed the following question: “Where do you see the role of orchestras in enhancing wellbeing and creating community belonging?” Some examples of successful partnerships between the Arts community and CHCs were presented at the two June conferences. South Riverdale CHC’s chronic pain management program, in partnership with the Art Gallery of Ontario, provides training for Peer Ambassadors to lead gallery visits and art-making workshops “with the lens of health and well-being to support self-management and healthy living” for people who have similar lived experience. What if orchestras across Canada are able to co-design similar community-specific arrangements with local healthcare providers that create facilitated access for those with health and social barriers and unable to attend otherwise? Or if docent programs run by the orchestra’s volunteer committee could include CHC clients identified for their love of children to help out with pre-concert activities at family concerts? With sufficient desire and adequate support, many more innovative partnerships like this one in Toronto could be piloted.

We believe music’s relationship with health and wellbeing can be viewed as four overlapping circles – ‘music therapy’, ‘music medicine’, ‘music care’ and ‘music in the community’. The different ways in which music and the arts can benefit society, in terms of health, wellbeing, care and community, suggest that our profession should not be totally reliant on cultural streams of income, public or private, but also find financial recognition from those delivering education, healthcare and social welfare. A more integrated and holistic approach to funding would enrich all the interconnected areas of work.

This leads naturally to the idea that social prescribing – currently valued as a beneficial social and community complement to clinical practice but largely reliant upon informal artistic and other social opportunities that are voluntary or receive one-time funding envelopes – may possibly one day be equally valued alongside pharmaceutical prescription for its health impacts and built in to the formal healthcare system. The UK government’s announcement in October 2019 of funding for a new Academy of Social Prescribing, with the purpose of regulating provision and making this available for every patient in the country, is an important step in the right direction. Also encouraging is the 2019 report by the World Health Organization “on the role of the arts in improving health and well-being”. Maybe Ontario, along with other provinces in Canada, will be next to embrace social prescribing for all patients? Until then, we can seek opportunities to partner, experiment, demonstrate and advocate for the healing power of music and the arts.

Health and well-being are simultaneously local and global issues. In traditional cultures, effective medical remedies have always been locally grown and sourced. As far as the arts are concerned, international success in creation or curation is normally dependent on the strength of the local roots and identity of the works and their makers. So the activities and networks for social prescribing – and for the nexus of arts, health and wellbeing in general – will continue to develop locally and be shared abroad: the world is our home and vice versa.

Ian Ritchie lives in London, UK and is Artistic Advisor, Setubal Music Festival as well as Artistic Director, The Musical Brain and Joint Chair, Music Action International. Claire Speed lives in Ottawa, Canada and is an Independent Consultant & Facilitator for the Arts/Health/Community. Musico-Nexus is being established as an international entity by Ian and Claire to create projects, curate events and develop networks which support music’s powerful and beneficial contribution to people’s health and wellbeing, social inclusion and interdisciplinary practice. For more information or to make contact: [email protected]

Member Spotlight: Music4Life String Orchestra

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Orchestras Canada’s member orchestras range in size from fully professional ensembles, to smaller regional orchestras, to community groups working with enthusiastic amateur musicians. The Music4Life String Orchestra is one such community group.  Based in Ajax, Ontario. Music4Life’s orchestra currently has over 30 string musicians, including four professional section leads who act as mentors and teachers to the rest of the ensemble. The orchestra members range in age from 8 to 78 years old, making for an unusual but beneficial social and musical experience for all involved.

Many community orchestras have professional musicians among their ranks. The extent of their participation varies, from having only a professional concertmaster, to having five professional principal strings, to engaging professional principal musicians in all sections to work alongside community musicians. While Music4Life’s employing a professional conductor and musicians in itself is not unusual, the way in which it is framed is. The orchestra uses the side-by-side professional/amateur experience and in-rehearsal teaching as a particular point of interest to current and prospective community musicians.

The community musicians benefit from having a professional conductor and section leaders present throughout the rehearsal and performance process. Although some of these musicians have private teachers, for many, orchestra rehearsal is the only chance they have for further instruction on their instrument. Seating is rotated at each rehearsal so that each musician gets a chance to sit next to their section leader, and break times are viewed as opportunities for further informal and social exchanges between professional and amateur musicians. The Music4Life arrangement provides an excellent collaborative and supportive environment for all and is a complement to traditional private lessons.

