There are only one or two pictures of me in Shanghai. Not entirely by design, of course: I was there on my own, working as a media consultant for a TV station startup, and was almost always behind the camera. (It's better that way.) One evening I gingerly balanced the apparatus on my balcony railing, … Continue reading A question of identity
I consider myself a pretty composed person. I generally have excellent performance nerves (which I came by much later in life, more on that later) and can handle most unfamiliar situations with a commendable degree of aplomb. When I made my début with Canada’s National Arts Center Orchestra, there were approximately 2000 people in … Continue reading A little knowledge…
Photo taken at the nucleo in Tabay, Merida State. I was taking a flight recently when I witnessed a mini-drama unfold at the front of the aircraft. From my vantage seat in row 1 I could see the flight attendant doing a routine in-flight announcement… except for her, there was nothing routine about it. … Continue reading Confidence trick
An update to this page, including a directory of the major Sistema programs, was posted on February 16, 2012, and is available here. I'm somewhat surprised by this realization, but I've never seen a Canadian el Sistema initiative myself. It isn't for lack of programs: I've heard of startups in Calgary, Hamilton, Mississauga, Toronto, … Continue reading El Sistema in Canada
The month of March marked two major milestones (alliteration unintentional) for this blog: the 15,000th unique visitor since the blog first went public in the Fall of 2009, with one of the last of those representing the one hundredth sovereign nation. (Tajikistan). Concerning the first, that’s only unique visitors: the number of total hits … Continue reading 15,000+ unique vistors from 100+ countries
Part 7 of the ongoing La Scena series was published in the print version in French only, so the English text is reproduced in full below. Both versions are also available for download in PDF format here. IT’S 35˚C IN THE TOWNSHIP gymnasium north of Cape Town, South Africa, but the bass-baritone is doing … Continue reading Symphony in Many Movements
The 2011 edition of the YouTube Symphony Orchestra has come and gone, the reports are in and the reviews have been…tepid, mostly confirming (albeit indirectly) the general suspicion that conductor Michael Tilson Thomas is far more interested in technology than in people. To be fair, he’s backed into a corner somewhat by geography; were … Continue reading One Year Later
Here's a wonderful video courtesy of Cape Festival that gives a real sense of the work being done through the project. The blog post reflecting on the experience as a whole can be found here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=saLQLFWTOyI
We were driving back from a rehearsal at one of the township schools north of Cape Town when we passed this and just had to get a photograph, had to pose for our petit hômmage to the Maestro from the opposite side of the Atlantic. I don't think for a moment that Dr. Abreu's … Continue reading Report from South Africa
There's nothing quite like teaching to be reminded of how much more you yourself have to learn: docemur docendo, as the poet wrote. I've participated in plenty of conducting workshops, so I can say from long and painful experience that the craft of conducting, or rather, the craft of teaching conducting, is particularly prone to … Continue reading Keeping me honest
Jonathan Andrew Govias 