Make Inclusion Your Goal

Three countries, three organisations, different cultures, people, experiences, problems, views and attitudes. So many expressions for all of us during our visits. From the very beginning, we knew the connection point for us is music and communities. As we know, communities include all the people living in them – people of different ages, opinions, social circles, beliefs, abilities, vulnerabilities and disabilities… and much, much more.

All our journey was to explore, how music relates to communities, what is the relation between people and music. Exploration was taken through the perspective of four people from three organisations:

– Margot Hoiting and Philip Curtis represents EMBRACE Netherlands. EMBRACE Netherlands initiates various projects regarding music and wellbeing for a wide range of vulnerable people (elderly people, people of all ages with disabilities etc.) Music connects, takes people out of their isolation, moves people and gives people self-confidence. EMBRACE Netherlands uses live music as an innovative motor for social change. Our philosophy also dictates that there should always be a legacy.

– Daiva Vaišnorienė represents The House of Activity and Creativity. She is the project leader as well. The house in Zapyskis is called Stuba. This means ‘home’. It is a wooden house founded by 6 women in the area who wanted to give their life a little more colour with social activities for their community. Daiva herself sings Lithuanian Polyphonic music (traditional vocal music). It is part of a century old choir and folk music tradition. Lithuanians have festivals with old traditional music that is on the UNESCO list of World Heritage. Zapyškis is a small village 20 kilometres away from Kaunas, European Capital of Culture in 2022 . Zapyškis has a population of around 260 people and is famous for its beautiful Gothic church built between 1530 and 1578.

– Ratka Višnić represents Otvoreno Kazalište Omišalj (Open Theatre Omisalj). She is the most active member since the foundation of the theatre – a small non-profit organisation, and their goal is to promote theatre culture on the island of Krk. They organise theatre performances, cultural nights, poetry evenings etc. Omišalj is a coastal municipality in the north-west of the island Krk in Croatia, 26 km from Rijeka which will be European Capital of Culture in 2020. The population in Omišalj consists of around 2.000 people. Ratka also participates in Human Rights Activism. She is a founder of the civil initiative Akt Art for civil society, human rights, activism and culture in her hometown Ogulin.

On 17 October, our journey started in Zapyškis (Kaunas distr., Lithuania), in the House of Activity and Creativity or Stuba. The organisation takes part in Kaunas 2022 activities under the programme “We, the People” developed for communities.

On the very first evening Margot and Philip from the Netherlands have testified that basketball is the second religion in Lithuania. The dinner was full of emotions 🙂

The second day was dedicated to village Zapyškis and some organisations. At the morning we met people from the Pažaislis music festival that has a long tradition in Lithuania; some concerts take part in Zapyškis old church as well.

After the meeting and a short walk by the old Zapyškis church which is under construction and it will be ready for Kaunas 2022, we visited the Daycare Social Services Center of Kaunas district, where kids and youngsters with disabilities can spend their day and have a wide range of social and health care services for free, thanks to the municipality of Kaunas district. We had a very warm welcome meeting and nice discussion about possible contribution. Some kids from the Zapyškis community go to this center as well.

At the end of the day we had a real community dinner – together with people from Zapyškis we prepared the food and had a nice talk by the table 🙂

During our meetings we gathered a lot of material that requires a lot of thought, so we spent the next day on discussions about the problems with inclusion, our project and future plans. It was really hard but interesting and productive. So we felt that we deserved a party! It happened 🙂 In the evening we had a final event – presentation of the project funded by one of Kaunas 2022 initiatives for communities. (During the summer Stuba worked on reconstructing a space for young people). We had an opening performance in a former barn with a concept of Light and Dark.

The next day was intended for work on the project and music. We’ve listened authentic “sutartinės” on the moundl with a beautiful landscape. We believe “sutartinės” can have a therapeutic effect and we need to learn how to use it and work with groups. We came up with a great idea: Stuba with “sutartinės” can participate with EMBRACE to learn more about working with groups and music therapy!

