A quarter of the programs tapped by the city for arts grants are focused on bringing music education to local schools.
ArtsBloom is an annual, city-funded program aimed at building small arts programs across Rochester. Previous recipients have ranged from dance therapy programs to community arts workshops. This year, 12 recipients were awarded a total of $150,000. Three of those programs are aimed specifically at bringing music to city students.
The Local Sound Collaborative and Sound Foundations received $15,000 and $10,000, respectively, and will work together to lead music education classes and bring instruments to the schools. The collaborative is working in the Rochester City School District, while Sound Foundations is in city charter schools. The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra received $20,000 for the Orchestral Program for Urban Students (OPUS), which will include classes and mentorship for city students.
The RPO was previously awarded an ArtsBloom grant in 2023. It also is the only organization that requires approval by the Rochester City Council due to other contracts the organization has with the city. Council will vote on the funding on Tuesday.
"There's clearly a need for, no matter the age, more music instruction to come about,” said Ray Mahar, a local musician best known for the folk band A Girl Named Genny who is founder and director of the Local Sound Collaborative. “We kind of operate based off of where those gaps are as a nonprofit inherently.”
The collaborative will be working in schools 12, 25, 17, 35 45, and the Browncroft day care pre-k program, he said.
There are fewer music teachers in the Rochester School District today than a decade ago, records show, a drop mirroring declines in student enrollment. But the district's overall budget has grown in that time. While vocal instructors have dropped by a higher amount, instrument instructors still remain a smaller proportion of music teachers.
"A lot of these kids, while they might have music teachers at their school, they might not have the money or the resources to have an instrument at their house," Mahar said. "They might not be able to take it home from school if they're using it at school. They might not have the extra resources to pay for weekly lessons that a lot of kids I knew growing up could afford."
A similar sentiment was shared by Ashlee Allaire, the youth orchestra and education projects manager at the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. The OPUS program provides chances for students to work with professional musicians, sit in on rehearsals, and meet RPO's visiting musicians from around the world.
"I think learning an instrument in and of itself is so important for so many reasons," Allaire said. "I think it teaches us a lot about patience and dedication and having to really persevere in order to achieve what you're trying to do."
Melinda Goldberg is executive director of Sound Foundations. That organization, as part of its school-outreach, partnered with the Rochester Education Foundation for an instrument drive at the Rochester International Jazz Festival. Those instruments could then be doled out to students learning in both the district and charter schools.
"We've been working with all the charter schools for the past couple of years, and we surveyed them," Goldberg said. "A couple had no music, a couple had minimal music, and we're like, 'Wait a minute, what can we do to help them?' I had one school that said we've got a teacher who can teach music, but we don't have any instruments."
Goldberg said the grant funding – supported through the city's Percent for Arts program -- adds to about $200,000 the nonprofit has raised for the initiative. Mahar, meanwhile, will work between both organizations to offer music instruction.
Both said an early introduction to music can be transformative for students.
"It's a lifelong learning process and a love," Goldberg said. "For some students, it's almost like therapy."
