Speeches on Careers and the Arts

Continental Harmony: Music that Builds Community

Speech by Linda L. Hoeschler to the New Century Club, April 2, 2003, St. Paul, MN

In 1998 the American Composers Forum, based in downtown St. Paul, was selected as one of six national organizations to launch millennial arts celebrations in partnership with the White House and the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). These millennial projects were nationwide endeavors to involve many people in celebrating this country in the year 2000, expressed through original art works.

In the case of the Forum, our program, called “Continental Harmony” (a lovely name, I think), challenged communities around the nation to identify themes celebrating their history, a current issue or future dreams. A national panel picked the best project for each state, based on originality of idea, variety of coalition members, ability to execute, etc. The local project leaders then selected a composer from a host of applicants recruited by the Forum. The winning composer was in residence over 18 months and wrote a piece of music for the local band, orchestra or chorus (and sometimes all three). During the residency the composer gathered information and inspiration, as well as taught and spoke in local schools and civic institutions.

So how did a nice St. Paul group end up playing in these big leagues, particularly since all the other awardees were located in New York or Washington (Save our Sculptures, the Poetry Project, etc.)? Moreover, why was our project the one selected as the centerpiece presentation for the NEA’s annual meeting in 2000 (converting several Board members and bringing others to tears, by the way), and the subject of an hour-long special on PBS and a new PBS web-site. Also, why is Continental Harmony the repeat focus of talks at national conferences, and why is it still thriving around the nation five years later, with many new communities vying for admission and many veteran localities asking to continue the program with us?

The key to Continental Harmony’s popularity and legacy is that we empower communities to design an art project relevant to their history, their capabilities, their needs. We tell the communities that they know good art, and will know how to select not only a good composer, but also design a creative residency and project. We challenge project initiators to include coalition members who are not part of the usual power circle—minorities, immigrants, non-arts participants. 

And what do they get? They get a great piece of new music for their town or city, but more important, they build a stronger community through the process of participating in Continental Harmony. Ironically, the communities apply for the end product, but all find the process, the residency and community building, the most extraordinary aspect of the program.

And what does the Forum get? Not only unprecedented recognition and appreciation for the role composers can play in building community, but a pride that we have designed a methodology that can serve as a model for all arts organizations—from symphonies to community theater—as to how to become a vital, not peripheral or decorative, part of their locales.

Before I show you a short video about Continental Harmony that illustrates the principles and mechanics of the program, and describe some of the specific successes of this and other American Composer Forum programs, I’d like to describe how we came to design a Continental Harmony.

Composers Stephen Paulus and Randall Davidson began recruiting me to run the Minnesota Composers Forum in the fall of 1990. I had had a 13-year career in corporate management at Dayton Hudson and National Computer Systems, after doing 7 years of free lance arts reviewing, feature writing and editing. But along the way, my husband and I developed a passion for working with artists, particularly composers, whom we commissioned to write new music for various celebrations. In 1990 the Forum was faltering; the prior executive director had stolen large sums of money, and the staff was executing the same 15 year-old programs, much to funders skepticism. As a personal favor to Steve, I finally agreed to come to the Forum, just for a year, to help out.

What I found was a small service organization dedicated to helping composers, but with little thought of relating to the communities. At that time I was on the Jerome Foundation Board and had heard staff discuss the myopic view of the Forum’s programs, and whether the Forum deserved further funding. This sentiment was echoed by other foundations and organizations that I interviewed in my first months on the job in the summer of 1991. 

Having little to lose, we restructured and polished existing programs, and designed some totally new programs within the first two years. Among these experiments were the Faith Partners program and a College Residency program.

The first, Faith Partners, placed composers in an 18 month long residency of 3 Minnesota-area churches/synagogues, writing 6 pieces of shared music. Surprisingly, recruiting the churches and synagogues was quite easy—many of them were looking for ways to invigorate their congregations and to develop working relationships with other faith-based institutions in their community or in another part of the state. However, one of the hallmarks of the program which differentiated it from most other arts programs that export art and artists, was our insistence that the consortia each listen to composers tapes, interview and select the finalists. The Forum would recruit composer applicants, but wouldn’t do the selection.

From my corporate background, I learned that to get, and more important, to keep consumers, they have to make the choice-- in this case the choice of composer. I had no idea this was such a revolutionary idea in the arts, where the usual practice is for an expert panel or organization to put the imprimatur on the “good” art or artists and tour them around.

The Forum’s approach for Faith Partners, takes a lot of time and effort to execute: we have to solicit church and synagogue applicants, listen to their choirs, then match them into a suitable consortium. We then have to recruit and organize composer applicants from our regional members, and then coach the consortia through the selection projects, often trying to convince some of the Faith Partners participants that they really have good ideas and ears, and are more than capable of selecting a quality composer with whom they can work.

The benefit of the Forum’s approach is that, despite the long planning time, our partnerships never fall apart. Because the faith based institutions determine the partnership projects and chose the composer they want, they are committed to making the residency work. And, after all, these alliances don’t last but a year and a half, and we all know that almost anyone can make a marriage last that long!

Another lesson we learned from Faith Partners was that the program was most meaningful to rural churches and to Catholic churches. In the former, having an artist in residence was a big deal in a small town, and since we encouraged the composers to find ways to relate their host churches to the larger community, the composers learn to play a vital entrepreneurial role, and along the way garner widespread recognition that usually eludes them in Twin Cities. The Catholic churches, by the way, often welcomed some high art in settings historically rich, but reduced to guitar singalongs after Vatican II. (I can say this since I was raised Catholic).

At the same time, through the good offices of one of our Board members, we developed a College Residency program for composers. The idea here was that colleges would design an interdisciplinary residency, and composers across the nation would be invited to apply.  Our pilot was at Bemidji State University, where the college wanted a composer to design and execute a project to tie together their Native American population (Bemidji is located between 3 reservations), a Japanese paper exhibit at the College Museum, and their spring lake festival. No small task!

