“Alex Gonzalez’s family isn’t particularly musical—his mom was in the Army and his dad was a truck driver and neither played an instrument,” writes Soni Sangha in Friday’s (12/4) Fox News Latino (New York). “When their son expressed an interest in the violin, they had to teach themselves about instruments and look into lessons. Gonzalez graduated from a conservatory a few months ago.… He is just now going through auditions and callbacks, hoping to earn a violin seat with a major orchestra.… Talented minority musicians like Gonzalez are a rarity in American orchestras. While African-American and Latinos combined make up about 30 percent of the national population, they only make up about 4 percent of its symphony members.… ‘I would say since last election, when the American demographics and demographics of the electorate were so different than what they had been, it’s been a wake-up call,’ Jesse Rosen, president of the League of American Orchestras, told Fox News Latino. ‘Any organization that wants to feel like it’s a part of America and America’s future has to reflect that in some way.’ ” The article cites music education programs in schools and initiatives to engage minority communities by organizations including the Cincinnati Symphony, Houston Symphony, Nashville Symphony, and Sphinx.
Posted December 8, 2015