For the professional musicians, this is an opportunity to share their musical knowledge and to reach a wider number of musicians in the community. The group’s professional and advanced musicians are given opportunities to play paid gigs in string quartet/quintet arrangements for public and private events. Proceeds raised from these performances are directed back into the operation of the non-profit orchestra. The side-by-side nature of the Music4Life String Orchestra is one that supports exchange between professional and amateur, and young and old, in a way that benefits the musical experience of all involved.

Music4Life’s next concert is on December 7th at Forest Brook Community Church. Under the musical direction of Kathryn Knowles, a Toronto-based Cellist, Composer and General Manager of the Canadian League of Composers, the event will feature a collaboration with a string quartet of award-winning jazz/classical crossover musicians who will perform seasonal, classical and jazz repertoire with the orchestra. Learn more about the Music4Life String Orchestra on their website.

The Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra goes Digital

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Daniel Raiskin and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra

Orchestras are always looking for ways to broaden their audience and engage more deeply with them. Many orchestras cite an aging audience and the move away from specialized music education in schools as reasons for a slow but steady decline in audience sizes. In recent years, however, there has also been a trend for orchestras to want to make up for this gap in specialized music education and to appeal to a younger new audience, while fostering a deeper engagement with their current patrons.  This is done in a variety of ways from pre-concert talks to ‘Symphony 101’ type guides. In the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s case? They went digital.

To elaborate, the WSO is making use of a companion app called EnCue at three of their concerts this year, with the intention of integrating this app into more concerts in coming seasons. EnCue is a free-to-download app that sends users live, real-time program notes, images and stories during the performance. The EnCue website lists the app at $350 USD per concert, with potential discounts for multiple concerts. The WSO launched the app at their October 18th (B)eyond Classics series concert, for the performance of Sergei Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dances. Though app-users weren’t separated from the rest of the audience, the screen is dark lit and the hall lights are brought up to avoid disturbing other patrons. This is the first example of something like this being done in Canada, though several orchestras in Europe and the United States have integrated similar technology into their concert programs. Advertising for the concert mentioned EnCue as a point of interest for prospective patrons.

RBC Resident Conductor Naomi Woo during the concert. Photo: Ruth Bonneville, Winnipeg Free Press

For Jean-François Phaneuf, VP Artistic Operations at the WSO, the benefits of the app are twofold. “We’re excited about using this app to appeal to new audiences and increase the level of engagement with current and prospective patrons. We saw some audience members who were deeply moved by the experience. You get to read about Rachmaninov’s thoughts when writing his work and Music Director Daniel Raiskin’s personal connection to a special passage while hearing it all unfold on stage in front of you.” Over the course of two months, Jean-François Phaneuf, James Manishen, Artistic Associate and RBC Assistant Conductor Naomi Woo worked hard to prepare the necessary materials. They tested their content among musically-educated and non-musically-educated WSO staff, and found that short slides (5 seconds to read) and images helped to keep people listening actively. The learning curve for programming the app was steep, but with satisfying results; basic concepts were explained for those unfamiliar to orchestral music, and more complex ‘tidbits’ of information were provided for experts. During the concert, Naomi Woo was backstage with the score, synchronizing the slides with the music for the approximately 200 patrons that downloaded the app. The response from app users was generally positive. By and large, patrons were excited to try something new. Some concertgoers expressed resistance to changes to the concert experience they know and love, but many felt a greater understanding of, and deeper connection with the music through the new information they were given.

There is no intention from the WSO to use EnCue at all of their concerts. It is planned only three times this season for one piece per program. WSO audiences will next see EnCue at the closing concert of the New Music Festival in January, for Michael Daugherty’s Metropolis Symphony and during Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 6 in March. There are plans to integrate EnCue into the second half of every concert for their (B)eyond Classics concert series in 2020-21. With a tech help desk in the lobby at the October 18th concert, most technical challenges were avoided. More studious patrons also requested receiving the slides in advance to ‘study up’ for the concert. Both the WSO and Orchestras Canada are excited about the opportunities presented by giving a wider audience more ways to open the door and access orchestral music in a way that enhances what is presented on stage.

