Music for social rescue in Ecuador

(Quito, February 24, 2011).- The CAF Social Action Program for Music and the Ecuadorian National Youth Orchestra Foundation (FOSJA) organized a concert with over 250 children and young people on stage in the House of Music.

"CAF is committed to reducing poverty and inequality in the region by contributing to strengthening and implementing an integrated development agenda by building socio-productive capacities, and preservation and promotion of culture as a vehicle for social inclusion," CAF `President & CEO Enrique García said.

In Ecuador, thanks to the CAF Social Action Program for Music, traveling training workshops have been organized which bring Venezuelan instructors with extensive experience to participating children and young people. The instructors travel for periods of 10 days to the FOSJA centers in the cities of Esmeraldas, Guayaquil and Quito to give classes on instrumental and choral techniques. The latest mission – with instructors in metal, wood, and string instruments– was coordinated by maestro Patricio Aizaga, president of the Ecuadoran Youth Symphony Orchestra Foundation.

Since its start in 2000 the initiative has become one of CAF's flagship programs in the field of social inclusion of children and youth at risk. The Program is based on the model of the Venezuelan system of youth and children’s orchestras led by maestro José Antonio Abreu, which CAF has internationalized in its partner countries.

Through choral and orchestral practice, the Program offers young people the opportunity to develop their intellectual, physical and spiritual capabilities and promote values of respect, work and solidarity which contribute to social integration and closer relations between peoples.

The CAF Social Action Program for Music, in Latin America, is one of the development bank’s most important investments in social responsibility in the last 10 years. So far the Program has trained 40,000 vulnerable children and young people, along with 380 teachers who are now multiplying the model in their own communities, and has organized 130 instrumental, choral and lutherie workshops in 36 Latin American locations. Today 45 institutions are replicating the model across Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela.

The Ecuadorian Youth Symphony Orchestra Foundation, led by maestro Patricio Aizaga, was founded in 1995 as sister institution to the Venezuelan FESNOJIV System. It is an educational and social foundation protected by the Ecuadorian state through the ministry of Education. Its achievements are a milestone in the history of Ecuadorian music education. The beneficiaries are over 1,000 children and young people who are members of the Philharmonic of Teachers of Ecuadorian Youth, Schools of Music, Chair of Singing, Choral Groups, and the Youth and Children Symphony Orchestras of the cities of Quito, Guayaquil and Esmeraldas members the FOSJA "Symphony for Life" program which takes the educational work to hundreds of beneficiaries and their environment.