Home »
See the Recycled Orchestra of Cateura June 4
Tomorrow at Key City Theatre
Did you know you have the makings of a symphony within your own home? More specifically, within your garbage can?
The Recycled Orchestra of Cateura knows this. The youth in this orchestra live in one of the poorest slums in Latin America. Cateura is the trash dump for the nearby Paraguayan capital, Asuncion. Surrounded by drug violence and destitution, the future for the youth of Cateura living amongst a sea of garbage was grim-until a local garbage picker got together with a nearby music teacher to create music instruments from trash. Violins from paint cans and forks, cellos from oil drums, guitars from packing crates, flutes from water pipes, spoons and coins and drums from Xray films.
By crafting musical instruments out of trash, residents of this Paraguayan city created the world’s most unlikely youth orchestra. The Recycled Orchestra of Cateura has given youth hope for a future different from that of their parents who pick through the pieces of trash that are their livelihood. Now performing in sold out concerts around the world and featured in the Landfillharmonic movie, this orchestra is a testimony to the transformative power of music and the resilience of the human spirit.
According to the orchestra’s director Favio Chavez, “Our goal is to show that culture is a basic human need. That music can change lives. And even when we live in the most unfavourable conditions we must never stop dreaming. To have nothing is not an excuse for doing nothing.”
Sharing a common vision to make music accessible to all children, the Cranbrook Violin Club under the direction of Kim Lutz is pleased to present the Recycled Orchestra of Cateura in concert at the Key City Theatre on Monday, June 4 at 7 p.m. Tickets are only $20 and can be purchased from the Cranbrook Violin Club (250) 417-9543 or from the Key City Theatre.
Proceeds from this concert will support the efforts of the Recycled Orchestra of Cateura to create a future of hope for youth in this Paraguayan city through health and dental care, scholarships and opportunity.
Just the simple act of sculpting a violin out of trash has given Paraguayan youth a chance to transcend out of that same trash which their hometown was built upon.
For more information about the Recycled Orchestra, please go HERE.
Submitted
