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Music in Schools Initiative

Sixth Morse Summer Music Academy begins Monday, July 6

Students perform at Morse Academy

On Monday, July 6, the Yale School of Music will welcome 142 young musicians to the fifth Morse Summer Music Academy, which will take place July 6–31, 2015.

The Morse Summer Music Academy provides free, comprehensive music instruction to New Haven Public School music students. In the intensive, four-week program, each student has a weekly private lesson and takes part in scheduled daily chamber music lessons, ensemble rehearsals, workshops, and master classes. Field trips include museums and galleries as well as the Yale Summer School of Music/Norfolk Chamber Music Festival in northwest Connecticut.

The most significant addition to this year’s Morse Academy programming is the addition of a choral program. With 16 new students and 3 new teaching artists, the choral program will also include daily classes, rehearsals, and chamber music study. Many students focusing on instrumental study will also be able to spend part of the day singing with the chorus.

Morse 2014 044

With a focus on growth through performance, each student will play a total of 14 concerts throughout the program. This includes a series of chamber music pop-up concerts at locations like the Peabody Museum, Yale University Art Gallery, and Cross Campus, as well as the New Haven Free Public Library.

These concerts will take place every Thursday and Friday afternoon during the program—July 9, 10, 16, 17, 23, 24, 30, and 31—starting at 1:00pm. The public is welcome to attend these afternoon concerts, as well as the more formal evening concerts in Sprague Hall on Monday and Wednesday evenings—July 13, 15, 20, 22, 27, and 29—at 6:00pm. All concerts are free to attend.

Through these activities, the program nurtures and develops creativity, musicianship, and musical leadership in students who are passionate about music. Parental involvement and continuing musical opportunities throughout the school year are hallmarks of the program.

The program is open for application to all NHPS students in grades 4–11 who sing and/or play piano, guitar, woodwind, brass, string, and percussion instruments. All instruction is given by NHPS music teachers, Yale School of Music graduate students and alumni, as well as faculty from the Yale School of Music.

The Morse Summer Music Academy is made possible through a generous endowment established by Enid and Lester Morse (Yale College ’51), and is offered free of charge to New Haven Public School students. The first Academy took place in summer 2010 with participants from 10 schools.