Composer Hannibal Lokumbe shaking hands with conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin following the Philadelphia Orchestra’s world premiere of Healing Tones at Verizon Hall on March 28, 2019. This performance was the culmination of Lokumbe’s Music Alive residency with the Philadelphia Orchestra.
New York, NY (December 12, 2019) — New Music USA is pleased to announce that their new Amplifying Voices program has been selected as a Sphinx Venture Fund (SVF) recipient for 2020. Sphinx Organization has made a commitment to invest $1.5 million over five years to transform the future of cultural diversity, equity, and inclusion in the arts through SVF. The Amplifying Voices program was one of two proposals selected this year. New Music USA is honored to partner with Sphinx Organization to affect extensive and long term positive change through this program.
In recent years, we’ve seen many positive examples of US orchestras commissioning and working closely with composers of color, including Philadelphia Orchestra and Detroit Symphony Orchestra who facilitated hugely successful residencies with Hannibal Lokumbe and Gabriela Frank through our Music Alive program with Mellon Foundation.
Amplifying Voices seeks to increase the momentum behind this change by encouraging more collaboration and collective action towards equitable representation of composers of color in the contemporary classical canon. As well as stimulating co-commissions and performance of existing repertoire, our new initiative with Sphinx will also give composers the chance to contribute to artistic-planning, working with our team at New Music USA and orchestras’ artistic management on highlighting the array of excellent composers whose work would benefit from more exposure.
Our aim is to create new opportunities and collaborations which will make major steps towards transforming the contemporary classical canon for future generations and inspire others to do the same.
“Our aim is to create new opportunities and collaborations which will make major steps towards transforming the contemporary classical canon for future generations and inspire others to do the same,” said Vanessa Reed CEO & President of New Music USA. “Many of you told us in our 2019 Impact Survey that you wanted New Music USA to encourage a greater awareness of equity, diversity, and inclusion across the new music landscape. Amplifying Voices is a response to this feedback and represents New Music USA’s first step towards other new initiatives which will put partnerships between music creators, performers, and institutions at the heart of long-term sector change.”
To find out more, visit the Sphinx Venture Fund announcement.