Learn more about the question of digital technology in the orchestral industry by reading our interview with The Space’s Fiona Morris on building a digital organization.

Music As Community Medicine at the Windsor Symphony Orchestra

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Musicians from the Windsor Symphony Orchestra visited community and health venues between October 1st and 10th as part of their Music for Health outreach program. Last year this program included 21 performances to more than 1200 seniors in and around Windsor.

The Music for Health program is an important part of the Windsor Symphony Orchestra’s commitment to the Windsor-Essex community.  This year’s edition included visits to Hospice Windsor, the Windsor Public Library, Downtown Mission, and senior’s retirement and care centres across Windsor-Essex, delivering beautiful music to those who would otherwise be unable to attend a mainstage performance.

The program is based upon the growing body of evidence that shows the positive impact music has on mental, emotional, and even physical health.  Developed by two WSO musicians who have worked very closely with local music therapists in hospital settings, this program features performances by WSO string quartets and quintets at rest homes, retirement homes and social service agencies across Essex County. Clients are encouraged to participate in the performances using small hand percussion (provided by the WSO), selecting works that the ensemble will perform, as well as sharing memories and recollections evoked by the performance. Learn more on the Windsor Symphony Orchestra’s website.

Youth Month and the 80th edition of the OSM Competition

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Youth Month

Since its beginnings, the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal has kept education at the centre of its mission, and has continued to develop new initiatives for engaging young people in classical music. One can think back to the Youth Concerts that were started in 1935 by Wilfrid Pelletier, or to more recent examples such as La Musique aux enfants and the Children’s’ Ball, a gala event that supports educational activities at the OSM and keeps these activities accessible for all.

Continuing the momentum from these initiatives, in November 2019 the OSM will be running a Youth Month dedicated to the many programs offered by the OSM to young musicians, schools and families. The public will be able to discover rising classical music stars during a series of recitals, or to attend the first concert in the Children’s Corner concert series, conducted by the OSM’s new assistant conductor Thomas Le Duc-Moreau. School-aged children will be able to make the most of new freely available educational resources, including (for the first time) the publication of a video of a youth concert filmed at professional standard. Learn more here.

The OSM Competition

Since 1940 the OSM has presented the OSM Competition, Canada’s most prestigious performance competition for young musicians, offering prizes worth more than $100,000 in value to its winners, as well as significant visibility on the international stage. The OSM invites the public to discover 17 violinists and cellists aged between 15 and 25 during the semi-finals and final rounds, which will take place from November 27th to 30th in Montreal. All competition events are webcast to allow for nationwide coverage of the competition. The OSM presents a rich and varied program to competitors and public alike; concerts with previous competition winners, training activities with industry experts, and musical activities at the Maison Symphonique and throughout the city are all part of the competition’s busy schedule. Competitors will benefit from an international jury consisting of, among others, the OSM’s musical director Kent Nagano, and the director of the BBC Proms in London, David Pickard.

Competition winners receive enormous support from the OSM. In addition to cash prizes and scholarships, many have developed a special relationship with the orchestra; the OSM has offered many competition winners the opportunity to perform as soloists, recitalists or chamber musicians with OSM musicians. Kent Nagano also conducts an orchestra of past competition winners during the summer Classical Spree festival. In addition, the OSM fosters partnerships between competition winners and its own artistic partners and international guest artists: an important step for early-career artists.

The orchestra is very proud of the OSM Competition due to the number of ways in which it has enriched the Canadian music scene. Among the winners, many have excelled on the Canadian and international stage, including James Ehnes (violin), Angela Hewitt (piano), Louis Lortie (piano), Karina Gauvin (soprano), Jan Lisiecki (piano), Jonathan Crow (concertmaster, Toronto Symphony), Andrew Wan (OSM Concertmaster), and more recently Timothy Chooi, Blake Pouliot, Carter Johnson and Kerson Leong.

Federal Election Polling Trends

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Note: The following analysis is based on data from 338Canada.com as of October 15, 2019.

