Inclusive Sphinx orchestra plays
compositions by Mozart to Marsalis

By John Mark Rafacz

It’s no secret that most classical ensembles include precious few African American and Latino musicians. The Detroit-based Sphinx Organization, a non-profit founded by violinist and former Penn State student Aaron Dworkin, is trying to change that by promoting the careers of classical musicians of color.

The Sphinx Chamber Orchestra, which makes its Penn State debut in a 7:30 p.m. Thursday, October 16, concert at Eisenhower Auditorium, is an ensemble featuring the top alumni of the national Sphinx Competition for young African American and Latino string players.

In addition to advancing diversity among classical musicians, the orchestra also seeks to engage young and new audiences through performances of varied repertoire. The ensemble embarks on its first American tour this fall. Chelsea Tipton II, the resident conductor of the Toledo Symphony Orchestra, guides the Sphinx in a program including works by Mozart, Vivaldi, Villa-Lobos, tango master Astor Piazzolla, jazz icon Wynton Marsalis, and contemporary American composers George Walker and Michael Abels.

“I can speak from the African American perspective,” Tipton says. “In our culture we tend to focus more toward choral music or gospel music or more contemporary musical styles. What I’ve done, in my own career as a conductor, is try to show that music is music, and it really is for everyone. Whether it’s Beethoven, whether it’s Brahms, whether it’s Michael Abels, who is a composer we’re doing on the concert, Vivaldi—all those composers can make a connection with people from all different cultures. I think that’s one of the most important messages that the Sphinx Organization brings to the various communities.”

The concert also features the Harlem Quartet, an ensemble of first-place laureates from the Sphinx Competition. Each member of the quartet has experience as a chamber musician and soloist. The quartet has performed in New York City, Detroit, Atlanta, and Boston. Members of the quartet have appeared as soloists with the Atlanta, Cleveland, Detroit, Pittsburgh, and Baltimore symphonies; the New York Philharmonic; and the Boston Pops.

The orchestra’s musicians have completed or continue their studies at America’s foremost music schools.

“When I first conducted the group I was amazed at the level of talent that’s out there, that’s coming out of conservatories, that’s coming out of music schools,” says Tipton, speaking by phone from Toledo.

A New York Times critic described the orchestra’s 2004 Carnegie Hall debut as “first-rate in every way.” The ensemble, the Times reviewer wrote, “produced a more beautiful, precise, and carefully shaped sound than some fully professional orchestras that came through Carnegie Hall in the course of the year.” The orchestra returned to Carnegie Hall in 2006 and 2007 to present two additional programs to sold-out houses. The orchestra is scheduled to make its fourth appearance at Carnegie Hall five days after its Penn State concert.

“Playing in New York—Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall—those are kind of stamps of approval that many ensembles use and arts organizations use. That’s why New York is such a bastion of great art …,” Tipton says. “To be on that stage it also signifies a certain milestone in one’s career. We’re not done. You don’t stop after you do a concert there. But it was interesting last year, you know, I did the Carnegie Hall concert with them, and to see how just being on that stage transformed the ensemble—this is really serious, this is really important—and to have such an enthusiastic audience. The audience was filled with a lot of young people. The organization had done a lot of outreach to various schools, so there were a lot of young people in the audience, as well as the media to write about the events that were happening on stage. That type of publicity and that type of exposure just is so important to an organization.”

Interlochen Arts Academy graduate Dworkin, who earned two degrees from The University of Michigan, created the Sphinx Organization in 1996 to counter the stereotype that African Americans and Latinos could not or would not participate in classical music. His organization and/or its ensembles have:

• administered more than $1.62 million in prizes and scholarships to Sphinx Competition semi-finalists;
• reached more than 65,000 students in 175 schools nationwide;
• been heard by more than two million listeners a year through national broadcasts on PBS and NPR;
• provided more than $190,000 worth of instruments to young musicians of color.

The organization also commissions pieces by African American composers to be performed at the closing concerts of the competition.

“We have to have great performers, but we also need the fabric of music to continue to grow, and that fabric is created by composers,” Tipton says. One such work is Abels’ Delights and Dances, which is on the scheduled program at Eisenhower.

Sometimes a commissioned composer will attend the orchestra’s rehearsal of a new work.

“It’s great to do music by the composers of the past—Mozart, Villa-Lobos—but it’s also important to do music by living composers and to have that composer to come and work with the group,” he says. “We had Michael Abels to come out and work with us. For me to turn around and say, ‘Michael, what do you think about in this area?,’ and to ask him questions and what his thought process was, and for the musicians in the orchestra to ask those questions, is extremely valuable.”

Walker, who like Abels happens to be African American, is a prolific composer who won a Pulitzer Prize for a piece called Blue Lilacs that he wrote for the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

“[Walker] is still alive and has just written a tremendous amount of music. This is probably one of his more performed pieces, Lyric for Strings that we’re doing. It’s sort of similar in character, and the sound and the tone of it, to another piece by another American composer [Samuel Barber] called Adagio for Strings,” Tipton points out. “It has kind of a climax to it. It starts off soft, builds up to this great climax where all the strings are playing, and then it goes back down to a very quiet ending. And this, I believe, also had the same genesis as the Adagio for Strings in that it came from a string quartet. It’s a slow movement from a string quartet, where he added a string bass part.”

Perhaps the most important part of the Sphinx mission involves its young musicians reaching out as role models.

“When I was growing up my parents worked in the Black colleges, and so I was always surrounded by professors and music teachers who were African American,” Tipton says. “But you just don’t see that very often in our society. So to see other people like myself up there gave me a sense of ‘oh yeah, I can do that, too.’ For young people to see other young people who are focused on art music, I think it’s an important message to send to various communities, and that’s why I was really excited about being part of this tour.”

Artistic Viewpoints, an informal moderated discussion featuring Aaron Dworkin, founder and president of the Sphinx Organization, is offered in Eisenhower Auditorium one hour before the performance and is free for ticket holders. Artistic Viewpoints regularly fills to capacity. Seating is available on a first-arrival basis.

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Conductor Chelsea Tipton II speaks with PreViews Editor John Mark Rafacz about his work with the Sphinx Chamber Orchestra. Tipton, also the resident conductor of the Toledo Symphony Orchestra, articulates the Sphinx’s dual mission of providing opportunities for extraordinary African American and Latino musicians while reaching out to young and diverse audiences.