Arthur Blank Family Foundation

By PIERRE RUHE/Staff

Of the 95 full-time contracted musicians in the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, trombonist Stephen Wilson is the lone African-American. Violinist Juan Ramirez is the one Latino.

The ASO's peer ensembles do no better, on average, with onstage diversity: The principal concert orchestras in Chicago, New York, Washington and Philadelphia each employ, at most, a few minority musicians. While women and Asian performers have earned prominence across the field of classical music, African-Americans and Latinos continue to be scarce on the orchestral stage.

That lack of diversity, musicians say, isn't a result of discrimination at the top levels: Candidates audition behind a screen, to eliminate gender and ethnic biases as much as racial prejudice. Last year, at an ASOL conference, New York-based trumpet player Aaron Flagg said, "I do not see racism or discrimination in the audition process as the key problem. The problem is that very few musicians of color are auditioning for orchestra positions at all."

Instead, it's a grass-roots matter: There's been too little attention paid to developing diverse talent at the source, among children.

Thus, a decade ago, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra founded the Talent Development Program to nurture young African-American (and more recently, Latino) performers, with the ultimate aim of getting them into professional orchestras.

This Saturday, the program celebrates its 10th anniversary with a concert featuring past and present alums. WSB-TV news anchor Monica Kaufman will host the event.

The program, explains Brenda Pruitt, the ASO's assistant director of education, started after a committee of ASO volunteers looked into the problem of audience diversity.

"They polled several prominent local African-Americans and heard a common complaint: 'We don't attend your concerts because we don't see black faces onstage.' Some viewed it as a white person's entertainment," says Pruitt.

Yet the ASO, like most orchestras with a merit-based mind-set and "blind" auditions, could not simply recruit a few black players and declare the problem solved. Vacancies in major ensembles open infrequently. When they do, hundreds of players apply; few are minorities.

"With the realization that audience diversity goes hand in hand with onstage diversity, our response became, 'We need to grow our own musicians,' " Pruitt says.

Small steps to big goal

The volunteer committee's push to create a local talent pool started with encouragement from the ASO executives, and little else.

"At the start," remembers Azira Hill, one of the most active TDP instigators, "we didn't have any budget or letterhead, but in about a year we raised almost $100,000. Everyone who heard about it was enthusiastic, even if some gave just $20. Coca-Cola gave $5,000. No one had much money to give."

Fulton County Tax Commissioner Arthur E. Ferdinand was also on that initial committee of ASO volunteers --- when, he says, "it was not unusual" for him and his wife to be "the only black couple in the audience."

Charged with creating a scheme to nurture young minority musicians, the committee looked to other orchestras, but, as Ferdinand recalls, "we were unable to find a model we could emulate."

So they started from scratch. They knew that professional musicians typically began playing as children and worked a decade or more toward basic proficiency. With an agenda in place and start-up funds in hand, Hill recalls, "we auditioned 200 black kids from the Atlanta-area public schools, came out with the 10 best and asked ASO musicians to be the mentors, at $50 a lesson. It took off from there."

At the 10-year mark, the TDP continues to grow, although budget constraints are still a limiting factor: Just 25 kids participate currently, from grades 4-12, and the annual budget is now $69,000 --- about $2,500 per child. (Much of these funds today come from the Arthur M. Blank and Goizueta foundations.)

Thus, to achieve the big goal --- steering local minority musicians into a professional orchestra so there will be more faces of color onstage and, consequently, a more diverse audience --- the TDP is built around a series of smaller steps, at little or no cost to the students. After passing an audition, the players are given weekly lessons with an ASO musician; they're given access to a quality instrument on which to practice; they and their families get tickets to ASO and other concerts; they're encouraged to audition for the competitive Atlanta Symphony Youth Orchestra; and finally, they're guided, with mentoring and scholarships, toward a top-tier national music camp, such as Interlochen in Michigan or the Tanglewood Music Center in Massachusetts. You plant a seed and only years later harvest the fruit.

Indeed, it took nine years for the TDP to get its first conservatory-bound protege. Double bassist Eric Thompson, who studied with ASO principal Ralph Jones, is now a student at Philadelphia's prestigious Curtis Institute of Music. For Thompson, 19, a professional orchestral career soon will be within reach.

His mother, Adrienne Thompson, teaches music in the DeKalb school system and has two other children on track to make music a career. Daughter Donna, 15, a percussionist, will perform at Saturday's TDP concert.

The Thompson home is unusually rich in music, but getting her kids into summer music camps --- Eric attended Interlochen, a sort of boot camp for young musicians --- made the difference: "It made them realize that they wanted music to be their career."

At a camp, "they have a place where they won't be [teased] and where 'practicing is cool' " she says, quoting son Stanford, a 16-year-old trumpet player. At home, her kids "don't have a lot in common with their high school classmates, and those relationships are less intimate," Thompson adds.

"Eric, Stanford and Donna would not have been able to develop their talent, to the extent they have, without the [TDP's] support network."

Clarinetist Sayo Tuyo-Lawal, 14, is another performer scheduled for Saturday's concert. His mother, Kunmi Olueye, credits the program with "tremendous financial relief."

"A few months after Sayo started [in the TDP], my husband lost his job," she explains. "We couldn't have afforded to continue any lessons. But the lessons with Bill [Rappaport, ASO clarinetist] never stopped, and his teacher says he has talent." Sayo also has plenty of energy, and he's a wide receiver on his freshman football team at Shiloh High in Gwinnett County.

Sayo --- pronounced "SHY-oh" --- is "a soft-spoken kid with an inquisitive mind," says Rappaport. "He likes to play duets with me, he's so attracted to music. I love to see a student bloom." Sayo's still finding his way, but with peer pressure and clashing interests, will he see classical music as a career?

For now, Sayo says he'd like to become a doctor or a soccer player, but adds: "It seems like every week I learn something new on the clarinet, and I really like my teacher. I also like to play jazz on my drums."

A gradual process

For students Sayo's age, there are increasing links in the web of support. The Atlanta Symphony Youth Orchestra is an enthusiastic, high-powered training ensemble. Pruitt credits the TDP with boosting African-American membership in the ASYO: Six years ago there were four black musicians in the 120-player group; last season there were 14.

The Azira G. Hill Scholarship Fund, established in 1999, has spent $70,000 on camp tuition for 41 students. The Sphinx Organization, an educational foundation based in Detroit, holds competitions for wannabe soloists from the black and Latino communities. Winners, some of whom have performed with the ASO at special concerts, are often whiz kids brimming with virtuosity and charisma. ASO President Allison Vulgamore says, "I think the field is going to see Sphinx candidates successfully audition in American orchestras."

Perhaps the fundamental lesson in all this, says clarinetist Rappaport, is that earning a career in music, or altering the face of America's orchestras, is a gradual proposition. "There are goals that will only come to you later if you work now," he says. "We all have to learn that lesson --- students and the people who organize these sorts of programs."