Activities

2023-2024 Special Initiatives

GROWING THE ACCELERANDO CLASSICAL MUSIC PERFORMANCE FUND
With the dramatic cutbacks in music education programs in PEI’s elementary and secondary schools, the Terra Nova Fund seeks to provide avenues for students and PEI residents to access music, both in the school system through extra-curricular activities and in the community at large.  To this end, in October 2014, the Fund’s founders made its initial contribution to the Confederation Centre of the Arts Foundation that resulted in the creation of the ACCELERANDO Classical Music Performance Fund.  It is a permanent endowment designed to support community engagement through live, classical music performances.  Monies contributed by the founding donors and others also foster training and career development of a new generation of young musicians, and, most importantly, help create a culture of musical literacy and life-long appreciation of orchestral masterpieces, chamber music, opera, and other forms of live ensemble performance. As of the end of fiscal 2022, the market value of the Fund’s holdings are $216,737.31.

During the upcoming concert appearance of the Canadian National Youth Orchestra in Charlottetown on July 23rd, 2023, the Confederation Centre of the Arts will announce a legacy gift by the Fund’s founders of $250,000.  This donation is to serve as the catalyst for a multi-year campaign to build the corpus of the ACCLERANDO Classical Music Performance Fund to no less than $500,000 dollars. All donations to the ACCLERANDO Fund are matched by the Government of Canada’s Department of Canadian Heritage to the degree specified by law.

THE CRESCENDO PROJECT: For eight years, Fund co-founder Bruce Craig served as President of the PEI Symphony Orchestra (PEISO). Having built the organization’s artistic capacity to an all-time high and seeing its financial reserves reach in excess of $100,000, in 2022 he resigned from the PEISO Board to focus his energies on other music-related initiatives. Going forward, a significant portion of the Fund’s financial resources will be deployed to support the advancement of chamber music performance and music education programs for Island youth. Hence, the birth of The CRESCENDO Project.

This multi-faceted initiative seeks to enhance classical music performance on Prince Edward Island (PEI) through a multi-year special initiative that would result in:

1. setting the stage for the creation of the first fully professional chamber orchestra: the Luminous Chamber Orchestra;
2. the advancement of a provincial-wide extra-curricular music program known as the Systema program for Island youth;
3. initiation of an Atlantic-wide young artist competition;
4. advancement of efforts to create a Chamber Music Society of PEI and a provincial youth orchestra.

The project is to be funded by individuals, corporate donations and government grants channeled through the Community Foundation of PEI. Cooperative programmatic agreements will be established between the Fund and the Confederation Center for the Art’s ACCLERANDO Classical Music Performance Fund and the UPEI Department of Music and other chamber music performance entities.

The goal of the project is to see organizations currently delivering chamber music such as The Singing Strings, Luminous Choir, Debut Atlantic, Under the Spire, and the UPEI Department of Music and the Confederation Centre of the Arts to move into a new era of collaboration to achieve year-round performances of high-quality chamber music island-wide.  Project objectives would be achieved through the team volunteer work of an activist group of musician volunteers acting in concert with other individuals and organizations, including the Terra Nova Fund of PEI.

SUPPORT FOR UKRAINIAN HUMANITARIAN RELIEF: The war in Ukraine has captured the concern and attention of many including the Fund’s founders. When the Russian invasion of Ukraine began the founders sought to find a local organization on PEI that could channel funds directly to meet humanitarian relief needs of the war-torn nation.  Individual donations by the Fund’s founders and other monies raised though their efforts have been and will continue to be channeled directly to the Angels of PEI which in turn funnels donated funds directly to various Ukrainian cities and community organizations in dire need of humanitarian assistance for such basic necessities as water, food and clothing.

LAND DONATION TO THE ISLAND NATURE TRUST: Fund co-founder Bruce Craig ended his three-year term on the board of the Island Nature Trust in 2022.  However, the Craig’s have pledged to donate in 2023 a 15-acre parcel of land they purchased several years back on the Old Bedford Road (just off the Afton Road) in Queens County to the Nature Trust.  This parcel of land is adjacent to existing Nature Trust holdings and, when donated, will contribute to the conservation of an endangered watershed.

With donations to the Confederation Centre’s ACCELERANDO Fund, and through additional, individual contributions made through the TERRA NOVA FUND, this year’s special initiative seeks to support the programs and activities of the following organizations:  PEI Symphony Orchestra, Singing Strings, Debut Atlantic, Indian River Festival, and the UPEI Department of Music, specifically, its recital series.