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Chamber Music Plus

20/5/2015

The idea of Severn Muses arose partly from an invitation I received from the West Midlands Chamber Music Societies to introduce a discussion on audiences in spring 2014. My husband Chris O'Grady and I have now taken this collaboration a step further, by taking over Chamber Music Plus, which produces an annual booklet listing all the concerts organised by its members. We are currently asking for submissions (copy deadline 6 July 2015) and plan to extend the area covered to the Severn Muses region. If you're interested in knowing more you can email us on chambermusicplus@btinternet.com.

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New ideas from Manchester Camerata

6/5/2015

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Here's another article from Bob Riley of the Manchester Camerata, taking another approach to finding new audiences:

"In 2013-14, we saw a 54 per cent increase in new attenders to see our chamber orchestra, Manchester Camerata, compared to the previous season. We have a restless ambition to redefine what an orchestra can do. We’re constantly challenging how we engage with audiences – so if that means we perform in a grand concert hall one day, and a car park the next, so be it.

Like any big city, there’s a real wealth of performance spaces in Manchester – clubs and bars, chapels and cathedrals, impressive concert halls and everything in between. We’ve found that by performing in venues like Gorilla Bar or the Royal Exchange Theatre, we’re cultivating a new audience for our work – taking the music to them, rather than expecting them to come to us.

In April, we were the first professional orchestra to perform at Manchester’s Albert Hall – a forgotten Wesleyan chapel resurrected by the man behind the Trof venue empire, Joel Wilkinson. And, of course, venues like this attract a huge clubbing audience, who are enjoying music and listening to amazing artists from different genres, so it’s a natural place for us to be. That’s an audience we want to test out and engage. We’ve had to adapt how we work and learn from how Trof produce their events to create the right type of programme and environment to cultivate those audiences. In the end, our concert in April attracted 25 per cent new attenders.

November sees us perform at Gorilla Bar for an electic programme ranging from Bach to Lady Gaga. We’ll be joined by the amazingly talented Martynas Levickis, the man who is single-handedly reinventing the accordion.

I’m always hungry to find the next venue or the next opportunity to engage with audiences, old and new. You can’t stand still in this industry and there’s too much opportunity out there not to chase it."

Read the full article in The Independent here

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Jill Davies and Severn Muses

All arts organisations have mailing lists – patrons – season ticket holders – volunteers – access to hundreds if not thousands of people who are already attending events. It’s much easier to persuade these people to go to more than to find completely new audiences. Severn Muses is here to help. I believe that working together we can raise awareness of the huge variety of arts events in our region and share them with as many people as possible.

Chamber Music Plus

New ideas from Manchester Camerata

Jill Davies and Severn Muses

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