OLD SCHOOL
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As health care workers bravely risk their lives to protect others in the fight against the coronavirus, nonmedical professionals have sought ways of their own to contribute to the wellness of society.
For many struggling arts organizations, virtual programming has become more than a means for survival. Embracing technology has enabled them to help counteract the detrimental effects of the pandemic and its consequential social isolation.
“One of our roles is as brain caretakers, especially now,” said Anthony Brandt, co-founder and artistic director of Musiqa, “and that’s a wonderful contribution we can make to people’s lives.”
With the remainder of its season postponed indefinitely and its annual spring benefit canceled, the composer-led new-music collective launched “Musiqa Monday,” a newsletter highlighting various commissions and artistic collaborations from past performances. Each edition of the weekly program, curated in the spirit of the historic Monday Evening Concerts series in Los Angeles, features archived material — “something to watch and something to hear” — alongside brief commentary by an artist involved in one of the selected works and links to the organization’s awardwinning education program, “Around the World With Musiqa.”
Since 2004, the latter has served over 60,000 local elementary school students, providing free, field-trip performances as part of the Discovery Series at the Hobby Center for the Performing Arts. Recognizing its potential to be used as a learning resource by both parents and teachers, Musiqa filmed the interactive, multimedia concert and made it available online, complete with study guides, singalong texts and engaging classroom activities.
“I think one of our biggest draws is the novelty aspect,” said Brandt, who in reflecting on the first 10 works that were showcased in “Musiqa Monday” — a portion of which is also posted on Facebook — described all but one as world premieres.
“More and more research shows that novelty is one of the healthiest things for the human brain, and that can take a lot of forms,” he continued. “That could be meeting new people or traveling to new places, but any time you’re experiencing something novel, your brain is literally rewiring itself, building new connections and becoming more plastic.”
Innovation is built into every aspect of the dynamic organization, which boasts an 18-year history of enriching the community with its characteristic interdisciplinary approach, but not all of its projects have the same longevity or scope of influence. Some of the most exceptional, Brandt said, have been one-off experiences, such as the unprecedented presentation of Annie Gosfield’s “The Blue Horse Walks on the Horizon,” in which Houston-based abstract artist Geraldina Interiano Wise completed a live painting onstage during the string quartet’s performance in 2019 at the Midtown Arts and Theater Center Houston.
Yet, the opportunity to give such concerts a lasting existence by circulating recordings of them more widely has proved a hidden treasure in the days of social distancing, Brandt explained.
“Music is about sharing, and the more people experience something, the more valuable that piece of music is, that experience becomes,” he said.
Plans for the upcoming June 1 newsletter include “The Arena,” a collaboration with the Contemporary Art Museum Houston and Project Row Houses, in which New York performance artist Shaun El C. Leonardo staged a Greco-Roman wrestling match accompanied by three improvising percussionists. Also in the works is a virtual viewing party of the organization’s recent co-production with Opera in the Heights, featuring “Kassandra” by Brandt and “The Leader” by Karim Al-Zand.
“We have never had a culture in human history without music,” Brandt said. “People will be writing new music until the end of time. It’s just a part of the fabric with which we relate to life..”