The winning application, by a Boston composer, Andy Vores, proposed several college wide creative activities, culminating in a music theatre performance centered on the retelling of the Orpheus myth through the stories and songs of various cultures: Western classical, Nez Perce Indian, Japanese Noh Drama and African folk tale. The final event, on Mother’s Day 1992, was a fabulous, two hour experience with original poems, music, dances and sets advancing this classic tale. The audience leaped up at the end and gave a standing ovation that went on and on, something almost never seen in new music.

But the most touching aspect of this project was the Dean’s introduction at the dinner preceding the performance. She said, her voice breaking, that in all her years at Bemidji they had never really engaged the large Native American population. The reservation students came to classes, but were not part of the college’s life. But through this residency, she said, Native Americans participated, for the first time, in a college-wide project. Moreover, to the astonishment of the University administration, the reservations had decided to hire several buses to bring residents to the packed performance.

The lesson for the Forum, that informed our other programs, particularly Continental Harmony, was that when all participants have substantial voice, when no culture is better than another, when each group can tell its story, the collaborative possibilities are enormous, far richer, far longer lasting.

Emboldened by the Bemidji experience, plus other residencies at Winona State and St. Thomas, and informed by the success of Faith Partners in rural communities, we decided to call 35 rural festival organizations in Minnesota to see if they would ever want a composer to work with them. To our amazement, everyone signed up. The problem was getting the money to fund this idea.

We finally got some Rockefeller Foundation money in about 1997 to pilot some rural Minnesota composer residencies. We would incorporate the fundamental lessons of Faith Partners and the College program into the design of a new Rural Commissioning Program: a host committee would represent several local institutions, the locality would define the project and pick the composer, and the composer would write for a local ensemble. The pilot projects were in Grand Marais (local ensembles played for inauguration of new hall), Grand Rapids (song cycle for Judy Garland Festival based on her poems) and New Ulm (town song for men’s chorus and band).

During this period NEA asked for ideas from many national organizations for ways to celebrate the millennium in all 50 states. They thought Faith Partners might be a suitable project for us to propose, but I advised them that with the NEA’s precarious funding situation, and the battles over church/state separation, this was not the program with which to lead. I talked with them instead about our new Rural Commissioning Program and they were intrigued.

The conversations with the NEA continued over the next year, and we learned that our idea was one of the dozen or so finalists. We agreed with the NEA that we would include urban underserved as well as rural communities among the applicants to meet their political needs. But we would not budge on letting the communities select the composers from an open application call; the NEA was very skeptical about letting communities do the selection—after all, how could the people in Podunk know what was good music. The NEA also urged us to develop an approved list of composers from which communities could choose one; again we would not compromise our principles, that seemed revolutionary to everyone else but us! 

In June 1998 we launched Continental Harmony with a reception for Bill Ivey, the new NEA chairman. Later that summer we mailed 12,000 applications to mayors, civic organizations and arts institutions around the nation (show poster). They were invited to outline a civic theme—an historical event, a current issue, or future hopes—to celebrate at the time of the millennium. We recommended that the premieres occur on July 4, 2000, so that we could maximize civic pride and publicity. The community applicants also had to outline composer residency activities to integrate this guest artist into their community. Within 6 weeks (despite a way too short timetable) we had 100’s of applications. We were thrilled that our approach was working on a national level.

We then convened a national panel of people who understood both music and community arts, and they selected the best project per state; a few more were recommended projects pending additional funding, which is why we ended up with 58 sites in all.

Late fall we mailed the list of funded sites to 5000 composers around the country. We received over 500 applications to the various sites; composers applied to a specific site or two, sending not only professional material and tapes, but an essay on what they would do to maximize the residency, and how they would approach writing the music. The communities then had about a month to review the materials, and interview the finalists in person or by phone. By March 1999 the partners were picked.

The first premiere was in Grand Forks, in late February, 2000. The project was to develop a choral work to commemorate the massive Red River floods and community rebuilding. Steve Heitzeg, from the Twin Cities, was the composer chosen by the North Dakota committee. As part of his residency he interviewed local folks about their view of the river; many later said that for the first time they could talk about their love, but also fear of their river, their fear that the river might destroy their community again. Steve also worked with school children and the wonderful University of North Dakota art museum. He found an old iron bed, and had the children collect driftwood, shells, flowers and grasses from the river banks that they then tied to this iron “river bed,” along with personal notes and small objects representing the possessions they had lost in the flood.

At the culminating concert, the chorus sang Steve’s touching work, “What the River Says,” that comprised three sections, with the last featuring a ballad about the river. After a lengthy standing ovation, the conductor turned to the audience and had them sing the ballad, whose words were taken from the residents’ interviews. Thunderous clapping was interlaced with tears and embraces. I was hugged by many unknown attendees, in what became a Pentecostal-like healing service. People thanked Steve for expressing their hopes and anxieties in music.

I was astonished, relieved and deeply moved. I knew that Continental Harmony was not just a good project, but that it could do something for these fragile communities that no government aid or social services could do. Continental Harmony was bigger than all of us. 

About that same time the Knight Foundation, another Continental Harmony funder, asked if we’d be willing to have a PBS documentary made of the program, since they thought Continental Harmony represented an extraordinary new model for the arts. Knight engaged our own local Twin Cities Public Television and a NY producer to make a one hour documentary, telling in-depth stories of five sites, with brief clips about 5 more. The documentary, which has been seen in millions of households, first aired in October, 2001; because it so closely followed the events of 9/11 it was had had a long life with its message of hope and healing. An accompanying web site, which I urge you all to visit, was developed primarily for students to learn how a composer works.  