During our visit to Kaunas, the Citytelling Festival was running. We attended to the Final Concert, in memory of the Kaunas Ghetto Orchestra. The concert was very moving, especially since the son of one of the Holocaust survivors was present and we all listened one of his fathers (Percy Haid) live compositions performed by the Kaunas City Symphony Orchestra. We heard sad story about Jewish people orchestra in ghetto, and this concert showed us that music can survive and help people and even in hardest conditions people can be amazing creators. After Poland, Kaunas is the second city by number of Jewish victims.

On the last day we went to meet representatives of a community programme of Kaunas 2022 Stefanija and Aistė – they were very hospitable!

Despite the autumn weather and lacking smiles on people faces in streets, Zapyškis and Kaunas left an impression of a very open society and place full of aspiration – a lot is being invested in the city of Kaunas and many buildings are renovated or under constructions; people are willing to contribute organisations, there are lot of cultural events, but not so many tourist that recognised the importance of this exceptional country and her beautiful landscapes.

Right after few days we went to Omišalj, Croatia, where we were warmly hosted by Ratka. Daiva made a comparison to Lithuania – completely different climate, beautiful landscape, food, and temperament.

On the first day we visited the Muzikopter association in Rijeka. The founder Irena Magaš is providing music therapy and other creative rehabilitation procedures to improve the quality of life of children with disabilities. She has her own space in collaboration with the association DIRA which programs include care for children and young people with disabilities, and both of them provide creative and educational content through individual and group counselling, education, workshops, courses and consultations. What enthusiasm and total passion for Irena’s work. One of two (!) music therapists in the whole city of Rijeka and Primorsko-goranska county.

In the evening we had the ability to see what passion can be provided by the music. In Omišalj, we visited the rehearsal of community choir KUD Ive Jurjević. The choir leader Dragica Vukušić made sure we were welcomed and she introduced us to her choir. We couldn’t resist singing with them, and our dear Phillip played the piano. The youngest members were playing on sopile; an ancient traditional woodwind instrument of Croatia, similar to the oboe or shawm. This is the first time that we had the opportunity to hear Istrian music scale which is protected by UNESCO and consists of six tones that are reduced by alternating half steps and whole stages.

The next day we visited the Tourist Information Center in Njvice which organises cultural events in the Krk island as well (Daiva was quite surprised with that fact, since the tourist offices in Lithuania are not included in organisation of cultural events). With Adriana from the tourist board of Omišalj and Njivice, we talked about cooperation within Tandem Cultural Capitals. During this meeting we agreed that we will promote inclusion of all people taking into account the different vulnerabilities, and that we would use music as a tool. Music acts directly on the unconscious part of the human soul and has a strong impact because it carries within it the natural laws that are inscribed in human beings. The power of music lies in the similarity of its structure to man: rhythm, harmony and melody have to do with body, soul and spirit. Music therapy heals people, and it should be available to the all people. We have concluded that none of our countries (Netherlands, Lithuania, Croatia) has sufficient facilities and educational people for music therapy.

It was the main topic of discussion for the next day when we worked and discussed about future contributions – charity concert to clarify the need for access to music therapy for all musicians and people with disabilities, music camp for kids and youngsters with disabilities prior to the concerts.

On Saturday, the last day of our meetings, we had an honour to meet Bosnimir Ličanin, one of the most important people of Croatia’s theatre world and founder of Open Theater Omišalj, as well as other members from the theatre. They really liked our idea about organising a charity concert and we can proudly say that we have a great team that supports us. The most interesting thing is that one of the members of the theatre, Augustin is finishing his medicine studies and is going to stay working in Omišalj as a doctor. He loves art and music very much, so, who knows, maybe he will turn to music therapy?

During our work we had a guided tour to Omišalj and surroundings, enjoyed in seafood delicacies, visited Fulfinum-Mirine – ruins of the ancient Roman city situated by the sea – a town built for retired soldiers who had served to Roman emperors Vespasian, Titus and Domitian. The ruins of a three nave basilica; the largest in the Mediterranean. We concluded that the venue would be ideal for our charity concert and it will be held in August next year.

The next stop in our Tandem journey is: Harlingen, in The Netherlands and EMBRACE. To be continued 🙂