“[The seminar] really gave me insight on how I could incorporate music into my everyday life.”

“The college / career information made me consider music as a possibility again.”

These are just a few of the numerous comments Project 440 receive from participants of our High School Seminar with members of Philadelphia’s All-City Orchestra held yesterday at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts.   Did the students really enjoy the course?  Would they recommend the Project 440 High School Seminars to their friends?  The answer: a resounding yes!  100% of the students in attendance said they would do just that.

After sitting in on a rehearsal by the renowned Philadelphia Orchestra, participants were ushered upstairs where they were served lunch.  Executive Director, Joseph Conyers, greeted all the students and then quickly followed with many insightful comments on the” ins and outs” of college life.  Stanford Thompson gave an inspirational lecture on the possibilities through music.  And Mary Javian, had participants marching around the room to a Mozart String Quartet – making it something any young child could relate to.

Pictures of the event will be posted in the coming weeks.

Project 440 motivated these young people to become ambassadors for music.  Students were so inspired that their work with Project 440 is far from finished. We are currently looking for opportunities for participating quartets in the seminar (the CAPA and GAMP Quartets) to be able to practice some of their new community engagement techniques in local schools to inspire other young people.  Now empowered with the tools to serve, we received numerous inquiries from many students with groups of their own on how they might be able to perform in various communities / schools.  We educated, we encouraged, and we empowered these young people through music:  Mission Accomplished!

Special thanks to Don Liuzzi, director of the All-City orchestra, for helping to make this seminar a reality.  And another huge thanks to our General Manager, Blake Espy, for helping to put this all together!

Interested in our program?  Learn more by clicking here.

OR

Contact us:

info@project440.org

912.596.7322

Click on Joseph's Pic to Read the Article!

Dubbed the UK’s favorite classical music station, Classic FM interviews Project 440 Director, Joseph Conyers, in their “From The Back Desk” series profiling musicians from orchestras all across the world!  Congrats, Joseph!

Click on his picture to read the article.

Philadelphia All-City Orchestra and Chorus 2013

*Update

Many thanks to the Philadelphia Orchestra for opening Tuesday morning’s rehearsal with Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin to the All-City Orchestra participants in Project 440′s High School Seminar.  Students will get to see the Fabulous Philadelphians in action before working with the Project 440 presenters in the afternoon. Thank you Philadelphia Orchestra for helping to make the day seminar participants will not soon forget!

Thanks to generous gifts from David and Linda Glickstein, Carole Haas-Gravagno, and the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, as well as the leadership of Don Liuzzi and the dedicated staff of the Project 440 team, Project 440 (P440) is thrilled to be able to present our High School Seminar (HSS) to the students of the Philadelphia’s All-City Orchestra.

The seminar will take place on Tuesday, May 21st at 1 PM in the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts and will be lead by an all-star team: Joseph Conyers, Project 440 Director, Mary Javian, Project 440 Director of Programming, and Stanford Thompson, P440 HSS Clinician. The seminar is open only to those currently enrolled in All-City Orchestra.

The P440 HSS is designed to teach high school musicians to use their own musical gifts to enhance the lives of others. Courses presented are:

• Colleges and the Audition Process

• Entrepreneurship & Networking

• Community Engagement & Interactive Performance.

After receiving training from P440 HSS Clinicians, students are charged with presenting a community engagement performance anywhere in their own community. The goal of the program is to highlight the array of career paths for a young, burgeoning musician and to ignite an early appreciation for community engagement and educational outreach.

The seminar will be presented free of charge, and all participating students will receive Project 440’s Young Musician’s Survival Kit.

“The students of All-City Orchestra are a talented and inspiring group of students,” says Project 440 Director, Joseph Conyers. “We know that after our program, All-City students will leave with a heightened awareness of the possibilities in classical music and feel empowered to serve others with their instruments in hand.”

For more information about Project 440 and / or our High School Seminar, please don’t hesitate to contact us at info@project440.org.

Bass, Bodybuilding, and bolstering up our nonprofit!!!!