In Ontario

  • Both the Conservatives and the Liberals could either lose or gain significant ground in Ontario. So many races are too close to call that the outcome in Ontario could help either party to form the next government. The Liberals held 76 seats in Ontario when the writ was dropped and are projected to win between 32 and 92 seats. The Conservatives held 33 seats in Ontario and are projected to win between 20 and 73 seats. Conservatives have been trending up in Ontario over the past week.
  • The Liberals are projected to lose up to 5 seats in OC member ridings: Kitchener-South-Hespeler, Peterborough-Kawartha, Richmond Hill, Oakville-North-Burlington, St Catharines.
  • At the onset of the election, we had identified 6 ridings to watch for OC members in Ontario: Kitchener-South-Hespeler (Toss up Liberal/Conservative – possible Liberal loss), Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound (Conservative hold), Hamilton-Centre (NDP hold ), Barrie-Springwater-Oro Medonte (Conservative hold), Richmond Hill (Toss up Liberal/Conservative – possible Liberal loss), Oakville-North-Burlington (Toss up Liberal/Conservative – possible Liberal loss).
  • Since the televised debates, NDP fortunes have been on the upswing in various regions throughout the country, including Ontario, where the party has now pulled into several tight races with Liberal incumbents.

In Québec

  • The NDP’s fortunes have improved somewhat since the televised debates, but the party still stands to lose significant ground in Québec. At the time the writ dropped, the NDP held 14 seats in Québec. As of now, they project to win 2 to 5 seats.
  • The NDP are projected to lose up to 5 seats in OC member ridings: Laurier-Sainte Marie, Hochelaga, Rimouski-Neigette-Témiscouatta-Les Basques, Trois rivières, Sherbrooke.
  • The Liberals could lose the most ground in Québec. At the time the writ was dropped, the Liberals held 40 seats in Québec. As of now, they project to win 18 to 44 seats.
  • In several ridings where OC members are based, the races between Liberals and the Bloc Québécois are too close to call.
  • The Bloc Québécois stands to be the biggest winner. At the time the writ was dropped, the Bloc held 10 seats. As of now, they project to win between 21 and 47 seats. The number of projected wins for the Bloc has nearly doubled since the televised debates.
  • At the onset of the election, we had identified 7 ridings to watch for OC members in Québec: Laurier-Sainte Marie (Toss up Liberal/Bloc – NDP loss), Hochelaga (Leaning Bloc – NDP loss), Outremont (Liberal Hold), Ville Marie-Sud Ouest-Île des soeurs (Liberal Hold), Longueil-Charles Lemoyne (Toss up Liberal/Bloc – possible Liberal loss), Québec (Toss up Liberal/Bloc – possible Liberal loss), Chicoutimi-Le Fjord (Toss up Bloc/Conservative – possible Conservative loss).

Arion’s long-serving Artistic Director wins Orchestras Canada’s 2019 Betty Webster Award

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Claire Guimond is the winner of the Orchestras Canada Betty Webster Award for 2019. Mme Guimond will receive the award on Friday, October 18th, at the opening concert of Arion Baroque Orchestra’s 2019-20 concert season. 2019-20 marks Mme Guimond’s final season as Artistic Director of the Montreal-based ensemble.

The Betty Webster Award is presented each year to an individual or organization that has made a sustained and significant contribution over a number of years to the Canadian orchestral community, with an emphasis on leadership, education and volunteerism. It was established in 2002 to honour Orchestras Canada’s founding Executive Director and is a tribute to Mrs. Webster’s visionary leadership and her extraordinary contributions to the health and vitality of orchestras right across Canada.

Mme Guimond founded Arion with three McGill University colleagues in 1981. Initially a quartet, over time the group expanded into one of North America’s best-known baroque orchestras. The orchestra features both established and emerging soloists and conductors along with Arion’s accomplished musicians in a busy program of concerts in Montreal, national and international touring, and recordings.

Mme Guimond has served not only as artistic director and flutist with Arion, but also as executive director for much of her time with the orchestra. A strong supporter of young musicians, she maintains a full calendar of teaching through masterclasses and private lessons.

