L’Académie Camac 2016

Uncategorized

November 10, 2015

Camac’s sponsorship department operates all over the world, and so we see a lot of different ways of working, under widely varying conditions. Some countries have a very freelance, gig-based professional culture: others focus more on teaching, and there are one or two countries where your chances of an orchestral job are still not less than zero. Despite this variety, it’s nonetheless the case that competition is fierce everywhere, and there is more economising on, than investment in, the arts.

Not all artistic restructure should be met with knee-jerk handwringing and petitions. My former orchestra used to haemorrhage money on musicians calling in sick when they weren’t ill, and they could have done something about this instead of performing operas without second harps or celestas. But any economising wobbles along a tightrope, hand-in-hand with false economising. The balance is not easy: it takes an in-depth understanding of your art form, not to mention a shrewd judge of investment, not to fall on your face.

One essential investment in the arts is in enough ambassadors of an inspiringly high level. A big part of art is about transcending the mundane, about raising the human spirit by showing some of the heights to which it can aspire. In order to achieve an exceptional level, it is necessary, at least sometimes, to work under exceptional conditions. In fact, this issue isn’t even unique to the arts. Elite universities have had to explain for years why their tuition costs more (more of it, more one-on-one), why it is worth it, and why it is both morally and societally destructive to meet these costs via tuition fees without provision for non-wealthy students.

It was with these sorts of cultural-political questions in mind that we launched our Académie Camac in 2014. This special project provides outstanding young concert harpists with a week of exceptional tuition and study conditions: daily private lessons, a personal practice room and harp, peaceful and beautiful surroundings, good food, and the freedom to work on what you like, how you like. Apart from your travel costs to the course venue, we sponsor all costs in full.

Our second Académie Camac took place from April 16th – 24th, 2016, with Isabelle Moretti.