Click his picture below for the article.

Inside “Prayers of Rain and Wind” with John B Hedges and Joseph Conyers

The full article can be found here.

Anne Timberlake from the Times-Dispatch writes, “When he’s not following a conductor’s baton, Conyers teaches at Temple and runs his own music education nonprofit organization, Project 440.

In his nonprofit work especially, he’s a classical music missionary.

“I get to teach young people how powerful they are. That even at a young age they can be holding a violin or holding a trumpet or holding a tuba and be leaders.”

Music, he says, builds cognitive skills, communication, entrepreneurship — and community.

In his own work and in other programs that introduce children to classical music, “you can literally see this happening, it’s bringing families together. Now you’ve added this value to music so that it’s not just something you come to the hall for, but something that’s actually changing the fabric of society.”

The full article can be found here.

Viola
jessica.chang@project440.org

Taiwanese-American violist Jessica T. Chang is passionate about sharing music through expanding educational opportunities in the arts for youth, and by presenting chamber music in innovative and accessible ways. Since making her debut in Carnegie Hall in 2008 with the Brunell String Quartet, her performances have been broadcast on American Public Media’s “Performance Today”, WAMC, WYNC, WHYY, and WQXR. Highlights include performing with Curtis on Tour throughout Europe alongside Roberto Díaz, Pamela Frank, and members of the Berlin Philharmonic; and chamber music performances with Itzhak Perlman, Joseph Silverstein, Soovin Kim, and Anthony McGill. 

Jessica has served as principal viola of the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, and the Yale Collegium. Festival appearances have included Music from Angel Fire, International Musicians Seminar Prussia Cove, Perlman Chamber Music Workshop, Verbier Festival, Taos School of Music, Aspen Music Festival, Tanglewood Music Center, and California Music Festival.  She is a founding member and violist of the Philadelphia chamber group ensemble39 and the Director of Chamber Music by the Bay, a new chamber music performance and youth education series in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Aside from her musical endeavors, Jessica has maintained commitments in Philadelphia toward improving youth access to quality arts education through ArtsRising in the School District of Philadelphia; and taught for educational programs in public schools in New Haven; Palo Alto; San Francisco; and San Jose. Also an artist and writer, Jessica’s works have been published by art and literary magazines at Yale, the North Central Review, CRED Magazine, and the American Literacy Council. 

A native of Saratoga, California, Jessica began her studies on the viola at age thirteen, and continued studies with Jenny Rudin, Jodi Levitz, Jesse Levine, and Daniel Panner. She received her B.A. with honors and distinction in 2009 from Yale University, where she was also the recipient of a Louis B. Sudler Fund Award and the Yale Friends of Music Chamber Music Award. She recently completed her Artist Diploma at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where she studied with Roberto Díaz, Misha Amory, and Michael Tree as the recipient of the William A. Loeb Fellowship. Jessica is currently continuing her graduate studies at The Juilliard School under the tutelage of Heidi Castleman and Steve Tenenbom with gracious support from the Satterthwaite Scholarship Fund and the Irene Diamond Graduate Fellowship.

Cello
mary.ramos@project440.org

Dr. Mary Ann Ramos has been on cello faculty at Northern Arizona University since Fall of 2010.  This summer she will be on faculty at the Sphinx Performance Academy in Chicago, IL and Oberlin, OH.  Previous summer festival engagements have included Festival du Chambre du Larzac (France), Festival Artistico Coahuila (Mexico), PhoenixPhest (Michigan), Insbrook Institute (Missouri), Chamber Music Encounter (Missouri), Rocky Mountain Summer Conservatory (Colorado), Peaks to Plains Advanced Chamber Camp (Colorado) and Chamber Music Connection (Ohio).  Dr. Ramos completed her Bachelor’s degree at New England Conservatory as a student of Laurence Lesser, her Master’s degree at Cleveland Institute of Music as a student of Richard Aaron, and her Doctorate at the University of Michigan as a student of Anthony Elliott.