All Rights Reserved by the photographer, Steve Bainbridge
ARCO'S MISSION
Creating wider access to high quality music education for all young people and connecting diverse communities.
​Our aim is to bring joy through music, whilst reaching each child's full musical potential.
ICCC event at the Islington Assembly Hall
Arco on a big stage, what a day! The team at Cripplegate Foundation invited us to perform at their Islington Council Community Chest celebration event in the Islington Assembly Hall. Surrounded by all organisations who make Islington such a great place, our young musicians performed their own chosen repertoire. Watch this space for more! Photos by Steve Bainbridge
Bootcamp for Strings 23
Bootcamp for Strings (BFS) is an intensive, fun, half term project for Arco students, focussed on developing their musical abilities, teamwork and confidence. This year, BFS was a 2 day project, for all ages and experience. On day 1, students came together for 1.5 hours to rehearse a new piece of music together. Arco’s more experienced students supported the younger students as Mentoring Musicians throughout rehearsals, under guidance of Arco teachers. On day 2, the students recorded their rehearsed pieces as a video to watch with family and friends at home. Go to our Youtube channel to watch their videos!
Arco goes Eco
We are on a mission to reduce the negative impact Music Education has on the environment. We ran a one month instrument collection point in April 2022, where we collected unused, unwanted and broken string instruments and accessories. Atelier Tammam hosted us at their sustainable couture shop, where we had half of the shop to display our work, host workshops and receive donors. Using parts of donated broken instruments, we repaired others, making as many complete sets as possible. The instruments are given to new students joining our programme or those needing an upgrade. We received many broken instruments from the Nucleo Project, Sistema England, parents whose children had stopped playing their instrument and independent musicians. Arco’s students came on several days to learn about repairs, sustainable practise and help with setting up the instruments. Bows that could not be repaired were turned into small practise bows, for the youngest beginner students. As we had a surplus of those, we have donated some to donors who were excited to use them in their teaching practice. Bodies of instruments that could not be repaired have been donated to artists, who have turned the instruments into art-pieces for their local community cafe. Cases that were irreparable have been stripped for parts and separated to ensure as much as possible could be recycled. Arco goes Eco reached donors as far as from Birmingham and Kent, through word of mouth and social media advertisement. The Strad wrote a piece about the project, which can be found here. All photos by Matt Hickmann Photography
Southbank Sinfonia Workshop
We joined the musicians of Southbank Sinfonia for a unique musical experience – visiting the musical zoo! Their musicians gave us the chance to meet lots of different families of instruments and we even had a go at playing some of them. All Arco kids brought their violins to play along with the musicians from the orchestra in a big musical celebration. A huge thank you to Southbank Sinfonia staff and musicians, what an experience!
Chineke! rehearsal sit-in Queen Elizabeth Hall
Chi-chi Nwanoku CBE generously welcomed us to watch a rehearsal of Chineke! at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, in front row seats! Chineke! champions change and celebrates diversity in classical music. They are the role models our young musicians need and we could not be more thrilled to watch them work from so closeby. Thank you!
Festival of the Girl 2022
Did you know no women were allowed to play in Orchestras in the UK until 1913? Vienna took this a step further and did not allow women to participate until 1997. There is an abundance of beautiful music written by women, however only 7.7% of classical music performed in 2021-2022 was by female composers. At Arco we work hard to represent a diversity of composers and music to all our young musicians. Beethoven wrote fantastic music, but so did Florence Price. On the 9th of October we celebrated our female musicians and a diversity of composers by performing at Festival of the Girl 22.