Let’s Play-Harmonizing Cultures Through Music Incorporated
Let’s Play-Harmonizing Cultures Through Music Incorporated is designed to give underserved musicians opportunities to play. One of the organizations is the Black Philharmonic Orchestra that lets people of color perform and work in a classical symphony orchestra. The other aspect of the non-profit is to put funds directly in the hands of jazz artists to connect with audiences in more rural areas.
The philosophy of the orchestra is to promote a healthy environment for musicians who have been neglected by main stream orchestras simply because of their race, skin color, age, academic background and nationality.
The Black Philharmonic Orchestra is to support, maintain, and operate a pre-eminent symphony orchestra; to maintain and foster an interest in and enjoyment of symphonic music, and to instill in its community, an interest in symphonic music by providing concerts, recordings, building a cultural community for all people and to intervene in racism inflicted on Black and Hispanic communities by symphony orchestra organizations.
The Black Philharmonic Orchestra is an orchestra that is modeled after the New York Philharmonic but with the difference in the makeup of the musicians performing in the orchestra. The majority of musicians will be African-American and Hispanic. The repertoire will the same used by symphony orchestras around the world.
The orchestra will be a complete symphony orchestra which uses on average forty musicians; strings, winds, brass, percussion and conductor. It will be located in New York City.
The target demographic of the orchestra will be able to employ previously underemployed and unemployed classical musicians. And there are many musicians waiting in the wings for their opportunity to work in a professional symphony orchestra.
The other aspect of the non-profit will be to have a more ethnically diverse population that performs at a variety of geographic locations with focus on rural areas around the United States.
The non-profit was formed in November 2022 and that in itself is an accomplishment. Let Us Play will be an ongoing project with concerts, both classical orchestra and jazz, happening throughout the year for many years to come.
The population served will be exposed to a different symphony orchestra, a minority population which is underserved in the classical world. The jazz aspect will serve the rural population, giving people who live in less populated areas access to jazz concerts.
The founder, Karen Stachel, the President and CEO, is a African-American flutist and has worked in the Symphony Orchestra arena for decades. At the same time that she worked in the classical world, she has been a jazz flutist. She co-leads a jazz group “LehCats” with her husband, saxophonist, Norbert Stachel.