The new head of Venezuela’s famed youth orchestra network said he would strive to uphold the program’s legacy of musical excellence and social service as it faces one of the toughest periods in its history following the death of its charismatic founder.
In an interview at the network’s Caracas headquarters, incoming director Eduardo Mendez said the program must overcome a crippling economic crisis that has forced hundreds of musicians to leave the nation along with the passing of Jose Antonio Abreu, who created the orchestra network known as El Sistema.
“We will have to multiply into thousands of Abreus,” Mendez said.
Photo: AP
Abreu, who died on Saturday aged 78, was a consummate musician and astute politician who secured government support for El Sistema and turned it into one of Venezuela’s showpiece programs.
The network now runs about 300 community schools that have given children in poor neighborhoods an opportunity to study classical music.
It has also produced a crop of world-renowned musicians, including Los Angeles Philharmonic director Gustavo Dudamel.
Mendez acknowledged that steering the orchestra network through Venezuela’s social and economic crisis would not be an easy task.
El Sistema’s new director said 8 percent of the program’s teachers have left the nation to seek a better life abroad.
The network’s marquee Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra has lost 42 percent of its musicians over the past six months, though most of the vacancies have been filled with younger musicians.
“It hasn’t been easy to convince people to stay,” Mendez said. “Many of these people are leaving in search of economic stability.”
Mendez, who worked alongside Abreu for 15 years, said his priority would be to strengthen musical initiation programs and explore new genres in the network’s academies.
According to El Sistema’s own figures, 980,000 children and young musicians are participating in its programs throughout Venezuela, but Mendez will also have to avoid conflicts between musicians and the Venezuelan government, which has been accused by critics of using the music program as a propaganda tool.
Tensions between El Sistema and Venezuelan officials surfaced last year when the network’s star pupil, Dudamel, criticized efforts by Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to install a constituent assembly dominated by government supporters that is seen by critics as another step toward dictatorship.
Maduro asked Dudamel to “not attack those of us who have been crucial to the expansion of the [musical] movement.”
Shortly after the heated exchange, Venezuelan officials suspended two El Sistema tours of the US and Asia, which were going to be conducted by Dudamel.
No official explanation was given as to why the tours were canceled.
Mendez said Dudamel would continue to be creative director at El Sistema.
Dudamel is expected to lead several concerts in Venezuela in August and September, and might also participate in an exhibition on El Sistema at a UN summit in Vienna in May.
When asked if he would allow his musicians to voice their political views, Mendez said he would not censure anyone.
“Everyone is responsible for his actions and is responsible for saying or doing what they think is right,” Mendez said.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS