This winter, ACMP is putting one of its new strategic objectives into action – that is, advocacy for amateur chamber music players. 

Our amateur chamber music world is a vibrant conglomerate of local groups and associations, ensembles, and individual players, all playing with a passion. ACMP, with the ACMP Foundation behind it, has the resources, staff and international reach to communicate a message of just how much amateur players contribute to their cultural communities and the chamber music and classical music worlds.

On January 18, 2019, ACMP was represented on a panel at the Chamber Music America conference in New York, an annual convening of more than 500 chamber music promoters, players, educators and students. The panel topic, Building Bridges: How Amateur and Professional Musicians Can Work Together to Reach Audiences, explored how musicians, ensembles, and presenters bridge the gap between the amateur and professional musical spheres to develop audiences and strengthen musical communities. The panel ivestigated the amateur musician’s role in cultural communities and in the chamber music ecosystem, and discussed ways to engage amateur players as supporters and audiences for professional chamber music programs.

ACMP Executive Director Jennifer Clarke was joined by Karin Brookes, Executive Director of Early Music America; and Gabe Bolkosky, Founder and Director, PhoenixPhest Amateur Chamber Music Festival. The panel moderator was Gary Padmore, Director of Education, New York Philharmonic.

The panel’s goal was to focus on the points of connections between players who share a passion for chamber music but who have followed different paths, exploring stories of how one group enriches the other.

From left to right: Gary Padmore, Gabe Bolkosky, Karin Brookes, and Jennifer Clarke