Essential Techniques for Curating Concerts for Diverse Audiences

Essential Techniques for Curating Concerts for Diverse Audiences

For many people, the concert hall, theatre and orchestra present intangible barriers that unknowingly deter people from engaging in wonderful Arts events (Dobson and Pitts 2011). For potential new and younger audiences, being unsure of etiquette and unspoken ‘rules’ of being an audience, having no or limited prior experience, or a lack of cultural capital frequently elicit responses such as 'that isn’t for me' and 'I don’t belong there' (Reeves 2015, Winterson 1998). From this position, the Toowoomba Concert Orchestra over 7 years has developed specialty concerts for 0-5 year olds and their families in conjunction with local arts organisations, regional libraries and literacy initiatives. This poster reports the practices that they have honed to a fine art informed through research and analysing their own and audience experiences.