The Santa Rita Project

by Cindy Beitmen

The Women's Antique Vocal Ensemble (WAVE) not only performs regularly scheduled spring and winter concerts, but in keeping with our mission statement also attempts to perform outreach programs for people who might otherwise not have an opportunity to attend concerts. We have performed benefits for Meals on Wheels, participated in a concert to help raise money for a victim of cancer, and have brought our music to senior citizens in the Bay Area. Having been a professional musician for most of my adult life, I have always felt that it was not enough to make music for my own fulfillment, but it is just as important to be willing to use whatever talent I have to help the community whenever possible. One of the things I love about being the director of WAVE is that the members of our organization believe in and value this sense of purpose as well, so each of us understands the vital importance of not only performing for our regular audiences but also reaching beyond that to give what we can to provide support to those in need.

By far our most ambitious outreach program was in February 2007 when WAVE and the WAVE Baroque Orchestra performed for the inmates of Santa Rita Jail. As many readers know, in the spring of 2005 we performed a concert entitled "Sanctuary," a program of music written for and performed by women who were cloistered in convents across Europe in the Middle Ages and Renaissance and in orphanages (ospedali) in 18th-century Italy. In keeping with our mission statement of outreach to bring music to communities that are in need or not able to attend concerts, we felt this program might particularly resonate for women incarcerated in prisons, since the women who originally sang or wrote this music were cloistered from the outer world inside their convents and ospedali. That is what led us to perform this program at Santa Rita Jail.

None of us knew what to expect, but I know all of us will probably never forget the experience. We met in the parking lot in concert attire with instruments, stands, and music and proceeded up the long sidewalk past a very long line of visitors waiting to get in to see their loved ones. People wondered what we were doing there and were gratified to learn that we were going to present a concert for the inmates. We were given passes and then were led to the gymnasium where we set up chairs, stands, and the harpsichord in front of bleacher seats. Soon the women entered the gym, dressed in light blue prison garb and slippers. The saddest thing to most of us was that practically all of them were just young girls. Each inmate volunteered to come, and there were more than a hundred who attended the concert. Before we began our performance, I talked a bit about the empowerment of women and the importance of convents and orphanages where they could find sanctuary and produce the music they did. A number of inmates were nodding their heads in understanding. During the concert we had every possible reaction to the music from these women, many of whom had never heard anything like this before. The singers told me it was good my back was to the audience because it was apparently a little hard to concentrate with all the various things going on. A number of women were in the back rows of the bleachers just talking, happy to have the opportunity to be together. Others were standing up in the bleachers enthusiastically shouting out in support, mimicking my conducting, or dancing away to the strains of Vivaldi's Gloria, and still others sat in rapt attention, listening intently to the music. I knew we had to expect anything, and we got just about everything.

At the end many jumped up, clapped, and cheered. For all the craziness that went on while we were performing, I got the sense that they really appreciated our just being there. I was told that we were not to touch the inmates at any time, but as they filed out of the gymnasium a number of them got close enough to whisper to me, "Beautiful." As we left we had strong feelings that we wanted to return with another program that might include the inmates singing something with us, since the first thing we heard as they walked in was, "Can we sing?"

We would like to publicly thank all of you who contributed so generously to this project and helped to make an idea become a reality.

Cindy Beitmen is Director of WAVE

SFEMS Newsletter - January 2008