The 2019-20 season will mark Claire’s 39th and final season at Arion’s helm. This year she is joined by co-artistic director Mathieu Lussier who will succeed her in 2020-21. It is a tribute to Mme Guimond’s hard work and success with Arion that Montreal is now seen as a thriving centre for early music that both attracts renowned international soloists and supports the baroque musicians that perform there.

In response to receiving the award, Claire Guimond said, “I am touched and honoured to receive the Betty Webster award from Orchestras Canada. I would also like to express my appreciation of Orchestras Canada for their important contribution to the vitality of our Canadian orchestras. I am grateful and would like to thank all those who believe in, work for, support and enrich musical life in Canada. Together we make a difference! I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Arion’s board members who have generously supported the orchestra for almost 40 years.” The award includes a plaque and a donation to an orchestra of the winner’s choosing. Mme Guimond has asked that this year’s donation be directed to Arion Baroque Orchestra.

The national jury was chaired by OC board member and Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra Director of Artistic Operations, Jennifer MacDonald, and included orchestral managers Hugh Donnan (Newfoundland Symphony Orchestra), Jean-François Phaneuf (Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra) and Joanne Harada; musician and arts manager Françoise Henri (Société pour les arts en milieux de santé – SAMS Montréal); and accountant and OC secretary-treasurer Karen Wilkinson, FCPA, FCA.

Speaking about the Award, jury chair Jennifer MacDonald noted, “the jury was touched with the number of impressive contributions being made to the orchestral landscape by individuals and organizations across Canada. The jury was particularly struck by the work accomplished by Mme Guimond as an artistic director, as an administrator, and as a musician in building Arion from a small, talented ensemble to a full baroque orchestra. Because of her vision, she and Arion have proven themselves capable of attracting international talent to a flourishing local early music scene; putting Montreal, Quebec and Canada on the baroque music world map.”

Updates on Instruments with Endangered Species Material

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Following three years of consensus-building among music stakeholders, governmental authorities, and conservation experts, policy requests put forward by a consortium of partners in the international music community (led by the League of American Orchestras, and heartily endorsed by Orchestras Canada, among many others) gained approval on August 28 at the gathering of 183 parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) at the Conference of the Parties (CoP18) in Geneva.

Actions were approved that will improve the mobility of performing artists, and redirect enforcement resources to support conservation, and facilitate international cultural activity.

For orchestras and individual musicians seeking to buy and sell instruments across borders, or to travel internationally for performances, CITES sets some limitations and requires permits for instruments containing material from species under protected status, such as rosewood, lizards, sea turtles, and elephants. At CoP18, treaty negotiators considered new rules related to items containing rosewood, cedrela, and mammoth ivory, and improvements to the Musical Instrument Certificate in use by touring orchestras.

Delegates from the U.S., Canada, the European Union, the CITES Secretariat, World Resources Institute, and the World Wildlife Fund International all spoke in support of policy changes that will advance both conservation needs and cultural activity. The following improvements were adopted:

Rosewood: A proposal was adopted to allow all commercial and non-commercial movement of finished musical instruments, parts, and accessories that contain rosewood (the dalbergia genus) to be exempt from CITES permit requirements, aside from Brazilian rosewood (dalbergia nigra), which has been under tighter restrictions since 1992, and will remain subject to permit requirements. The exemption will be in effect starting in late November 2019, 90 days after adoption.

This represents a significant relief for musicians that buy and sell instruments containing rosewood internationally. This also adds certainty for musicians and orchestras traveling with instruments that contain rosewood. These instruments will be fully exempt from permit requirements.

In the course of discussions among a variety of stakeholders, a consensus emerged confirming that conservation goals are not furthered by requiring finished musical instruments, parts, and accessories to repeatedly undergo permit processes. However, the rosewood material used in making musical instruments will remain subject to permit requirements; this conservation effort was supported by musical instrument stakeholders.

Cedrela: A proposal related to newly listing Cedrela (a tree species used in making some classical guitars), was amended to exclude finished musical instruments containing the wood from new CITES permit requirements. The exemption will be in effect starting in late August 2020, 12 months after adoption.

