AMAZING performance by Venezuelan youth orchestra proves music transforms lives of poor kids

Streaming Museum, a new hybrid museum that exhibits the arts in cyberspace and pubic spaces on 7 continents, showcases outstanding arts education programs alongside its schedule of arts exhibitions.

Watch an amazing, uplifting performance on www.streamingmuseum.org
by the Teresa Carreño Youth Orchestra – the top youth orchestra of Venezuela - performing music by Shostakovich and Danzon, conducted by Gustavo Dudamel, Music Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic!!

The orchestra is the result of the dedication of Dr. Jose Abreu, TED Prize 2009 award recipient, who founded El Sistema in 1975 - a visionary movement to help transform the lives of poor Venezuelan children by learning to play a music instrument and being part of an orchestra.

"Music has to be recognized as an ... agent of social development in the highest sense, because it transmits the highest values -- solidarity, harmony, mutual compassion. And it has the ability to unite an entire community and to express sublime feelings." Dr. Jose Abreu.

The gulf between the rich and the poor in Venezuela is one of the worst in the world. Dr. José Antonio Abreu, a retired economist, trained musician, and social reformer 33 years ago in a parking garage in Caracas, gathered together 11 children to play music. El Sistema was born. It now teaches music to 300,000 of Venezuela’s poorest children, demonstrating the power of ensemble music to dramatically change the life trajectory of hundreds of thousands of a nation’s youth while transforming the communities around them. El Sistema is now a nationwide organization of 102 youth orchestras, 55 children’s orchestras, and 270 music centers.

Debuting the Abreu Fellows Program ... the first initiative of el Sistema USA ... a one-year postgraduate certificate program for accomplished young musicians who desire to become ambassadors of El Sistema and who are committed to developing it outside of Venezuela. Housed at New England Conservatory, Abreu Fellows will spend a year studying between Boston and Caracas, and leave with the tools to return to their communities to teach the El Sistema model.

The curriculum, teacher training materials and documentation of the Abreu Fellows Program will be freely available on elSistemaUSA.org as a resource for all to support local El Sistema programs being developed around the country and internationally.

Support an Abreu Fellow: http://elsistemausa.org/support-a-fellow

Contact:
Anna Verghese
TED Prize
55 Vandam Street, 16th Floor
New York, NY 10013 T: 212-792-9178
E: anna@ted.com
http://www.ted.com
TED Prize gives awards annually to the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers

Nina Colosi
Founder / Creative Director, Streaming Museum
nina@streamingmuseum.org


Streaming Museum (streamingmuseum.org) is a new hybrid museum that presents exhibitions in cyberspace and public space on seven continents. Launched on January 29, 2008, its ongoing program of multi-media exhibitions is produced in New York City in collaboration with international cultural, educational, and public centers; artists, curators and visionary creators. The museum was inspired by Nam June Paik who in the 1970's envisioned the Internet, predicting an "information superhighway" as an open and free medium for imagination and exchange of cultures.