Rural and Community Art Project Grant

We aim to increase community access to brass music, live music performances in central locations, provide opportunities for students and community members to perform professionally, and attract people to follow their passions and pursue musical arts. Additionally, we aim to draw crowds to Story Art and Museum, Old Central School, and other local businesses in the area. These spaces and resources are crucial to allowing our community to thrive as well as draw in tourists. As detailed further both above and below, our measurable outcomes will be number of attendees, number of new Story Art and Museum visitors, and feedback from performers and audience members. We will ask for feedback after both concerts and use this to guide further program development and help us determine if this program was a success. Success will be measured by attendance (we anticipate ~100 audience members at the August concert and ~50 at the Winter Festival), by positive feedback upon request as well as non-solicited conversational buzz, furthermore we hope to determine if the performers themselves find this to be a rewarding experience. Rapid Brass is unique in that all members, including the students and community members, will be paid for their participation in these events. We have found that this increases the sense of community appreciation for the performances themselves and we will survey the performers to ensure they are finding these events to be a positive use of their time, from a level of community social engagement as well as a financial perspective.