Bowl’s Instrument Fund Kicks Off with Major Funding

At the Bowl, one of our most important initiatives is working to ensure that everyone has access to music — whether by playing or by listening. In addition to hosting concerts, the Bowl strives to deliver on its Mission by investing in future artists and audiences through performing arts education for youth.

That’s why we formed the Santa Barbara Bowl Instrument Fund as part of the Bowl’s Education Outreach program: to foster communal experiences through performing arts. The Instrument Fund ensures that lack of an instrument doesn’t prevent a child from learning to play music.

Funded by a generous grant of $250,000 from the Elaine F. Stepanek Foundation, the Instrument Fund came about in direct response to the recurring needs of local schools and arts education programs. The Fund lends, repairs and replaces instruments for Santa Barbara County youth music programs.

“Our goal it to ensure children in Santa Barbara are not prevented from playing music because of lack of access of instruments,” said Graham Farrar, Education Committee Chair and Bowl Board Member. “We’re creating an efficient and sustainable program to expedite — and simplify — access to instruments.”

Most schools have little or no budget for musical programs including instrument repair, maintenance or purchase. School music programs initially took a hit during the 2008 recession when funding all but evaporated. Legislators later diverted $109 million earmarked for music and art programs, forcing half of California's public schools to shutter their music programs. The remaining programs routinely deal with lack of working instruments in the classroom. Some repairs, however simple, such as replacing strings on a violin, for example, mean the world of difference to a student. And as instruments break and go unfixed, they drop out of service leaving the demand on remaining working instruments more strained, and more restricted: meaning that students don’t have the ability to take instruments home for practice.

The recent grant received by the Stepanek Foundation is the start of providing instruments to all children in the Santa Barbara community. The grant spans five years ($50,000 each year) and stipulates that the Bowl will provide charitable instrument assistance to the youth of the Santa Barbara by providing access to instruments for music education purposes.

“The repairs and instrument replacement are the first phase of this program,” said Kai Tepper, Education Outreach Program Director. “We’ve launched the program with a focus on the Santa Barbara Unified School District in order to match the District’s funding of $1000.00 per school for instruments. We are now broadening the reach with Carpinteria Unified School District and Hope School District. As we expand the program we would like to see applications come in from music programs across Santa Barbara County.”

The Bowl is collaborating with Jensen Music Foundation who will play a key role coordinating instrument collection and repair.

“Music is transformative,” added Farrar. “Our belief is that instruments are tools, not art pieces, they are vehicles to a musical experience; and that the tragedy is not when an instrument gets worn out or damaged, but when it goes unutilized.”

Donate to the Instrument Fund!

Learn more about how you can help keep instruments in the classroom, visit ww.sbbowl.com/outreach/education/education_outreach.