While I think a lot of music is stellar (particularly my wife’s music!), that’s not really the subject of this post.
Stellar Music Conservatory and Frontier Light & Sound in Newmarket held an event yesterday to “bring down the wall.” In this case it was literally the wall between the two businesses.
Owner David Blackmore had arranged the charity event and invited all of the election candidates to participate with a sledge hammer. Tim Jones and I were the only two to bother showing up, and Dave had arranged SNAP to take photo’s. It was a lot of fun. Thanks, Dave!
This was a good opportunity to highlight that “the arts” is more than just rich people in galas with questionable multimillion dollar paintings that we all see on television from time to time, as Mr Harper would have us believe. The REAL arts that is in need of government assistance is the access to musical instruments and instruction for children, particularly for those whose families are unable to afford it themselves.
Far too often we hear of children diagnosed with ADHD, or we hear of rising youth crime rates in economically depressed areas.
Conservatives want to deal with these issues by treating the symptoms with pharmaceutical drugs or throwing young offenders in jail after plastering their picture on the front page of national newspapers, when all they really need is a safe environment and a creative outlet for their energy which we are failing to provide.
Some of us have not written off these young people and want to work toward programs to keep low income youth engaged and working toward a productive, healthy lifestyle.