I’d now like to show you a 9 minute tape which we developed from our video footage and from the PBS show, in order to explain the program to communities, composers, and of course, funders. The theme music in the opening and closing segments, by the way, is from the Fitchberg, Massachusetts orchestral performance.

Thank you. I’d like now to explain some of our findings from our assessment of this first round of Continental Harmony, and tell you about some of the current projects. You saw Dr. Patricia Shifferd in the video, the Director of Continental Harmony, whom we hired in June, 1998 to run the program. Pat, who would be with us here today but for elbow surgery from a recent fall at our North Carolina Continental Harmony site (our staff really throws themselves into their work), is a sociologist and anthropologist, and the former dean of Northland College in Ashland, Wisconsin. Pat is not only an amazing manager, but is interested in measuring the impact of the arts on community building. When Rockefeller Foundation learned of her expertise, they asked if they could fund us to better document and measure this historic program.

Pat’s multi-part research involved the hiring of some independent measurement contractors so that we could guarantee honest evaluation (I’d be glad to provide more in-depth information on this for those who are interested).  The findings, now contained in a 125-page book, guided us in our fine-tuning the program after the Millennium celebrations, particularly regarding the makeup of the community coalitions, the project leadership, and various residency details. While I certainly don’t have time to list and elucidate the many conclusions of the assessment study, I’d like to talk about the community development aspects of Continental Harmony, for me the most thrilling legacy of this program.

In a nutshell, we learned from Continental Harmony that when you bring people together to celebrate their shared histories, their common values and visions, you often solve many underlying tensions and divisions. Most approaches to community divisiveness involve sitting the parties down and talking about their differing views and goals, then mediating compromise goals and behaviors. It’s a bit like marriage counseling: the airing of your frustrations and disappointments can often reinforce your underlying anger and alienation.

But in Continental Harmony we start by identifying our commonalities and celebrating them. And in the buildup to a final musical performance, a small group’s enthusiasm can sweep up others and translate into community-wide pride; particularly significant was Continental Harmony’s impact on rural youth who said that for the first time they felt a real pride in their home towns.

This invigoration of a locality often leads to solving problems well outside the arts arena, problems such as economic redevelopment, immigrant integration, racial healing, and on and on. And, to our amazement, many of the Continental Harmony coalitions continue, often commissioning their original composer, or venturing into new partnerships with new artists.

I could tell you scores of wonderful stories, but here are just a few. David City Nebraska, whose site coordinator you saw in the video, said that Continental Harmony gave his dying farm community hope they could save it (By the way over half the town attended the premiere, a choral setting of poems written for the occasion). 

In Farmington and Jay, Maine, an area divided ethnically and socio-economically, the French and Anglos were given money to build a new concert hall because a premiere attendee was embarrassed that they had to perform in a high school gym, and the community chorus formed for the project is still performing in both communities.

Fitchberg, Massachusetts wanted an economic revival theme song. The composer wrote a march within an orchestral work, performed numerous times since, celebrating this mill town’s ignored riverfront. Now the mayor is planning to build a band shell on the river banks and the arts are a key part in the town’s revitalization plan; in fact, the Continental Harmony coordinator is in charge of the city’s revitalization task force.

In Grand Forks Steve Heitzeg’s piece has become the community’s anthem. We are again working there to premiere a CH 2 orchestral work, with a residency which partners the surrounding reservations, the local symphony and the museum.

And the Grand Canyon project, a snippet of which you saw on the video, has had extraordinary results in 2000 and beyond. That site’s composer, Native American Brent Michael Davids, a Minneapolis resident, now teaches Arizona reservation children how to compose music (the music is performed to great acclaim, I might add). We would like to expand this concept to the reservation youth in Minnesota, pending funding.

We expect the same community building results with Continental Harmony 2, as we develop projects in 15 to 20 states a year, with ongoing support from the NEA, Rockefeller and Knight Foundations. Some of the most promising projects include Dearborn, Michigan where we have established a partnership with the Arab-American Community Center for Economic and Social Service and the University of Michigan Music Society to support Simon Shaheen, an Arab-American composer.  Shaheen is writing a composition for the opening of a new Arab-American museum.

The Forum plans to nurture this coalition, and to play an even larger role in the reconciliation of Arab and North American cultures.

In California’s Central Valley, generally considered a cultural wasteland, we are working with a Modesto community organization to train youth in the Mariachi tradition; they will perform with a local youth orchestra. In Long Beach, we are helping knit together the Anglo and Hispanic communities with a coalition between the Symphony Orchestra and Museum of Latin American Art. Two composers, one from Pennsylvania, the other from Mexico City, are collaborating on a symphonic work to be performed in both California and Mexico.  

In Minnesota, we are partnering with Abbott Northwestern Hospital to place a composer in residence. This composer would work with the caregivers and doctors, plus residents of the Phillips neighborhood, to write a work for the opening of the new Heart Hospital wing. We believe that this model can be developed into a national program for all medical institutions.

We are also developing a wonderful St. Paul project, “Rondo Harmony,” based on oral histories of this sundered neighborhood. The organizers want this project to provide a rallying point for the rebirth of community institutions and infrastructure along Selby Avenue. “Rondo Harmony”, for which we will be seeking funding, is a pilot of the kind of engagement and trust building the Forum needs to develop as we become, hopefully, a real player in community development.

We all expect the arts to elevate, entertain and, occasionally, enrage us. I hope I have also shown you how the arts can provide a catalyst for building community spirit, energizing the resigned, integrating the forgotten, all the while transcending age, color and religion.

Continental Harmony is but one model for making this a better, more optimistic, more cohesive country. We at the American Composers Forum will continue to do it the old fashioned way, one community at a time. Thank you.

