The 2nd-graders were having the time of their lives conducting the strains of Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker.” The 15 children kept enthusiastic, if not perfect, time with the music, raising and lowering their arms to indicate loud and soft passages. One boy became so energized that he jumped with every crescendo, spinning in the air before he landed with a broad smile — a miniature, musical Michael Jordan. When the music ended the children burst into applause, then politely filed out of the bright, carpeted room in pairs.
The musicians were imaginary and the setting wasn’t exactly Orchestra Hall, but that didn’t matter to these 7- and 8-year-olds from Wendell Smith Elementary School on the South Side. For many of them, the experience at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s new ECHO music learning center was their first taste of classical music.
“I want them to leave this classroom with a new appreciation for music,” explained ECHO instructor Rodney Stapleton after the students left. “Not exactly with the feeling of `I love classical music’ but `I can look at an orchestra and understand better what the musicians are doing and what the conductor does because I played rhythm sticks in a section and waved my arms around for two minutes.’ “
The center, which opened at Symphony Center in September, is the result of the CSO’s quest to create a larger, more diverse audience for classical music. The CSO spent $3.7 million to build ECHO, an approximate acronym for the Eloise W. Martin Center of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
Visitors start at the street-level Welcome Center at 67 E. Adams St., where they pay admission and can look at four resource terminals that display the CSO’s Web site. On the second floor are the A-Musing Room and the music labs, which provide both individualized and group sessions structured around five musical themes designed to give people a stronger grasp of classical music. Jazz, blues, folk, rap and rock music play a significant role in the activities.
“ECHO is not, in fact, designed for people who go to our concerts, even though people who already appreciate music and do go (to ECHO) learn more about it and think more about it and react to it in a different way,” said Henry Fogel, CSO president. The ultimate aim, he said, is to provide listeners of all ages and cultural backgrounds with a greater variety of techniques to connect with different kinds of music.
The technology-heavy A-Musing Room, in which sophisticated interactive software leads visitors through simple exercises that illustrate classical music’s key concepts, may surprise those familiar with the orchestra. The room’s red carpet, vibrant yellow walls and abundant color photographs seem more fitting for a children’s museum than one of the city’s oldest, most traditional institutions.
Visitors first select one of four types of wooden boxes, shaped like musical instruments, that activate computer terminals housed in booths. One activity in the booth called Teams lets viewers play the tam-tam with the CSO in Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition,” under the direction of Daniel Barenboim. Afterward, the conductor even critiques the performance, offering advice such as, “You’re erratic; sometimes it’s too soon, sometimes too late,” if you miss a cue.
In the Links booth, visitors can listen to selections from groups as far-ranging as Senegalese drummers, a traditional Irish ensemble and medieval Gregorian chanters. A booth in Mapping and Recording compares reading an orchestral score to following a street map, then invites people to compose a short piece of music on their instrument box while a waltz rhythm plays in the background.
After following the directions, the curious and the brave can hear their composition broadcast at Orchestra Wall. Visitors attach their instrument boxes to the wall, then see their names displayed in lights as their pieces of music are featured as solos in a contemporary orchestral piece composed by CSO violist Maxwell Raimi.
To translate the CSO’s ideas into interactive technology for the A-Musing Room, the CSO hired the New York-based exhibition design firm of Edwin Schlossberg Inc. Schlossberg said the creative juices started flowing once he realized that he couldn’t use classical music as the sole vehicle for introducing ideas.
“We couldn’t put up a big sign that said `Bach is fun,’ ” Schlossberg said. “It just wouldn’t work. People who are involved with classical music love it so much they think all you have to do is say it slower and louder and everyone will get it, and that isn’t true.
“We had to find something different. We knew there must be a reason why classical music has been such an important part of so many people’s lives. Then we realized that it teaches about the importance of teamwork, of emotion and perception, of ritual and celebration, of sound in our lives and of notation and mapping. That became the strategy of the project.”
Those themes extend to classes in ECHO’s music labs, designed for visitors 6 years of age and up. The rooms are filled with percussion instruments as well as unexpected materials such as feather boas, plastic toys, and pots and pans. A music educator leads groups in 45-minute sessions geared to their age level, giving them firsthand experience in creating stories, playing rhythms, tones and chords, and building simple instruments.
Before designing ECHO the CSO assembled a task force of leaders in a variety of Chicago arts and education organizations for input. “Our desire to form a task force was based on the understanding that there were some real and perceived barriers around the CSO, and we wanted to find a way to get beyond those barriers,” said Holly Hudak, ECHO’s manager. “One of the biggest was that a lot of people feel they don’t know enough about classical music, they don’t know how to read music, they don’t have enough money to buy a ticket, they don’t have the right clothes. I’ve heard all these things from all different kinds of people.”
Attendance at ECHO has been low in the few weeks since it opened, but Hudak said she is not discouraged.
“It takes a long time to build an audience for anything new. In addition to the people who have gone through the ECHO experience, I think there are just as many who have come to the Welcome Center, poked their heads in, gotten used to the space and said they will return with family members, and I believe they will,” she said.
Duffie Adelson, executive director of Merit Music Program, a community music school focusing on inner-city students, applauds the CSO for its efforts. “ECHO complements the CSO’s other community engagements taking place around the city. It’s a nice bridge to bring in people who are comfortable with computer technology into Symphony Center. It will start the process of stimulating kids to listen critically, which leads to other good things later.”
