Partnering with Los Angeles’ Street Symphony
Street Symphony is a community of professional musicians who bring world-class performances and meaningful musical engagement to people living in homelessness, incarceration, and recovery across Los Angeles County (featured on NPR, Washington Post, NBC, Yale Institute of Sacred Music, PBS, Harvard Business School, BBC, Los Angeles Times) .
Our high schoolers across the country are eager to perform community concerts to raise funds for VMA’s Sweet Sounds of Service Campaign and Street Symphony’s mission “to create opportunities for deep musical encounter in places where live performance rarely happens.”
Benefit concerts have long been a meaningful way for musicians to support charitable causes. At the VMA, students' fundraising efforts are helping build the VMA infrastructure for future service.
While some educators generously volunteer their time to perform outreach (see nonprofit Music for Food), not all have the capacity to organize outreach concerts without additional support. Our long-term goal is to equip educators and students across the country to create a lasting network of community service through music, multiplying the impact of every concert far beyond a single fundraising concert.
Want to get involved with the Street Symphony project? Everyone can play their part. Take a look at Albert’s page.
Our National Fundraising Chair Elect, Albert Zhou, took the initiative to create a fundraising page through our Sweet Sounds of Service Campaign. His team at Concord Academy has a goal of raising $5,000.
During our conversations, Street Symphony founder Vijay Gupta expressed his support for the collaborative fundraising model behind this partnership. It will enable the VMA to equip educators and students to lead meaningful outreach in their own communities.
More info from our student government is forthcoming after summer internships and camps.