Additional material, from New Yorker, September 2002

Auden, in a pregnant fragment, even glimpsed what may be the only rational theory of art in an open society: art, he writes, “is one of the most powerful means of transforming closed communities into open ones, in moving people from passion to desire.” Instead of inflaming a passion, an incoherent and irrational want, the artists disciplines it to a desire, something exact. He takes a feeling and makes it into a thought—or, at least, a though-through feeling. This is high sounding, but it is plain truth. Why were so many, after 9/11, drawn to Auden’s poems save that reading them helped us to make the overwhelming passions of the time—fear, rage—into specific desires: to have a voice, to affirm a truth, to speak to a friend, to love more wisely. “For art had set in order sense/And feeling an intelligence,/And from its ideal order grew/Our local understanding too.”

Jerome Hill’s Legacy to Artists

May 9, 2005

Many private foundations in America bear a deceased donor’s name. But none seems to mirror and leverage its donor’s private interests and public largesse better than the Jerome Foundation. The St.Paul-based charity models its grants after the passionate personal commitments of its founder, Jerome Hill, by helping out artists, especially the new and unknown. As a result, Hill’s lifetime giving, coupled with his legacy grants, have had a huge, unparalleled and continuing impact on American artists.  

The effect of Hill’s endowment is even more amazing, given that the corpus is a moderate $79 million (from an initial gift of $2 million). Since inception in 1964 through April 2004, Hill and his Foundation have given almost 4000 grants totaling $60.5 million. The average-size grant is $15,000, often parsed into sub-grants to serve more artists. But even in 2005, 100 years after Jerome Hill’s birth, a modest grant often represents a critical infusion toward birthing a new piece of art. It is exactly what Jerome Hill wanted to do, and did, so gracefully.

Hill was born into a family that was far more than silver spoon and carriage trade. His grandfather, James Jerome Hill, his namesake, was one of the great industrial barons of the late 19th and early 20th century. James J. Hill was a larger-than-life dynamo whose influence and power shaped and shadowed his family, community and nation. Jerome Hill could have chosen an obvious career working in the family railroad or bank, or lived a pleasant life pursuing hobbies and travel. Instead he disciplined himself to seriously study composition, painting and filmmaking, and then went on to work hard making art. He was pretty good in the first two disciplines, and really good at the last, filmmaking. He hoped that the fame of his art work would survive his death, and in that he modestly succeeded. But his exemplary support of individual artists has become the famous creation of Jerome Hill that definitely survives his death.

Hill’s financial gifts were often anonymous, although the source was apparent when recipients’ project checks arrived with a St. Paul postmark. Years ago I met a director in New York City who told me that “everyone in the arts knew that when they were desperate for some money to complete a project, you could go to Jerome Hill and he’d help you out. There was no one else like him.”

Interestingly enough, when Hill formalized his giving in 1964 by establishing the Avon Foundation (Hill family foundations were named after St. Paul streets), artists and the arts were not mentioned in its Articles of Incorporation. “The purpose of this corporation shall be…to use and distribute its income and principal exclusively for charitable, educational, literary, religious and scientific purposes…” A few years later, 1967, Hill established the Camargo Foundation, a residential center for humanities and social science scholars and artists pursuing French culture-related research, on his Cassis, France estate.

Al Heckman initially staffed the Avon Foundation, working with Jerome and his brother, Louis W. Hill. Grants went to a kaleidoscope of charitable organizations and projects, some barely reflecting Jerome’s personal interests. Jerome Hill was being a good citizen. Jonas Mekas, the New York City filmmaker and film historian, convinced Jerome to give not just personal money to artists, but also foundation grants. That theme soon became the Foundation’s through line. Camargo awards complimented this support, offering its dramatic Cassis facilities on the Mediterranean (12 apartments, library, atelier and music studio), plus stipends, to artists (now over 100) developing creative projects.

After Jerome Hill died in 1972, the Avon Foundation Board decided to pattern its grants more closely on Jerome Hill’s personal giving. The name was changed to the Jerome Foundation, and artists were added to the Board. Because Hill was from Minnesota but lived so many years in New York City, grants were gradually restricted to and split between those regions, giving more clarity and impact to the foundation’s relatively small grants.

Jerome Hill’s venturesome support of experimental, not established artists was adopted by the Foundation in the late 70’s. Many of these artists pushed artistic and social boundaries with iconoclastic or new forms of art. Some were the outsiders whom Hill had also embraced: female artists, artists with alternative sexual preferences, and artists making confrontational art. Hill viewed the artist as a magician, and intensely believed that all these creators should be able to make their work, even if it failed. In his 1972 “Film Portrait” he voiced some passionate ideas about the value of artists. “The only real valid present is the eternal moment, seized and set down once and for all; that is the creation of the arts.” “Every artist lends his own eyes to his audience.”

Quantifying the impact of Jerome Hill’s ongoing gifts to artists and to the artistic life of Minnesota and New York City is, of course, difficult, possibly a fool’s errand. Grant statistics can be cited and quotes proffered, but these don’t begin to convey the emotion attached to a Jerome grant. I speak as a former Board member who subsequently went on to run a non-profit service organization whose New York and Minnesota members flourished because of Jerome Hill’s legacy. Wearing my Board hat, I toured the facilities of many New York arts organizations and met recipient artists. Their stories of particular grants at key times in their early careers always provoked pride. A few dollars, carefully shaped and targeted, helped stabilize many a program, catalyzed some exciting (and occasionally less than stellar!) art works, and engendered confidence in young artists working in adventuresome art. This is Jerome Hill’s spirit writ large.

