Funded Projects Query Form
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Implementation of orchestra performances, lectures, recitals, and related programs exploring the history and culture informing works by composer Kurt Weill.

The present application requests $760,538 (a Chairman’s Award) for “phase three” of an existing NEH project: Music Unwound, a consortium of orchestras, festivals, and universities engaged in re-thinking their core mission in order to incorporate thematic, contextualized, cross-disciplinary public programming. In phases one and two, each participant undertook one, two, or three festival topics: “Dvorak and America,” “Copland and Mexico,” and “Charles Ives’s America.” For phase three, the consortium would add a new, fourth topic to the mix: “Kurt Weill’s America.” The four topics, in tandem, cover a broad swath of American cultural history.

Implementation of orchestra performances, a CD, and related programs exploring the history and culture informing works by Dvorak and Copland.

A consortium of four orchestras -- Pacific Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic, the North Carolina Symphony, and the Louisville Orchestra -- seeks NEH support to create humanities-infused thematic programming. Two “Music Unwound” topics would be developed: "Dvorak and America," and "Copland and Mexico." Each orchestra would use a composer to illuminate issues of culture and society and explore these topics via festivals incorporating multi-media subscription concerts. Ancillary events, educational outreach, and collaborations with museums are also planned. The project will provide contexts for emotional and intellectual engagement and features potent linkage to high schools and universities featuring thematic humanities content. “Music Unwound” is conceived in the conviction that if orchestras are to regain impact as agents of cultural identity, a broader humanities mandate would vitally enhance both their mission and their capacity.