Violin Lessons for Detroit Youth Volume!

The students & teaching artists of Detroit Youth Volume need your help! 

We have TWO goals for this school year:

#1 - to continue making playing the violin accessible & equitable to low-income youth by providing financial aid to over half of our student body. We do this in order to curate the ideal learning environment for ALL our students; one in which young people practice collaborating with others from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds!

#2 - to create and produce our fifth album in collaboration with local musicians! 

We're dreaming of hosting our FIFTH Collaborating Artists Workshop Series this Winter. Imagine seventeen violinists ages 6-19 getting together with local jazz, electronic, and hip hop musicians to celebrate our favorite Detroit genres. We'd love to bring back a handful of the 40+ artists who've worked with us over the past dozen years. Check out what we've done together so far: http://www.detroityouthvolume.org/albums.html 

If our community shows up to support this dream, you'll be invited to hear our FIFTH album recorded live at the end of the school year during our Twelve-Year Anniversary Birthday Party!

1. Continue private violin lessons and group classes we began in September 2021 for 17 youth ages 6-17. Focus is classical Suzuki method and improvising. Each student will receive 30 private lessons between September 2021 and June 2022.
2. Student and parent brainstorming sessions for our next Collaborating Artist Workshop Series during violin group classes held at the Poplar Street Art Park on October 23 and November 20th, 2021. 
3. Hold Parent/Teacher conferences 2nd week fo December to review each students' development of changemaker and music skills.
4. Begin workshop series with local musicians in 2022.
5. Host the workshop series culminating show in late Spring at DYV's Twelve-Year Anniversary Birthday Party at a really cool venue!

#1 - IT NURTURES CHANGELEADERS!

DYV Founding Director & violin teacher Clara Hardie's purpose of teaching violin is to use social justice pedagogies to nurture students' changemaker skills. She believes that creativity, resilience, collaboration & higher-order thinking skills are the most important for thriving as a human in Detroit and beyond! Private violin lessons, group classes, and collaborations with local musicians nurture all of these. 

#2 - WE NEED DIVERSE, EQUITABLE CLASSROOMS!

The best place for youth to evolve as changemakers is within a socioeconomically diverse learning environment using a curriculum that is place-based and culturally relevant. Welcome to the DYV classroom!

Over half of our students receive financial aid. 65% of DYV students are youth of color. The annual Collaborating Artists Workshop Series develops positive cultural identity in our students as Detroiters by celebrating place-based genres and bringing in amazing musicians.

How do we do it? With help! Our community of supporters have been making quality arts education accessible to low-income families, especially those from Capuchin Soup Kitchen, since 2010. From September through June, paying and scholarship students alike engage in the Collaborating Artists Workshops Series every Winter. They also engage in weekly private lessons in the classical Suzuki method (with a nice instrument they can take home for practicing).