In summary terms, the 3973 grants totaling about $60.55 million that the Foundation gave during its first forty years (through April 2004), can be divided into seven disciplines. Over 17% of the dollars, roughly $10.5 million, has gone to Media Arts, particularly film and video, Jerome Hill’s most significant area of artistic work and personal philanthropy. The next largest recipient category is Visual Arts, where16% of the whole ($9.9 million) was allocated among emerging artists and the organizations that support them. Strong Theater communities in both New York and Minnesota attracted a bit over $9.8 million from the Foundation (16%). Music grants, where the Foundation targets the creation, development and production of new works, totaled $7.9 million or almost 13%. Receiving about the same percentage (with $7.8 million) is Multidisciplinary art, a newer and burgeoning category in which artists combine several disciplines to create their works. Dance grants to emerging choreographers and their companies totaled $6.7 million or 11%. Literature has received the smallest portion, $5.4 million or 9%, where writers often work independently from the few literary support organizations.

The impact of the Media Arts grants is astonishing, given that the $10.5 million allocated to this category would barely begin to underwrite a commercial Hollywood film. About 2/3 of the film and video money has supported New York City artists, reflecting the large number of significant independent film and video artists residing in the five boroughs. Over 350 NYC and 100-plus Minnesota production grants helped generate documentaries, dramas, animated films and experimental works. Award-winning documentaries funded by Jerome include Born into Brothels (2004 Academy Award) and The Collector of Bedford Street. Drama director recipients such as Spike Lee and Mira Nair got early underwriting for works that launched their spectacular careers. The media artist recipients generally praise the absence of editorial strictures, plus the critical timing of financial support when they had few non-family/friends as backers.

Just as Jerome Hill was passionately committed to experimental film, his legacy foundation has supported seminal avant-garde filmmakers such as Stan Brakhage and Jonas Mekas, as well as more modern innovators who do video installations, create virtual environments, and experiment with new media technology. Other media beneficiaries include visionary media arts organizations that provide critical facilities for emerging creators. Minnesota artists in this and other disciplines also benefited from Travel and Study grants, a key artist development program underwritten by several Minnesota foundations.

Thousands of Visual Artists have benefited from 636 grants to institutions, primarily for exhibition programs, with Minnesota receiving the majority (60%) of funds. Artists can create their art alone, yet seldom have the means to exhibit it. Jerome has often been the solo outside funder of these invaluable venues.

Jerome-underwritten commissions, residencies, fellowships, mentoring, critical review, project grants and travel, represent seminal infusions to artists’ careers and creative development. For example, Minnesota photographers Alec Soth and Jan Estep, and sculptural artist Chris Larson, received early Jerome investments that helped catapult them into the national arena. Artists invariably report that outside funding allowed them to purchase materials, increase and improve their output, reconsider their art because of a changed environment coupled with critical feedback, get catalogue documentation, and connect with a commercial agent/gallery. While these small grants only begin to solve some of the issues facing artists today, they stimulate creative works that make for more enlightened and livable communities.

Playwrights, like media artists, probably face the largest challenges among all artists in terms of getting production of and feedback on their work.  Through 565 key Theater grants, Minnesota and New York City playwrights have benefited from production and career assistance, as well as mentoring by the likes of August Wilson and Lisa D’Amour. Playwright support (with about 58% of the total dollars directed to Minnesota) has included training, opportunities to create and develop new work (such as travel, readings and fellowships), critical assessment or full production.

In many cases immigrant and of-color playwrights have been given their first public voice through Jerome Hill’s funds, accelerating both our understanding of their cultures and their integration into our society. Again, this mirrors Jerome Hill’s pattern of producing and supporting art that is meaningful. For many recipient artists, a Jerome grant has amounted to an imprimatur, leveraging connections and serious consideration by theaters, festivals and directors.

The vitality of the new Music community in Minnesota, now a major venue able to compete with the coasts, is substantially attributable to artists’ support by Jerome Hill funds. And emerging NYC composers have often cited Jerome as their only support in their highly competitive metropolis. At a time when institutions have generally neglected investing in music creators, Jerome has been boldly willing to go it alone.

Jerome grants have supported then-emerging but now-famous composers such as Pulitzer-prize winner Aaron Jay Kernis, as well as Bun-Ching Lam, Brent Michael Davids, and scores of others. Consistent with its theme of supporting the creation, development and production of new works by emerging artists, the Foundation has underwritten commission, travel and performance programs executed by service and producing organizations. As these emerging composers and other artists become successful, Jerome now offers mid-career grants, again providing career boosts at critical times.

Just as the lines within artistic disciplines have blurred with the availability of new media and machines, so have the lines between disciplines as artists integrate multiple art forms in their creations. Recognizing its inability to categorize these works, Jerome was one of the first foundations to adopt a Multidisciplinary funding area. Despite its relative newness, this is an expensive medium and reflects 13% of total historic grants, with a 55/45 break between Minnesota and NYC. Seminal grants have leveraged major careers for artists such as Karen Finley, Danny Hoch and the Alladeen international project. Some of the largest, most unwieldy, most provocative, and most memorable art stems from this category.

The Dance explosion in America since the 1960’s, centered in New York City, but with a healthy chapter in Minnesota, was fueled by early and sustained investments by the Hill funds. The recipients are, without exception, the major creators of modern dance today, including Bill T. Jones, Stephen Petronio, Urban Bush Women, Ralph Lemon, David Dorfman in NYC and Danny Buraczewski in Minnesota. Grants supported individual works, but were more critically targeted to sustain, for three to seven years, the fragile companies of independent choreographers. To encourage momentum, other funds underwrote programs that elicited and nurtured the next generation of emerging choreographers.

Assistance spurring new Literature has been particularly challenging, since writers are often the most solo of creators. In its first 40 years of funding, Jerome has explored many ways to support emerging writers, who often need developmental, critical and publication support. While Minnesota has been blessed in having the most non-profit publishers of literature in the United States, an obvious support system through which grants could be funneled, support of New York City writers has required more research and experimentation. The 400 Jerome grants made over 40 years have underwritten workshops, writers’ festivals, readings and residency programs, teaching and writing residencies, fellowships, publication opportunities and travel and study (the latter for Minnesota artists).

