About GMSM

Welcome to the eighth season of Gros Morne Summer Music! I am proud (and perhaps even more humbled) to think back for a moment on where this began. First let me say, I'm a little surprised we're still here. This festival was an experiment. Many of my colleagues and I, fresh out of conservatory programs, were wondering what to do with this classical music stuff we'd been slaving over for so long. Audiences were shrinking, we were accused of being inaccessible, elitist, snobby, and so on. So the idea that sprouted this festival was to find a place where we couldn't get away with that, where the typical pretensions of classical music wouldn't cut it. We sought to challenge ourselves, find a context that would shape us in a way that the traditional strongholds of classical music wouldn't. It was ‘sink or swim' we sought, and after six years I finally think we're starting to get the hang of it!

The Past...

Since our first season in 2003, Gros Morne Summer Music has produced over 150 performances in venues as grand as the Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto to those as cozy as the campgrounds of Cow Head. We've been joined by artists from Korea, Japan, Taiwan, the U.S., Germany, The Netherlands, Wales, as well as from British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland and Labrador. What began as essentially a classical music festival has expanded to embrace jazz, blues, show tunes, rock and roll, and traditional music from the U.S., Asia, Ireland, Quebec, and Newfoundland. As a festival we've had the honour of regular appearances on CBC radio national broadcasts such as In Performance, Sunday Afternoon in Concert, and Sounds Like Canada, as well as regional programming from one end of the country (Westcoast Performance) to the other (Musicraft). With the help of CBC producer Francesca Swann and sound engineer Terry Winsor, in 2008 Gros Morne Summer Music released its first CD, The Bohemian Years.

What's it all about?

Two of our core beliefs at GMSM are 1) art is good for you and 2) part of why that is comes from the way art challenges us, artists and audience alike, to go beyond simply reflecting our own horizons and instead provoking rich encounters with possibility, posing questions we don't have the answers for, and leaving us in a state of wonder. That's why Gros Morne Summer Music is constantly on the move, searching for new ways to bring expansive encounters with artistic expression into experiences that are accessible, welcoming and warm.

Where's the money come from ...
and where does it go?

Funding an undertaking as ambitious as this festival is a constant challenge. Still, with the commitment of our communities, a variety of strong public funders and a dedicated paying public, we've been able to grow into a substantial cultural force over the years. We're a lean, mean, culture machine. We keep our administrative costs low and our artist fees high so that we can keep a steady presence of great music outside your front door all summer long. As part of our commitment to our communities we have invested in several important initiatives for 2009. Our community choir program features Order of Newfoundland recipient Gary Graham travelling to three communities in June, July and August to rehearse and perform with each local choir. Our public school initiative sends out free coupons to classroom music students and this year we are making available donations of $100 to every highschool classroom music program in the region (contact info@gmsm.ca for details).