November DYV Newsletter with photos click here

DYV wins People's Choice and Knight Arts Challenge Detroit! 
Detroit Youth Volume won $22,000! In order to access this grant from Knight Arts Challenge Detroit, we must raise the $22,000 match first. Please continue to support the project. Choose your plan(s) of action:

• JOIN THE FACEBOOK EVENT PAGE Stay up to date on our fundraising efforts and learn more about project details
• DONATE NOW Click to visit our online giving page 
• PLEDGE TO DONATE on Day 1 of our kickstarter campaign Nov 30th by emailingdetroityouthvolume@gmail.com with your pledge amount. The most successful crowdsourcing campaigns have 50% of their goal pledged before the campaign begins.

About our Knight Arts Challenge project Our project celebrates, reflects and furthers what’s happening, and what’s been happening, in the City of Detroit. With a professionally recorded album, we will show the world how we've integrated internationally-loved Suzuki violin repertoire into our own Detroit jams. Over 20 youth, ages six to eighteen, from Capuchin Soup Kitchen receiving free violin lessons through DYV will record, produce and publicly perform our album in the summer of 2016.  

Album artists:

• Detroit Youth Volume, violinists and album art co-designers
• Sterling Toles, beat-maker, album co-producer, recording engineer
• Stevie Soul, beat boxer
• Nick Speed, beat-maker
• Tunde Olaniran, album co-producer
• Matthew Cross, recording engineer

Album Track List:

• Twinkle with Beats (Suzuki Variation A) featuring beats by Sterling Toles
• Lightly Row Beats in a Scroll, featuing beat boxing by Stevie Soul
• Song of the Wind, featuring beats by Nick Speed

Album release party participating artists:

• Tunde Olaniran, event production
• Piper Carter, photography
• Randall Jacobs, costumer

Album release party performers:

• Detroit Youth Volume with beat-makers Sterling Toles, Stevie Soul (live), Nick Speed
• Invincible, activist MC and friends
• HardCore Detroit urban dance crew
• CutTime Players classical ensemble

Album release party date:
August 2016

Album release party location:
TBA -- have an idea? email us!
​
Did you win the People's Choice Award? ​DYV received 1,396 votes out of the total 6,800, which broke records! The People's Choice winner was the Hamtramck Free School, who facilitates poetry classes called Writers Bloc for men in prison. The poets, many are fathers, did not want to take money from the competing youth organizations (DYV, Stitching Up Detroit and Heritage Works) so they opted to give their share to another organization on the condition that Knight Foundation would provide $20k to the remaining two nominees. At the awards ceremony, Knight president surprised the crowd by offering $20k to all four People's Choice nominees!

DYV will put our $20k toward paying our violin teachers to provide Private Lessons to all 23 students. Once we raise the match, our Knight Arts Challenge grant will cover the album project and 50% of our Group Classes.

PERFORMANCE CALENDAR

November 18, 2105 - 7pm 
Featured performers with CutTime 
Simfonica of Classical Revolution Detroit 
at St CeCes
​
December 10, 2015 
Kickstarter Fundraising Party
at PJ Lager House 
Early evening folk show co-sponsored bySeraphine Collective. Later show featuring DYV hip hop artists from the album to-be.

December 12 2015 - 6-8pm
Teatro del Chico at Mexicantown Mercado
DYV will collaborate with beat-maker Sterling Stoles at an all-ages community program of the DIA's 30 Americans exhibit, an evening of art and dance
​
December 18, 2015 5-7pm
Holiday Potluck and Play In
at St Charles Parrish
Fans, family and friends all welcome!


SALE Alternative Gift holiday cards Choose alternative gift giving by donating toDetroit Youth Volume in honor of a loved one. Receive a bright, beautiful holiday photo card with this message:

In your honor, I gave the gift of music by donating to Detroit Youth Volume. Thank you for helping make Suzuki violin lessons FREE to youth from 
Capuchin Soup Kitchen in Detroit!