The writers’ post-funding reports are impressive in their gratitude, but more telling are the accounts of work advanced, careers improved and attitudes lifted. Belief in their ideas, critical feedback, money to complete a project, money to buy time to make art (the most precious commodity for any artist) are the hallmarks of Jerome Hill’s legacy to writers and to all artists.

The magical impact of Jerome Hill’s legacy grants emanates from the application of his ideas, not just his money. Artist communities in Minnesota and New York City have been encouraged to experiment, following Jerome Hill’s example. As one playwright wrote, “I firmly believe that the range and ambition of a writer’s work enlarges when they are freed from the burden of the commercially viable.” Because of Jerome Hill, many more artists have been able to lend us, the audience, their eyes. That is just as Hill thought it should be, and the blessing is that he then went on to make it possible.

Managing Your Career (or How to Become Self Employed)

by Linda L. Hoeschler, March 13, 2002

·      Reflect on some lessons learned which helped me advance career both within and between organizations

·      Offer these from the viewpoint that we each must assume responsibility for managing our own careers and must be prepared to quickly adapt to changing demands and opportunities

·      With thoughtful analysis of our skills, personal values and work environment, can set some positive goals to manage our jobs and career changes

 1. Pursue Your Passions: Match your activities with your values

·      Before you can develop a satisfying career plan, you must view your career within the context of your entire life

·      Develop parallel lists

1. One listing your values and goals re: family, friends, money, job, health, spiritual, and community

2. List current activities in each category

·      Develop a plan or set of plans to get them in sync. Create a life which reflects your values
 

2. Keep on Training: Consistently work on increasing your assets to improve your marketability and enhance your choices

·      Assess your existing assets or skills

1.     use updated resume

2.     consult industrial psychologist

·      Determine assets needed

1.     Assess your technical skills in your current (or future) profession:  do you know your field in depth; are you on the cutting edge of developments

2.     Grade your portable skills (those good in any industry):

#1 is oral communications (ability to listen and convey information)

writing (computer)

organizational ability; efficiency (for self and others)

finance, human resources., sales, training, computer

other keys: interpersonal, stress management, ability to learn, ability to problem solve

·      Develop a training plan (tailored to how you learn best, e.g. classes, tapes, reading, interviewing, etc.)

1.     Always learn as much as you can from work: training, classes, co-workers, meetings, company literature, task forces

2.     Read

3.     Take outside classes

4.     Volunteer work (right; learn skills; network) 

3. Be a Political Hack: A Smart Career Manager Practices Smart Corporate Politics

Definition of smart politics: Developing support from others (especially those who don’t report to you) so you can do your job well.

Elements of smart politics or recognizing the culture:

·      Peer support: most important factor in job success

1.     Use first 6 months on job to build a network

2.     The ability to work within a group is a skill you must demonstrate in order to get ahead

·      Boss support:  companies often judge you on how you get along with your boss. Factors:

1.     Be loyal; try to understand his/her pressures—not undying respect or blind devotion

2.     Compliment and coach; watch timing

3.     Do 3 most important things (to boss)

4.     Keep informed about your work; pass on helpful information

5.     Pointing out his/her shortcoming highlights your lack of character and good judgment

·      Choose battles carefully (6 silver bullets) 

·      Hire internally; hire better than you; develop a backup(s); keep an up to date inventory of the talent around you

·      Encourage people to be smart; add responsibility and see how they do

·      Correct ‘stereotypes’ about you:

1.     Overweight; techies; MBA; work-family balancer; job hopper; over 40; low-level job holder.

·      Maintain modesty at all times: “It’s only me.”

·      Don’t spread rumors; focus on results and ignore mindless speculation

·      Avoid profanity and control your moods: if you can’t manage your emotions, how can you manage others?

·      Resigning: be positive about employer; don’t threaten it as a job negotiation tool

·      Passed over: learn from it; Fired: handle gracefully 

4: Just do it: Always be a self-starter, work hard, and if blocked expand your power base

·      Companies are looking for people who can handle less supervision but take on more responsibility

·      The best measure of future job success is past performance; companies are looking for people who work hard day in and out, not for the sporadic genius who offers a few flashy performances

·      The ability to perform maintenance activities is particularly important for those with a reputation as start-up, turnaround, or star performers

·      Always work to increase profits—think of the customers’ needs

·      Some caveats while working hard:

1.     Reprioritize your work each day

2.     Don’t work 80 hours a week

3.     Do what you agree to; don’t agree to the impossible

4.     Do well in areas perceived as weak 

If you’re self starting, working hard, but either blocked from promotion or bored,  you can still develop your career by expanding your power base:

·      Create a new job for yourself—get out of middle management

1.     Take on work that needs doing

2.     Create or join task forces with study issues and propose solutions

·      Benefits of this new job creation:

1.     Acquire skills

2.     Increase your value to employer since more knowledgeable, productive, and not pressuring the organization to solve your problems

·      Caveats

1.     Don’t neglect your core job ( and let your boss know)

2.     Be a team player as you expand your territory: this point applies to Lesson 3

5.Take a Flyer: To get out of middle management show leadership, take risks and forget what others think.

·      You want to be recognized as a leader; remember “A desk is a dangerous place from which to view the world

·      A leader is a catalyst for thinking and cooperation, in other words, leveraging others 

·      A leader challenges the status quo in order to learn more and discover how to do things better

·      Prepare to be unpopular (sometimes difficult for women)

·      Know thyself and what you can offer

·      Be decisive; don’t dither; solve problems yourself

·      Risk

1.     Present new ideas even if they’re shot down

2.     Tackle hopeless projects; learn to rebound quickly

3.     Be willing to say “it’s my fault,” showing you are not so small minded as to blame others

·      Credit others; toot your horn sparingly

·      Dress for the next job

·      “Keep people happy, exceed expectations and good things will happen.”

