While you were all enjoying Chicago's lovely February weather last weekend, Jim Palermo and I hopped on American Airlines and joined forty of our classical music colleagues in equally lovely Detroit for what was "billed" as a classical music think tank. The group was comprised of artist managers, music education professionals, classical music presenters, orchestra managers, record
label executives, writers, composers, and musicians. There was even a classical music "futurist", Jean Cook (she's the sideways one), who has promised to guest-blog for me soon.
So what do all of these people talk about when locked in a conference room in the Marriott Detroit Renaissance Center for two straight days? Pretty much what you would expect.
Lots of talk about audiences; who they are, where they are coming from, how the next generations of classical music audiences differ from those we currently serve; how music education seems to be failing to adequately prepare young musicians for the challenging reality of the 21st century workplace; how language and classifications are rapidly evolving, especially among younger segments, and what that means to the field; how market forces will shape how we operate, what we present, and how we present it; and much more.
I'm hoping that some of the colleagues who joined us might comment on this blog, or write their own and link to this. Daniel Wood, a musician who performs with a group called Quadre, participated and said that he was going to blog.
After waking up 
on Friday at 4:30 a.m., flying to Detroit, and sitting through the first meeting until 5 p.m., we were bussed to a performance of young, mostly African American children and teens presented by an organization called Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit. Most of us were pretty wiped out by 8 p.m. when the curtain raised, but it only took a few moments to get swept away by the quality, energy, and emotion of their performance.
I never cease to be amazed by what participation in the arts can mean to kids. According to Rick Sperling, Mosaic's Founder and CEO, most of the children who participate in this program enter with grade point averages in the 1.0 range. By the end of the first year, most have raised their GPAs to 3.0 and 90% of these kids go on to college, as compared to 50% for the entire Detroit system. Hmm... maybe investing in arts is a good idea.
In any event, I'm hoping that the Mosaic students can perform with the Chicago Sinfonietta sometime in the future and share their talents and boundless energy with our audience.
And finally, the Sphinx Competition was being held in Detroit the same weekend. For those of you unfamiliar with Sphinx, it was founded ten years ago by Aaron Dworkin to help identify 
and nurture young soloists of color. The Sinfonietta has presented a number of Sphinx winners including cellist Patrice Jackson and violinist Melissa White. You should check out this fantastic program.
Okay, this is really long today so I'll shut up and let my colleagues fill in some of the things I missed. I must thank Sandra Gibson, President and CEO of Arts Presenters, for sponsoring this gathering. As always, I invite you, too, to join in the fun.
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