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This blog was active from 2012 to 2020. It was intended as a space of critical refection on El Sistema. As of 2021, I have stopped adding to this blog. I am now blogging about Social Action Through Music (SATM) here.
Below you can find a complete list of all my blog posts on El Sistema from 2012 to 2020.
If you just want to see highlights, please visit “El Sistema – key resources.”
Complete index of posts: (most recent first)
El Sistema blog: the last post
The Mothers of Santa Rosa de Agua – or how El Eistema really works
Bruno Campo and the Cult of the Maestro (part 2)
Bruno Campo and the Cult of the Maestro (part 1)
“El Sistema, ‘The Venezuelan Musical Miracle’: The Construction of a Global Myth”
“False philanthropy” in the Sistema-inspired sphere
El Sistema is dead! Long live Sistema!
Who watches the watchmen? Evaluating evaluations of El Sistema
A model of social inclusion for the world?
“The limits of musical populism”: Abreu and his legacy under the spotlight
Eric Booth and Wuilly Arteaga, the Sistema icon who isn’t
An El Sistema-inspired program under the lens
7 things to know about the IDB graphic
Is anyone paying attention to the big issues?
2017: a myth-busting year in review
Enchantment and disenchantment
Does Sistema work? Does it matter? Reflections on the Longy/WolfBrown evaluation
A hotbed of political resistance?
What’s wrong with sending child musicians to play for the FARC?
“Authoritarianism and talent flight: cracks in the System of Orchestras”
Too little, too late: Venezuelans respond to Gustavo Dudamel
Fake news? El Sistema and the IDB launch their study
Dudamel and the Bolívars: Media responses and silences
Tricia Tunstall’s Alternative Facts
José Antonio Abreu: musician, philanthropist, ogre, caudillo
Professionalization or rescuing the poor? The origins of El Sistema (in Abreu’s own words)
What is the role of music in the age of Trump and Maduro?
“In El Sistema there are no poor people”: follow-up to the IDB study
IDB study sheds doubt on El Sistema’s claims of social inclusion and transformation (full version)
IDB study sheds doubt on El Sistema’s claims of social inclusion and transformation (short version)
New Year, Old Problems: Rolex Man in Vienna
“The Venezuelan musical miracle needs a miracle”
Building for an uncertain future
Playing for their Lives: Sins of mission and omission
Reflections on ISME 2016 (Part 2): The evolving research on El Sistema
Reflections on ISME 2016 (Part 1)
Before you turn the page: Connecting the parallel worlds of Sistema and critical scholarship
The Simón Bolívar orchestra hits a bum note; and a neuroscientist is led astray
The AHRC Report and In Harmony Sistema England
Super Bowl Part 2 (or what would have been cool)
Who won the Super Bowl (halftime show)?
Felicity Laurence reviews “El Sistema: Orchestrating Venezuela’s Youth”
ACT special issue on El Sistema
Two Sistema articles in VAN Magazine
When is it a good thing to be plagiarised?
Stop press! A story about the real Sistema in The Times
El Sistema: the future of classical music?
Hand in Glove: El Sistema and Neoliberal Research
El Sistema, politics, and citizenship (again…)
Scripp, Mazzocchi, and an insider’s view of El Sistema
ESOVY’s first birthday: some reflections
Exploring the shallows: Nicholas Kenyon on “El Sistema: Orchestrating Venezuela’s Youth”
A review and a couple of omissions
Baker and Sistema Fellows Agree. Whatever Next?
Review or advocacy? Kathryn Jourdan on “El Sistema”
Gillian Howell reviews “El Sistema: Orchestrating Venezuela’s Youth”
El Sistema in the (social) media
Censorship and self-censorship in the Sistema sphere
Report on “El Sistema and the Alternatives” conference
Introduction to “El Sistema and the Alternatives” conference
Larry Scripp on “El Sistema: Orchestrating Venezuela’s Youth”
Keeping El Sistema out of politics?
Review of “El Sistema: Orchestrating Venezuela’s Youth” by Anna Bull in LSE Review of Books
Registration now open for the conference “El Sistema and the Alternatives”
Interview with Geoff Baker by Sistema Global
Response to Jonathan Govias, “Sistema through the noise”
First academic review of “El Sistema: Orchestrating Venezuela’s Youth”
“Does elite music teaching leave pupils open to abuse?”
Inside the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra
Response to Tunstall in Classical Music
Response to New York Times and Tunstall reviews
Response to Jonathan Govias’s review
The Spectator, Music Matters, and LA Times
Weekly roundup, Sat 29 November
Weekly roundup, Sat 22 November
Music education, discipline, and profit
An interview with Diego Matheuz
Geoff Baker 