6. Jumping Ship: Prepare Yourself for a Career Change (you’ll probably have to at some time) and Know When to Change

Preparation:

·      Keep your resume up to date

1.     Know significant job and career accomplishments and quantify them

2.     Cite obstacles overcome and skills learned

·      Save money

·      Clearly identify those factors you want in next job (values, co-workers, boss, experience, money, peace of mind, etc.)

·      Pay for assessment by industrial psychologist: gets courage up

1.     You can’t be half-hearted in a job search

2.     Be prepared to fail

·      Groom a successor

·      Protect your ego: get personal life in order; since work provides our primary social circle, need to develop other support structures 

1.     Simplify life with rituals, lists and delegation

2.     Watch health and exercise; maintain outside interests; feel good about yourself

3.     Don’t take issues and self too seriously; don’t change jobs if getting divorced

When to consider a job change:

·      Assess if your job has a future:

1.     Is your boss well regarded and moving up?

2.     Do supervisors spend time in developing your skills?

3.     Are you challenged and still learning on the job?

4.     How does your company view you in terms of: comparable pay; acting upon your recommendations; passing over you

5.     Is your company a market leader and in an industry with a future; is it developing new products or resting on its laurels?

·      Are you chronically sick or late?

·      Have you been demoted or asked to take a career counseling course?

Evaluating a new job:

·      How does it meet the key factors you set for next job?

·      Are your values and style similar to that of the CEO and management team?

·      If the new employer has or is downsizing, are they retraining their existing workers? (Cite long term stock trends) 

7. Changing Identity: Becoming a manager can make or break your career, depending on your ability to switch gears

Behaviors that get you to the top (aggressiveness, solo-performance), are often inappropriate. Need to replace them with these three 

·      Set the example for ethics, hard work, sensitivity to employee needs and buffering: do right by the company and by the employee 

·      Provide a simple vision for your staff; set 1-3 goals a year (with employee input as to how to choose and achieve them) 

·      Make stars of your employees:

1.     Choose people better than you

2.     Develop a team by solving problems and developing plans; help them see how their values fit with those of the organization

3.     Manage each employee in the style with he/she needs (director, coach, or delegator)

4.     Give them feedback and help them reach their goals

5.     Show them your appreciation; appreciation is the number 1 employee request

Some thoughts about Cuban Music

By Linda L. Hoeschler, January 1, 2003

The sounds of Cuba continue to swirl in my mind, an aural imprint of the country that freshens itself whenever I hear or hum one of its lilting, driving tunes. Each song renews my enjoyment of the unending live music that encircled me during my November 2002 trip.  This pulsating sound sculpture provides more powerful memories than those of the decaying pastel colors of old Havana or the peppery-sweet tastes of Cuban food. Simply said, I never dreamed that there existed such a musical country.

My first live experience occurred upon arrival at the Nacional Hotel in Havana, on Friday, November 8, after having just spent several hours in the wallpaper-Muzak environment of the Cancun, Mexico airport. I, and most of my traveling colleagues, thought we were ready for bed, after a late night penance called Cuban customs, followed by a sleepy drive from the airport through the quiet, poorly lit streets of the capital. But the Nacional was vibrating! Blaring bands challenged gorgeous trim Cuban couples in sinuous clothes to writhe in mirror-image perfect, provocative steps. Why hadn’t I brought at least one party outfit, rather than a wardrobe suitable for church visits?

The next day, after charming mealtime serenades (that almost never included the American pop tunes that infiltrate other countries), and city squares featuring colorfully-clad musicians on stilts as well as poorly dressed panpipers, I had a private meeting with Lerlys Morales Fernandez, a 22 year-old violinist who had been selected as my “counterpart.” Since I run a composer-service organization, I was initially disappointed with her youth and lack of compositional experience. However, she was very charming and spoke honestly of the difficulties of being a musician in Cuba. Basically, there are no steady jobs, so a “career” is a series of piecemeal, poorly paid gigs that force most musicians to continue living with their parents. The Cuban government boasts of its support for artists, but in fact, Lerlys only receives a stipend of $5 a month from the Popular Center of Music for her work there, whether or not she shows up. (Since Cuba has been “dollarized” most people speak as often about costs in dollars as in pesos.) Lerlys added that she might also receive the same amount for giving a lesson. She continued to explain that since violin jobs were scarce, she was playing with more popular bands to earn some money, and had I heard of Pedro Ferrer with whom she worked? (I said no, which turned out to be like denying I had ever heard of Bob Dylan.) She sighed, and said she’d like me to hear his music.

Our Delegation for Friendship among Women focused on learning about issues affecting women in Cuba, so our week involved lectures by experts and leaders on pertinent subjects. Cuba is well prepared for such tours, since Americans may only visit legally if they are on an “educational mission.” Many Cubans work hard to accommodate the US government’s tourist strictures, an industry in its own right, in order to feed their starving economy some critical dollars. But between the proud tales of accomplishment tempered by economic hardship for all, the carefree compelling music betrayed no problems, just joyful celebration of life.

We took dancing lessons on the rooftop of Ernest Hemingway’s favorite hotel, learning salsa and a rumba that Arthur Murray never taught. With no warning a man would plunge his hand or foot toward his female partner’s privates, her challenge being to cover hers before he “hits.” When asked about the difference between the Cuban rumba and our staid version, the question was taken as slightly ridiculous. What did we mean? This is the only real rumba!