Mammoth: A proposal to include the woolly mammoth as a species subject to CITES controls was rejected. Many Parties stated that mammoth ivory can be differentiated from elephant ivory in trade. Mammoth ivory has been used in small quantities to replace elephant ivory in musical instruments for several decades. CITES parties agreed to consider studying how the trade in mammoth ivory impacts elephant conservation.

Musical Instrument Certificate: A decision was approved to initiate a CITES effort to streamline and simplify permit requirements for “the international movement of CITES specimens where the trade will have a negligible impact on the conservation of the species concerned,” including the non-commercial cross-border movement of musical instruments. The CITES Musical Instrument Certificate is used by musicians performing internationally with older instruments that contain protected species material that require CITES permits, such as elephant ivory tips on bows, tortoiseshell embellishments, and lizard skin bow grips. Currently, substantial resources must be invested by both musicians and enforcement authorities to enable musicians to perform internationally with their instruments. Next steps in response to calls to ease the permit burden will take place in CITES meetings beginning in 2020. Resolutions were also approved to harmonize the codes used on the Musical Instrument Certificate and clarify the requirements for determining that items qualify for CITES permits.

The international musical community has a lasting commitment to the goals of CITES, and will remain at the table to help form policies that support the sustainability of endangered species. Detailed information on changes to the current rules for traveling with musical instruments containing endangered species material is available on the League of American Orchestras website.

In Geneva and over the course of the three-year negotiations, orchestras and other stakeholders have been ably represented by Heather Noonan, Vice President for Advocacy at the League of American Orchestras. We are grateful to Heather, the League, and the many international partners that collaborated to advance these policy requests, including:

American Federation of Musicians, Argentinian Association of Musical Instruments Manufacturers, Association of British Orchestras, Australian Music Association, Brazilian Music Industry Association (ANAFIMA), The National Association of German Musical Instruments Manufacturers, C.F. Martin & Co., Confederation of European Music Industries (CAFIM), Dismamusica, Fender Musical Instruments Corporation, ForestBased Solutions, LLC, French Musical Instrument Organization (CSFI), International Alliance of Instrument and Bow Makers for Endangered Species, International Association of Violin and Bow Makers (EILA), International Federation of Musicians (FIM), International Wood Products Association, Japan Musical Instruments Association, Madinter, Music Industries Association, National Association of Music Merchants, Orchestras Canada, Paul Reed Smith, PEARLE*, The Recording Academy, The SOMM – Society of Music Merchants e. V., and Taylor Guitars.

Submission to the Standing Committee on Finance: 2020 Pre-Budget Consultation

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The entire submission is available here.

Orchestras Canada/Orchestres Canada Recommendations:
  1. Ensure that charities and not-for-profits have the same access to federal programs supporting research and fact-based carbon reduction education and projects as their SME  and MUSH sector counterparts.
  2. Ensure that the five-year $180 million investment for the Canada Council for the Arts announced in Budget 2016 is completed in Budget 2020-21.
  3. Enhance the budget of the Endowment Incentives component of the Canada Cultural Investment Fund by $6.5 million annually, to help arts and culture organizations raise private sector contributions and develop stable, long-term revenues through the growth of endowment funds.
  4. Increase funding and support for internships and on-the-job training for arts managers by $500,000 annually to ensure succession planning and diversification of the sector.
Preamble

On behalf of our 125 member orchestras from across Canada, the audiences they engage, and the diverse communities they serve, Orchestras Canada/Orchestres Canada (OC) is pleased to participate in the Standing Committee on Finance’s pre-budget consultations.

At OC, we believe that orchestras are strong contributors to quality of life in Canadian towns and cities, valued participants in community commemorations, capable partners in community cultural and educational development, and proud standard-bearers for Canadian achievement, locally, nationally and internationally.

Canadian orchestras are not-for-profit organizations and registered charities. According to data collected by Orchestras Canada, Canadian orchestras performed 3718 performances for 2.894 million Canadians in 2017-18. That same season, our members generated revenue from box office and other earned sources (an average of 36.2% of revenues); donations, sponsorship, and special events (38.8%), and from grants and contributions from various levels of government (25%). Over 70% of a typical orchestra’s budget is spent on people. Orchestras manage their resources prudently, but – without adequate capitalization – they can be profoundly affected by prevailing economic conditions.

