Co inanity

Musical 11

Upbeat concert is a meeting
ground for young people from
diverse communities.

DIANA LIEBERMAN

Staff Writer

0

n the program for the recent concert, "Music Bridging
Communities," were a both 99-year-old composition for
string quartet and a brand-new musical creation.
But the Sept. 19 program, which featured the Jeff Haas
Quartet and the Ann Arbor-based Phoenix Ensemble, centered on
more than music. Instead, 9- and 10-year-olds from Hillel Day School
of Metropolitan
Detroit joined stu-
dents from two ele-
mentary schools,
John R. King in
Detroit and Burton
in Huntington
Woods, for a lesson
in ethnic under-
standing.
Jeff Haas
received a grant
from ArtSery
Michigan and the
Michigan Council
for Arts and
Cultural Affairs to
write "Age of
Confluence," in
which he broke
down the perceived
gulf between classi-
cal music, ethnic
music and jazz. In
1894, composer
Antonin Dvorak
used similar ele-
ments in his piece,
"American' String
Quartet."
Performing the Haas' and Dvorak's works side by side, along
with pieces from a standard jazz repertoire, Haas led his young
audience to discover how the gulf between people of different
races or religions is just as arbitrary as the gulf between differ-
ent types of music.
The program was one of two workshops and a public concert held at
the Northwest Activities Center in Detroit, coordinated by the Detroit
Jewish Initiative, a program of the Jewish Community Council of
Metropolitan Detroit. The activities center, which is housed in the for-
mer Jewish Community Center building at Meyers and Curtis, was a
co-sponsor, along with the JCC of Metropolitan Detroit and African

American Magazine.

❑

Clockwiseftom upper.

•

Jeff Haaszlcusses . the similarities between classic-al musk and jazz.

Danielle'Pladgy, 10, of Farmington .P-14 ready to volunteer.

Enjoying the concert are Hil:lel.studen4 Nicole' Hollander, 10, and-Emily Liebman, 9,
of West Bloomfield and .10-ycy4's-olds Robert Goodlet and David Washington of Detroit.

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10/3
2003

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