New England String Orchestra's Education Programs

String Fever

Community Outreach

The New England String Orchestra has a strong commitment to engage the community Both as audience members and as music makers themselves. The orchestra was founded in 1994 to champion strings in performance and education. Educational efforts are focused primarily on supporting public school music programs.

The String Competition - which celebrated its 10th year at the String Celebration concert with Mark O'Connor - provides inspiration for string students coming up through the grades. Our goal is to create lasting relationships with young performers and composers who will transform the world as tomorrow's musical artists, concert audience members, composers, philanthropists and arts advocates.

NESO believes that:

1. Strings are central to classical music - the majority of orchestral music and a large portion of chamber music music involve strings.

2. String instruments are challenging to master - in a culture of short attention spans, students need much encouragement and inspiration, but the benefits are multi-dimensional, powerful and lasting.

3. String music is emotionally rich, so achieving a level of technical mastery opens up great opportunities for personal development.

4. Public schools' string programs are sometimes an endangered species-most children will not have the option to study strings without a significant effort to nurture existing programs and create new ones.