Pittsburgh Children's Museum: Roaming Concert (PA)

10/2019

I am a teaching artist in the chamber group Ears Engaged. We met at Carnegie Mellon University and were inspired by our professor, Monique Mead, to connect more with our audiences and community through music. As individuals and collectively we are dedicated to educational, interactive, and accessible performances curated for our community.

We love performing at Pittsburgh's Children's Museum! For this roaming concert we played in their Love and Forgiveness exhibit, Garage, and Art room. The interactive elements of the performance were inspired by the exhibits including: musically narrating the pulley machine in the garage room with free improv, leading interpretive movement with scarves on the dance floor, and having guests interpret music by drawing while actively listening in the art room.

CJ Corbett, clarinet

Casey Stamm, bassoon

Performing in the Love and Forgiveness Exhibit!

Creating a circuit to review a secret message!

CJ leading a scarf dance activity in the art room! We played the 'red light green light' game ~ freeze whenever the music stops while you're dancing!

In the art room, the kids were so tuned into what we played! One little boy completely locked eyes with me waiting to see where the next phrase would take him, and when I played higher notes he drew higher circles. I'll never forget that personal connection made possible through music. I honestly think this was my best performance of the Brahms Violin Concerto excerpt.

Drawing examples while listening to Brahms Violin Concerto

Drawing examples the kids made while listening to Sorcerer's Apprentice

Our performance was advertised on Google Maps, pretty cool!