A commentary by alumni of Vancouver Island University’s audio program, lessons of 1986 and 1990 respectively.
We are shocked and dismayed on mastering that motion is staying taken to dismantle the tunes software at Vancouver Island University.
We believe this is quick-sighted, as new music is just one of the most profitable levels to attain for so many explanations. We can attest to the achievements of this application, as we are both graduates from VIU’s previous Malaspina Higher education two-12 months jazz diploma.
We have designed international occupations in the new music marketplace as multi Juno-award profitable conductors, performers and producers, in component owing to our formative many years at this institution.
Christine is a saxophonist and the jazz composition and arranging professor in Jazz Reports and Modern Media at the Eastman College of Songs (regularly ranked as one particular of the best 10 songs universities in the United States), wherever Ingrid is the inventive director and conductor of the famous Eastman Jazz Ensemble.
Christine has received various Canada Council for the Arts grants, SOCAN awards and is a recipient of the Oscar Peterson Award from the Montreal Jazz Festival for her contribution to jazz in Canada.
Ingrid is a Juno and Grammy award-successful jazz trumpet player, and simply one particular of the prime jazz improvisers in the environment. She is Dean of Jazz Arts at the prestigious Manhattan School of Music, the place she teaches some of the world’s very best musicians.
Each of us have experienced enough prospect doing work as visiting guest artists at a huge array of songs establishments across the globe, and upon each individual return we both concur that we deeply benefit our time put in with the application at Malaspina.
It is very important to keep our tradition industries on a nearby and regional level. These are the places that nurture our youthful skills to hone their skills and shape the upcoming of the arts in Canada and globally.
VIU is integral to supporting the vivid new music scene on Vancouver Island in particular, as it is the remaining frontier for arts culture on the Island.
It is the only substitute to the extra conventional audio method at the University of Victoria, and thus vital, as there are no other packages north or south of Nanaimo that present this suitable specialization in jazz and common tunes.
The inhabitants on the Island is escalating quickly, with society staying extra and much more regionally pushed. If anything at all, this tunes software enables for a much more various, inclusive ecosystem that cultivates the arts, primary to a sustainable and far more peaceful group.
We hope that alternatively than chopping this method, there be a pause for reflection and then a rebuild.
We consider that there is a sturdy sector in the establishment to have a strong body of learners who want to be educated to enter the ever-growing and altering Canadian new music marketplace, irrespective of whether in education and learning or expert arts professions in audio.
VIU is the perfect position for this to happen. Nanaimo has constantly experienced the probable to be a lifestyle magnet and has had growth in this location because of VIU’s audio method.
Closing this software will surely shutter culture in the Nanaimo location, interval.
“Music instruction isn’t just about developing unbelievable musicians its about creating incredible humans” — Kris Bowers, Oscar winner, The Very last Repair service Store.
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