Giving Compass' Take:

• Vijay Gupta describes his work and life as a member of the LA Philharmonic and as the founder of Street Symphony, a local nonprofit helping individuals experiencing homelessness and incarceration better cope with their hardships through the power of music.

• How can arts and music help build community and be part of a healing process?

• Learn about how other organizations are helping the homeless population through the arts.

The great “masterpieces” I play as a symphonic musician were written to tell the stories of communities, as much as they were written for what we might perceive as some grandiose idea of individual expression.

We will always be humbled by the opportunity to hear—and play—something new in the music we love. But we have to ask the question—do we truly reflect the vibrancy and power of our communities just by playing the music of old, dead, white men? What’s our modern day “Messiah”? What is the sound of America, today, now?

America is the sound of vulnerable, brave questions.

We, as artists, have before us a “joyful work”: to heal and inspire, but also to disrupt and provoke. It’s our job to disrupt the patterns which, while working for some, create and demonize the “other.” It’s our job to provoke meaningful, often painful, conversations which lead to meaningful policy changes for our communities, while joining in the “joyful work” of giving voice to that gorgeous multiplicity of American cultures and identities.

Street Symphony is a non-profit organization I formed in 2011 to engage people experiencing homelessness and incarceration through musical performances, dialogue, and storytelling in Skid Row.

The epicenter of homelessness in America today, Skid Row is a community of thousands upon thousands of people—too often thrown away or ignored by the bright lights of our world. Often, the Skid Row community is described as an “emergency, a disgrace, a crisis."

However, the Skid Row community is one of the most vibrant, resilient—and yes, artistic—communities of people in America today. They are people who, as Dr. King said, have taken “the hardest realities of life and put them into music, only to come out with some new hope or sense of triumph.”

Read the full article about community through music by Vijay Gupta  at ARTS Blog