That is what Ma and young colleagues have done during his decade-long tenure as the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s creative consultant, which ended last June. But his work in that role, most notably via multifaceted collaborations with the Civic Orchestra (the CSO’s training ensemble), will return to prominence on March 1, when he solos with the Civic in Dvorak’s Cello Concerto.
That concert will not only mark the centennial of the orchestra, which German conductor and composer Frederick Stock founded in the 1919-20 season, but will remind Chicagoans of how Ma has tried to influence a generation of young musicians.
For when Ma wasn’t performing alongside the Civic Orchestra in Orchestra Hall or Millennium Park, he was visiting Chicago Public Schools, giving “Concerts for Peace” at St Sabina Church, helping design a Once Upon a Symphony concert series for ages 3 to 5, and inspiring Civic musicians to bring their art to correctional facilities, homeless shelters, violence-plagued Chicago neighbourhoods and other places where they’re desperately needed.
The idea has been to persuade gifted young musicians to think beyond the rigours of their instruments and the lure of the limelight, and to envision how their music can change people’s lives.
“The reason that we do any of this, that we create new disciplines of thinking, of speaking – it’s for service,” says Ma. “So the idea is not: create a project, take it or leave it. No, we’re doing this to serve.”
The question is whether Ma’s zeal for using music to serve society – and to address its many ills – has forced the Civic Orchestra musicians to do likewise on their own.
The best indications come from the young artists themselves, particularly those who have become Civic Fellows, a programme launched in 2013 to propel them into “teaching, community engagement and programme planning”, according to the orchestra.
“Last year I got to perform with Yo-Yo Ma in Unity Park in North Lawndale – I was to perform on a flute made out of a rifle,” remembers flautist Alexandria Hoffman, a Civic Fellow.
“Pedro Reyes is an artist who has this project where he takes guns from violent cities and melts them down into those shovels and uses these shovels to plant trees.
“Some of the guns were also melted down into instruments, including the flute that I performed on. We played Bach’s Air on the G String. It was really kind of surreal. It made me question where had this gun been and a lot of things.”
Cellist Ma has long been a believer in trying to enlighten musicians and bring people together through such activities. His work as a United Nations Messenger of Peace, his role as artistic director of the annual Youth Music Culture Guangdong (China) festival and the training programmes offered by his Silkroad project are just a few examples of how he has done so.
Classical musicians learn to improvise at Yo-Yo Ma’s music camp
But he also feels his Civic Orchestra collaborations and CSO work have been as much about learning as teaching.
“They’ve been an unbelievable education in terms of getting to know an organisation much more deeply – the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association and [its] Negaunee Music Institute – and seeing the inner workings of a great cultural institution,” he says.
“And [they’ve also helped in] getting to know a great city and its workings – visiting neighbourhoods from Pilsen to other places, then working very happily within the [Chicago] Public Schools system and getting to know and seeing what was accomplished during that time.”
The idea, adds Ma, was to figure out “what we can do that fulfils a not-yet-necessarily-expressed need in society. One of the things that I think people are very proud of is [the Civic] started doing a Bach Marathon project every fall leading into the holiday season, where they play all six Brandenburg Concertos.
“They learn to play rehearsals and perform by themselves, and then take it into a community … in the schools. They go to Theaster Gates’ venues on the South Side and also work at St. Sabina’s, doing these peace concerts. Just really getting to know our city.”
I’m hoping that the job of someone like me is to actually plant seeds. And when those seeds start to be sown and take root and blossom and flower, it’s according to the individual and the environment they are in
Whether such efforts have lasting value after the last note has sounded and the musicians have gone home is open to debate. Ma concedes that the results are not easily measured, but he contends that is precisely the point.
“If you’re in any kind of education sphere, what we do is not pick low-hanging fruit and say: ‘Here’s the transaction, here’s what you got from me’,” he says.
“It’s more like: here’s ideas, here are some ways of thinking about things. And as you go through life, you might be revisiting these questions at different times and find the answers that suit the period of life that you’re in.
“I’m hoping that the job of someone like me is to actually plant seeds. And when those seeds start to be sown and take root and blossom and flower, it’s according to the individual and the environment they are in.”