Orchestras contribute significantly to the vitality, cohesion and competitiveness of Canadian communities; the ability of Canadian communities and businesses to attract and retain talent; creating and maintaining good jobs and contributing to the quality of lives of Canadians. These are key attributes that help make Canada such a desirable country in which to live and do business. Export of Canadian orchestras’ work – through international touring and digital dissemination of recordings and live streaming – projects a modern image of Canada, highlights the talent of artists from across the country, supports innovative approaches and leverages the creativity of technological progress and contributes to Canada’s cultural diplomacy.

Accordingly, while we see government investment in orchestras as important, we are equally interested in policies that favour attractive, sustainable, participatory communities, and the growth and sustainability of the charitable sector. The four measures that we propose this year will be good for orchestras; and they’ll contribute to the cultural and economic fabric of our communities, too.

Recommendation #1: Collective responses to the climate emergency

This year, the Committee is specifically seeking recommendations pertaining to the climate emergency and the transition to a low carbon economy. OC and our members know that climate change is a profound threat to our economy, our communities and our future, and we are pleased to address this topic in our brief.

Canadian orchestras are increasingly engaged in carbon reduction efforts through:

  • Stewardship (operation or tenancy) of performing, rehearsal and office space, often in re-purposed or heritage buildings;
  • Operating practices that prioritize energy-use and waste reduction, and strategic use of digital materials in place of paper;
  • Encouragement to audience members to consider transportation alternatives;
  • Careful planning of tours, to minimize carbon footprint;
  • Artistic programming that helps to draw public attention to environmental issues.  (The Earth Day Network has compiled a list of orchestral works inspired by environmental issues, including Canadian composer Vincent Ho’s Arctic Symphony, composed for the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra)

As important as these measures are, they reflect hyper-local and isolated responses to a global concern. For Canadian orchestras to fully engage in this work – with other performing arts partners in both the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors – they require access to the same policy frameworks, research, knowledge-sharing, and supports as their counterparts in the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) and Municipalities, Universities, School Boards and Hospitals (MUSH) sectors. Environmental sustainability and the transition to a low carbon economy must be a movement and not simply an action: and it starts with research and education, and culminates in collective and informed action.

Orchestras Canada looks for inspiration to the UK, where bespoke research on the carbon footprint of the performing arts sector has shed light on the greenhouse gas emissions associated with music venues, touring, and audience travel, among other contributors. This solid base of facts has empowered funders, member-driven organizations and orchestras to take meaningful, collective steps toward a lasting change. The UK orchestral sector has developed a Green Charter; arts organizations have identified and measured their main environmental impacts (energy, water, waste, travel); the sector has started to create a demand for goods with strong environmental credentials and commit to sustainable procurement; touring groups have included a “green rider” in performance contracts, made marked efforts to “travel green” (including using public transportation where possible, including on tour), and have worked in collaboration with their venues and with public transit agencies to make it easier for audience members to travel to concerts by transit, bicycle, or electric car.

Canadian orchestras are keen to play our part, and we will work in collaboration with peer organizations in the live music industry to share best practices and, where relevant, engage in dialogue with the Government of Canada. Our efforts will be immeasurably aided if charities and not-for-profits have the same access to federal programs supporting research and fact-based carbon reduction education and projects as their SME and MUSH-sector counterparts.

Recommendation #2: Support for the arts through the Canada Council for the Arts

In Budget 2016, the Government of Canada made a five-year commitment to doubling funding for the arts through the Canada Council for the Arts, taking the Council’s annual parliamentary appropriation from $181 million in 2015-16 to $361 million by 2020-21. We thank the Government of Canada for this investment, and we encourage the Government of Canada to honour this commitment in full, and include the final installment of $35 million in Budget 2020-21.

Canada Council funding made up just 5.9% of total orchestras’ revenues in 2017-18, a proportion that had been declining over the previous five years. With the new infusion of Canada Council funds, we see that this trend is starting to shift. Increased core funding from the Council will permit better planning, more efficient use of resources, and greater resiliency. This, in turn, will enable greater reach, stronger investment in human potential and robust responses to the diverse and changing nature of Canadian communities. Artists and arts organizations in communities across the country have only just started to benefit from this enhanced investment, and they are using it to create new work, new markets, and new prosperity.