Choose your price: $5-25 per card
​Place your order by emailingdetroityouthvolume@gmail.com or visiting our fiscal sponsor's online store: https://store.alliedmedia.org/

ORDER CARDS

Food Justice Task Force welcomes Kamaria Gray, DYV snack chef Facilitated by board member Linda Campbell, the Food Justice Task Force is funding healthy afterschool snacks forDetroit Youth Volume. We are excited to welcome snack chef, Kamaria Gray, onto the DYV team. It takes a village! Kamaria is a baker at neighboring cafe Sister Pie. 

Visit Kamaria's instragram to see what she has cooked for us each week! 
instagram.com/kamarias__kitchen/

​Young Artists Award On October 21st, Astarria and her grandmother, Miss Clara and board member Kim Christopher accepted the Young Artist Award on behalf of DetroitYouth Volume. The award was presented at the 18th Annual Recognition Awards Ceremony Wayne County Council for Arts, History and Humanities. DYV's favorite jazz bassist, Marion Hayden, also received an award and took a photo with Star after the ceremony. During her acceptance speech, she read a quote, "To whom much is given, much is required." We feel the same way!

The Wayne County Council for the Arts, History & Humanities will present Detroit Youth Volume with the Young Artist Award. One of our favorite local jazz musicians, Marion Hayden, will receive the Artist/Performer Award. Detroit School for Arts will be given the Arts Education Award. Come find out who else will be a 2015 Honoree.

October 21st 2015, 7pm 
18th Annual WCCAHH's Recognition Awards Ceremony
Ford Community & Performing Arts Center 
15801 Michigan Avenue, Dearborn 48126

Reception in the Padzeiski Art Gallery will follow the awards ceremony. Both are free and open to the public. Questions and RSVPs may be directed to 734-216-0753

The WCCAHH goal is to enhance the quality of life throughout the County while simultaneously fostering & preserving the diverse cultural, artistic & historical assets that define the creative economy within Wayne County.

This prestigious free event is WCCAHH’s opportunity to reach out to the Arts, cultural community and public officials to identify and acknowledge those organizations and individuals who have made significant contributions to the quality of life in Wayne County. 

Today, we’re excited to share the finalists of the 2015 Detroit Knight Arts Challenge - 70 ideas culled from 1,000-plus submissions from neighborhoods across Detroit.

The list below is packed with exciting ideas from the city’s cultural community, and a few trends. This year, we saw projects focused on capturing and preserving Detroit’s historical and artistic legacy, reclaiming spaces for local artists to create new work and exchange ideas, and to release made-in Detroit musical recordings that celebrate the cities unique sound – from 70s gospel music reissues to Bengali songbooks.

We will announce the winners on Oct. 27, once the finalists’ detailed proposals are reviewed by a panel of local artists and arts advocates.

Thanks to everyone who submitted an idea, and we look forward to celebrating with the winners in the fall.

Link to the full article. 

Detroit Youth Volume, the only program in the city to offer violin lessons using a special training known as the Suzuki Method, has an innovative ethic that starts with free lessons. Participating Detroit children also get instruments at no cost, and parents even get gas cards to ease the strain of getting their kids to class.
 
Every week, about 20 young students accompanied by parents meet at the Samaritan Center on Conner near I-94 where they participate in group lessons. Clara Hardie, the organization's program director and founder, instructs the Saturday classes with fellow teacher and operations director Allison Harris and two part-time volunteers.
 
Astarria Lewis, 9, attends weekly classes with her 16-year-old sister Ashley Ardis, the only viola player of the group, and she's thrilled to be there. "This is a really cool and fun program," she says. "I always like learning how to play [my instrument]. I like my teachers. I like talking to my friends."
 
Detroit Youth Volume (DYV) began five years ago when Hardie was tutoring and teaching art therapy as a program assistant for the Rosa Parks Children and Youth Program at the Capuchin Soup Kitchen. An Upper Peninsula native, Hardie developed the class as a mashup of her activist ideals and own upbringing in Marquette, where she studied the Suzuki Method with her mom and continued with violin lessons until she was 18.

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Link to entire article