Music for All

Friday, February 16 2007 | Send to a friend

MUSIC FOR ALL

Aaron Dworkin with his violin

This past weekend, 20-year-old Latina violinist Elena Urioste won first prize in The Sphinx Competition, a national contest designed to showcase the talent of minority classical musicians. It's the second win for Elena, and it's made a difference. She has performed with symphony orchestras in Atlanta, Cleveland and Boston. 

Elena's achievement is precisely what Aaron Dworkin had in mind when he founded the Sphinx Organization.

Aaron Dworkin

Aaron is himself a violinist, but he recalls that from the outset, people were most interested in asking him how it was that a black kid got interested in the violin.

A lot of times people would ask me, "Oh well, you know, how do you identify yourself?" And my quick response, and I think still to this day, is that I'm Aaron. First and foremost.  And in that is encompassed a number of different things, including: black, white, Jehovah's Witness, Irish Catholic, Jew who plays the violin, and used to have a big Afro …  I've never really fit into any one group.
-Aaron Dworkin

Dick Gordon talks with Aaron Dworkin and listens to classical music today on The Story.

• Find out more about Aaron's organization
  

Music heard in the program:

• Mozart, Concerto No. 4 in D Major, Allegro performed by Elena Urioste
• The D Minor Partida solo violin, D minor I by Nathan Milstein for the album Bach: Sonatas and Partitas
• William Grant Still's Suite for Violin and Piano II and III performed by Videmus
• Blue/s Forms for Solo Violin: I. Plain performed by Sanford Allen for the album Coleridge-Taylor
• Perkinson: A Celebration
• Bach Cello Suites Unaccompanied Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major, BWV 1007: I. Prélude performed by Matt Haimovitz for the album Bach: 6 Suites for Cello Solo
• Happy Birthday Variations: Variation Nach Joseph Haydn performed by Kremerata Baltica, Gidon Kremer for the album Happy Birthday
  

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AHMED'S DIARY

It's been a while since we've heard from Ahmed Abdullah. Ahmed keeps a diary for The Story from Baghdad where he lives and works as a journalist.

The last few weeks have been one of the worst periods for car bombs and factional violence. A grenade from a rocket-propelled grenade launcher landed in his backyard a while back. It blew out all of his windows and severed his internet connection. It took Ahmed a long time to get everything working again.

Ahmed tells us that right now in Baghdad, events that would normally be fun occasions are now just fractured reflections of the chaos where he lives.