Recommendation #3: Increased investment in matching funding for endowments

As the next step in recent updates to the guidelines for the Endowment Incentives Component of the Department of Canadian Heritage’s Canada Cultural Investment Fund, we encourage the Government of Canada to increase the budget of the Component by an additional $6.5 million per year.

Orchestras continue to seek ways to stabilize and diversify their revenues, and endowment funds (funds contributed for long-term impact, invested in perpetuity, and producing an annual payout to support a charity’s mission) are an increasingly important tool for them. OC began collecting information on endowed funds held by or managed on behalf of by Canadian orchestras in 2005-06; since then, orchestras’ endowment holdings have grown from just over $74 million to almost $260 million. The annual payout from these funds is in the order of $12.3 million, almost as much as the total contribution of the Canada Council to Canadian orchestras. The proceeds of endowment funds are critical to securing orchestras’ artistic and community programs.

Since 2001, the Department of Canadian Heritage has supported the growth of arts endowments through a component of the Canada Cultural Investment Fund. Arts organizations can apply annually to get gifts to endowments matched by up to 100% through the Endowment Incentives program, and many orchestras both large and small have taken part. The program has been extremely successful: applications to the program are growing in number, and in recent years it is increasingly limited in the match it can offer. An additional $6.5 million annual investment in the Endowment Incentives program would address the growth in demand on the program. These enhancements would also enable arts organizations of all sizes to continue to build endowment funds by encouraging donors to think long-term.

This is an investment in the future: smart tax policy and progressive program design can provide incentives for increased giving by Canadians, and Canadian orchestras are highly motivated to pursue private sector giving. As stated earlier, in 2017-18, a remarkable 38.8% of Canadian orchestras’ revenue came from charitable, corporate, and special event fundraising. According to a recent analysis by the Canada Council for the Arts, Canadian orchestras saw a 34.4% growth in private sector giving between 2010-11 and 2016-17. If this recommendation is implemented, arts and culture organizations of all sizes will grow their endowment funds, thereby diversifying revenue streams. The result? Arts organizations that are even more artistically vibrant, responsive to community concerns, and adaptable in a transitioning economy, too.

Recommendation #4: Increased investment in internships and youth training

Our sector is continually called upon to anticipate changes in our communities, and develop strategies to adapt our current business models. We know that investing in workforce training and opportunities for emerging management, administrative, and artistic talent is critical to the continued viability of orchestras. Yet continuing financial pressures have resulted in a restructuring of the administrative workforce at Canadian orchestras: a recent Canada Council study of 47 of Canada’s largest orchestras reveals that there’s been an 11.4% decline in the number of full-time, full-year positions at Canadian orchestras between 2010-11 and 2016-17, while seasonal and short-term contract positions have gone from 29% to 50% of the workforce during the same time period. These changes reflect orchestras’ keen interest in making their operations ever more efficient; however, they may – quite inadvertently – close off necessary opportunities for meaningful, reciprocal inter-generational knowledge transfer and thoughtful succession planning.

Canadian orchestras continue to highlight the critical importance of a well-trained, up-to-date and diverse workforce. Working for a Canadian arts organization is often seen as a labour of love, not necessarily a viable career. This, despite the overall cultural sector contribution of $53.1 billion to our country’s GDP. This is particularly the case for young Canadians, seeking to start their career in the current precarious job market. At present, there are few ways to gain a foothold in the cultural sector. In recent years, the Young Canada Works/ Cultural Human Resources Council funding program has had a budget of $226,000 to partially support only 20 paid placements in arts administration per year. Given the urgent need for succession planning, mentorship and knowledge transfer, we need to do better.

Accordingly, we urge the Government of Canada to expand the Young Canada Works program in the area of arts and cultural administration. By increasing the investment in this program by $500,000 per year (from its current base of $226,000), young and emerging arts and cultural workers will gain valuable experience with arts organizations and the organizations themselves can skill up.

Conclusion

Orchestras Canada thanks the Standing Committee on Finance for the opportunity to contribute to the 2020 pre-budget consultations. We would be pleased to discuss our recommendations with you further.