‘Music can change the world.’ We've heard it a million times, and probably said it too. How many of us have rolled our eyes when faced with that cliche after watching the news at the end of an exhausting week? But we do still believe it on some level – even if we only create a change for one person, or for one day. We still do what we do.
Panos Karan is a true believer, and he thinks big. Born in Greece, Karan studied piano at the Royal Academy of Music and began a career as a concert pianist, giving recitals at Queen Elizabeth Hall and Carnegie Hall. In 2011, he founded Keys of Change, a charity bringing classical music to communities in challenging conditions all over the world.
I managed to catch up with Karan between his recital at the Sydney Opera House raising funds for the charity, and his departure from there to play and conduct in Peru.
‘During my music education, while I learned so many things about the music I am playing, the most fundamental question of “Why do we play music?” was never answered’, he tells me. ‘In 2011, in search for an answer to this important question, I started leaving behind the concert halls and travelling as far away as possible, trying to reach audiences living in extraordinary circumstances in life.’
He went to the Amazon, taking a keyboard with him. If you're in the Amazon with a keyboard, you need a canoe, so Karan and his team paddled from community to community in remote regions of Ecuador and Peru. The aim was to reach the magic number of 88 communities – the same number as the keys on the piano.
After this, Karan went to the disaster-struck Fukushima region of Japan to set up the second project of what was now the official Keys of Change charity. A million people had been made homeless. Karan gave recitals at emergency shelters and schools, and established the Fukushima Youth Sinfonietta, which recently performed Tchaikovsky at the London's Queen Elizabeth Hall. ‘Only music gave me courage and strength when I changed school from my home town, Minamisōma, because of the radiation,’ said one young cellist who performed at the concert.
I ask Karan about his belief in the power of music to improve people's lives.
‘Classical music is the genre I am comfortable with and I can teach, but of course it could be any other genre. In Ecuador, for example, our students are learning traditional Ecuadorian music, as well as rock and pop. The idea is that music is simple – the tool, the invitation to participate in something communal and achieve something new, something that wasn't possible a moment ago.’
Karan and Keys of Change have projects in places where people are living in almost unimaginable conditions. In Mexico they set up an orchestra with children who live in a rubbish dump and performed the first movement of Beethoven's Fifth. ‘For the first time they were seen as musicians and not children from the garbage dump,’ says Karan.
When faced with so many pressing needs, does he ever wonder if music is really the most important thing? ‘Many needs can be achieved by tangible things, and in many cases when there is an emergency, NGOs must find a way to bring these tangible things as fast as possible to those that need it. In post-emergency, however, it is the non-tangible things like education, inspiration, self-worth, collaboration, hope and many more tools that matter the most. I believe strongly that music is one of the quickest ways to achieve all these,’ Karan says.
The projects Keys of Change delivers around the world vary depending on the setting – there are currently guitar classes in Ecuador and singing classes in Serbia. They are short- or long-term interventions, depending on local circumstances. There might be one or two visits to put a programme together, while other programmes are continuous with lessons taking place every week. As well as the countries already mentioned, Keys of Change works with young musicians in Sierra Leone, Uganda, Ghana, Russia, India and Greece.
Keys of Change and the Accra Youth Sinfonietta
‘Our main focus is performing music in a live setting, and we have put more than 200 concerts together over the last 10 years, in venues such as a schoolyard in the Amazon [and] the stage of Symphony Hall in Boston,’ Karan tells me.
The charity's core team is very small, and Karan stresses the importance of finding the right partners on the ground. As with any charity, the biggest challenge is raising funds and making them go as far as possible.
Keys of Change has recently partnered with Club Europe, a UK company with decades of experience in music tours for young people. ‘We are incredibly proud to be supporting Keys of Change’, says Lucy Szymonski, Club Europe's head of concert and educational tours. ‘Our relationship began when we helped promote Fukushima Youth Sinfonietta's concert in Queen Elizabeth Hall at the Southbank last year.
‘Since then we have been touched and moved by the work that Panos Karan and his small team do to bring music to areas of the world which are experiencing suffering, torment and poverty. Panos's vision and drive to perform music to those who would otherwise not hear it is simply inspirational, and if we can help in some small way to allow Panos to carry on with this work, we will be so happy.’
Karan will soon be visiting UK schools to give recitals and workshops, and he and Club Europe plan to bring young UK orchestral musicians together with the Fukushima Youth Sinfonietta, both here and in Japan.
Next year will be Keys of Change's 10th anniversary. What has Karan learnt in a decade working with impoverished and disaster-stricken communities? He answers, ‘I can say with certainty now that classical music belongs as much in a schoolyard in the Amazon or a slum community in India as it does on the stage of Carnegie Hall.’
