October 31, 2005 -

OTTAWA, CANADA -- Imagine having the chance to sing and play with professional orchestra musicians.

Students from Prince Albert Grand Council schools in Saskatchewan will get that chance when eight members of the National Arts Centre Orchestra brass section come to visit and perform with them on Nov. 7. 

The Prince Albert Grand Council Recorder Project will culminate in a music-sharing session on November 7 at 1:30 pm at the E.A. Rawlinson Centre for the Arts that will feature the NACO brass octet and up to 65 children from three elementary schools within the Prince Albert Grand Council – a first nation tribal council in northern Saskatchewan. The student participants will open the performance with traditional dancing and drumming in a grand entry representative of their own cultural traditions. The event is open to the public.

On Nov. 8, the students will perform at the Rawlinson Centre again when they play their recorders onstage with the string section of the NAC Orchestra at a matinee concert for hundreds of local school children.

“Music has the potential to change lives,” said Claire Speed, director of music education of the NAC. “This project has challenged the students and the teachers to learn in a new way, through the arts. To hear about the progress the children have made on the recorder since the program began in early September confirms for me that if given the right tools and encouragement, all children can succeed.”

The students have been busy preparing for the musicians’ visit. They have been learning how to sing and play an excerpt from Antonio Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons.

The teachers have been working hard too. In late summer and early fall, the NAC arranged for a local music educator to lead recorder clinics for teachers. The NAC also supplied its latest teacher resource kit, called Vivaldi and the Four Seasons, as well as class sets of student newspapers of the same name. The NAC developed the kit with curriculum experts and this fall distributed it to every elementary school in Alberta and Saskatchewan. 

The PAGC Recorder Project is a sequel to the highly successful “Kispiox Music Project” that took place during the NAC Orchestra’s 2004 British Columbia Tour.

The NAC gratefully acknowledges the support of SaskEnergy for the PAGC Recorder Project.

“We’re just delighted to help bring this caliber of music to Saskatchewan youth, particularly those living in smaller communities who would not normally have access to this kind of cultural experience,” said Leslie Gosselin, Manager of Advertising and Community Relations for SaskEnergy.

Yamaha Canada and local distributor St John’s Music in Saskatoon supported the PAGC Recorder Project by supplying recorders, method books and partial funding for recorder clinics.

The National Arts Centre plays a national role in education and community outreach, and in the use of new technology to reach Canadians from coast to coast.

The NAC Orchestra Alberta-Saskatchewan Tour is supported by Alberta Presenting Sponsor EPCOR and Saskatchewan Presenting Sponsor CN, with additional Major Support in Alberta from CN.  Bell is the Technology Sponsor in Alberta. The Tour’s Education Sponsors are ConocoPhillips in Alberta and SaskEnergy in Saskatchewan. True Energy Inc. is the Saskatchewan Community Sponsor. Special funding for the Tour’s education programs is provided by Education Donor CIBC, National Arts Centre Friends – Alberta and donors to the NAC’s National Youth and Education Trust. The National Post is the Tour’s National Media Partner.

Special thanks to the Interdepartmental Partnership with the Official-Language Communities (IPOLC) and supporters of the National Youth and Education Trust.

Follow the tour online at www.artsalive.ca

For more information, contact:
Mary Gordon
Communications Advisor
National Arts Centre
(613) 947-7000 x 524