On a visit with a revolutionary journalist, Marta Rojas, whose younger version we later saw in a Castro documentary, we overheard a brief mention of a concert the next day, Wednesday, at UNEAC, the national artists’ league. An octet of us attended what I thought would be a conventional music performance of new concert music by top artists. Only the top artists part was true. At the end of a long day we joined a packed crowd on a lovely terrace outside the mansion headquarters of UNEAC (probably seized from a pro-Batista magnate). Four diverse groups comprising vocalists and instrumentalists commanded the porch-stage to play an unending series of original rumbas, each so driving, so African, so different. The audience not only clapped to and for the music, but some seemed propelled to a small clearing in front of the performers, dancing the most perfectly choreographed movements. Did anyone in the country not play, sing and dance out of a Jerome Kern-goes-Caribbean musical?

We continued our women-focused meetings and tours, serenaded in between by the ubiquitous musicians in restaurants, squares and on corners. I never once heard recorded music. In the meantime I tried to contact several leading composers of new music, Alfred Diez Nieto and Harold Gramatges, friends of Cuban American composer, Tania Leon. Tania had also given me contact information for her brother, Oscar, a pianist, but no one seemed to answer when I called between appointments. When I asked Tania what I could offer Cuban composers, she said that I should just show them that someone cared about them and their work. On Wednesday, just before our briefing at the U.S. Special Interests Section (where we have 51 Americans and 280 Cuban employees, compared to the four Swiss in the Swiss Embassy under which the U.S. operates), I finally reached Nieto and set a meeting for the following day. We also got a call from Lerlys, my Sunday afternoon counterpart, that we were all invited to Pedro Ferrer’s home for a concert Thursday evening after our African dance concert.

In the meantime, a group of us splurged on tickets to the Tropicana nightclub that Wednesday, a two-hour color-coded (the orange act, followed by the blue routine, etc.) extravaganza under the stars that played on a main stage as well as on several suspended platforms in the trees. Lighted dates “1939-2002” twinkled in the trees, although I presume that a few years had seen no showgirl action due to the puritan revolutionaries. The 40-piece band was the kind you only see today in the Busby Berkley movies, and although this show is considered the predecessor of Las Vegas, modesty prevailed, perhaps because the few scantily clad dancers (about 10 in a cast of 60) had not had breast and buttocks implants. The music was fine, but while loud and brassy, it seemed more controlled than the other live music we had heard. After all, the Tropicana is but a “living museum” for tourists.

Thursday was the ultimate music day for us, so much so that by the time it was over, I felt that Cuba was the musical heart of the world. Stimulating meetings with Habana University women and painter Flora Fong were followed by Nieto, African dancing and Ferrer. Three of us, Leaetta Hough, a member of the American Composers Forum Board, music afficianado Carol Lilyholm, and I found Nieto’s charming home in the Playa section of Havana. His wife, Lillian, and he had prepared coffee and tea, served on heirloom china (and made with bottled water, she later mentioned, since Havana’s drinking water is not longer potable). Lovely tiny cakes accompanied the beverages, only later did I learn that cakes are a treasured delicacy in short supply.

We talked about the hardship that Cuba’s many composers endure today: lack of work, money and recordings. At my request Nieto played some of his works on an old tape recorder. The pieces were quite compelling, serious but with some welcome Latin flavor, and would have been more riveting but for the distracting distortions of either the recording or the machine. Nieto seemed not to notice. He was very generous about other composers in Cuba (many have since contacted me at his direction), a nice sign. Only at the end of the visit, after we had toured the detached studio which he built and decorated with his own lovely abstract wall paintings and when one of his 15 private students arrived, did his wife mention that he and Harold Gramatges were receiving national recognition the next day (akin to being named a “living treasure”). Although the Nietos were gracious and cheerful, I felt sad when I waved goodbye, for I wasn’t sure if there was anything I could really do to help them or their country’s composers, given the difficulty of even getting mail from the States to their island.

A brief dinner where the hotel restaurant ensemble played the first American tunes of the week (they switched to Cuban music as I was about to ask them to stop!), was followed by a show of Afro-Cuban dances and songs. I felt tired by it, since it seemed to lack the honest originality of the other musicians I had seen. But my fellow travelers enjoyed it, so I smiled and applauded with them. I thought that if I hadn’t seen all the other musicians, I would have probably loved it.

We then took cabs to Pedro Ferrer’s home, where spectacular magic happened. We sat on his front porch where his young South African wife, Miami-based mother-in-law, an NPR stringer living in Mexico City, and other musicians were gathered. From 10 to 12 we had a private concert such as I may never again experience in my life. Ferrer, who is from a remote part of Cuba, is dedicated to preserving indigenous musical forms, many of which are disappearing. He takes these forms and writes original melodies and words (some of which have gotten him thrown in jail). The middle-age musician was accompanied by three younger performers: my friend, Lerlys, on percussion, guitar and flute, Ferrer’s 20-something daughter, Lena, who hauntingly sang and played percussion, plus a young man who performed on a variety of African instruments (one like a large finger piano). Ferrer played a steel-string acoustic guitar, made for him, and sang. Ferrer would have sung all night, but for our self-imposed curfew, based on an early tour the next day. We cut the concert at midnight, and then toured his well-appointed studio where he could obviously make quality recordings. I was in love; we all were.

Since my return to Minnesota I have been outlining a project to do a series of recordings, through the American Composers Forum, of Cuban jazz, new-ethnic and classical music. In the meantime I play my Cuban CD’s, cook Cuban food, and think sentimentally about an extraordinary island in the sun where the music is heartfelt, vital and ubiquitous. I am anxious to travel there again with my family, and advise others to go there soon. For once relations with the US are “normalized,” I don’t think Cuban music will be so pure and free. They will then be deluged by American recorded music, that they, like other musicians around the world,  will curse, or emulate, or incorporate. Go now, before it’s too late.