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EUBO - European Union Baroque Orchestra |
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Introduction
The Orchestra was originally conceived as a one-year project to celebrate European Music Year in 1985, which marked the 300th anniversary of the births of Handel, Scarlatti and JS Bach. Such was the success of the original project that the Orchestra’s work has been continued permanently on the initiative of the European Parliament.
Structure
The European Union Baroque Orchestra is an official training programme of the European Union, and is granted annual funding by the European Parliament under the budget line “support to organisations which promote European culture”. The Orchestra’s grant is administered through the European Commission Directorate General for Education and Culture in Brussels.
The European Union Baroque Orchestra is a company registered in the UK and a UK Charity. The Orchestra is run by a small executive appointed by the EUBO’s governing Board of Trustees.
Aims
The EUBO exists to give pre-professional orchestral experience and training to Europe’s most talented young musicians, acting as a bridge between their post-graduate studies and entry into the professional music world. Such experience is only rarely available at a national level, principally because of uneven distribution of students and a lack of qualified teachers in any one place: hence the existence of this unique pan-European initiative. Members of EUBO, who are not paid, stay with the Orchestra for one season only, after which they leave to take up a full-time professional career.
Activities
Every year EUBO invites short-list of around 100 talented young baroque musicians from across Europe to take part in one of the three-day audition courses. The 30 or so successful candidates, normally from 13 EU countries with an average age of 25 years, then spend six months together, training, touring and performing throughout Europe and further afield under the world’s leading baroque specialists.
At the end of each year, the students of EUBO move on into the professional world and the whole process from audition to graduation, begins again. EUBO has been so successful in its mission, that there are now former EUBO students in every major professional baroque ensemble in the world, including, for example, The Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, Les Musiciens du Louvre, English Concert, Europa Galante, Academy of Ancient Music, La Petite Bande, The King's Consort, Concerto Copenhagen and Les Arts Florissants.
An important element of EUBO’s planning policy is to ensure that the Orchestra fulfils its role as an ambassador for the European Union in non-EU countries. The youthful co-operation of musicians of many nationalities, transcending obvious national boundaries, is a powerful emblem that is much admired. Over the last 17 years, the EUBO has performed in 49 countries and carried the flag of European integration widely into much of the former Soviet Bloc, the Middle East, Africa, China, Japan and South America.
Contact
Culture Action Europe contact: Paul James (General Administrator)
European Baroque Orchestra
Hordley
Wootton
WOODSTOCK
OX20 1EP
UK
T. +44 1993 812 111
F. +44 1993 812 911
e-mail:
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www.eubo.org.uk |
