TWO BARBADIAN YOUTH will be chosen annually to attend some of the best musical academies in the United States.
This was announced today by Michael Aiken, managing director of Spring, one of the producers of this weekend’s Classical/Pops festival.
He made the announcement at a Press conference at the Ministry of Culture’s Haggatt Hall offices, which was attended by Minister Stephen Lashley and Terry Layne, general manager of Jet Blue, the other sponsor of the show.
Aiken explained that even after going through extensive musical training young people were still having difficulty finding opportunities.
“So we decided to develop an additional program to give students opportunities for cross-cultural collaboration and additional training in the United States with some of our best musical academies,” he said, adding that the scholarship program will take two Barbadian youth to several of the best academies in the US.
The Ministry of Culture will choose the two candidates.
Meanwhile Minister Lashley also announced the JetBlue Masters Series as part of the Classical/Pops festival.
This will be in the form of three workshops to be held over this week with a number of international professional artistes.
Entertainment events producer Faye Mcmahon will conduct training in sound production while renowned Barbadian makeup specialist, Thelma Pollard, also the principal makeup artist of Phantom of the Opera, will conduct a workshop in makeup for theatre.
Grammy Award-winning trumpeter Irvin Mayfield, cultural ambassador for the City of New Orleans, Chapman Roberts and Tye Murray, world renowned violinist will conduct a workshop on voice, violin, trumpet and jazz.
All of the workshops will be held at the Queen’s Park Steel Shed. (MB)