Imagine sitting in a concert hall. On stage are 200 young musicians performing better than the best orchestra you’ve ever heard. Recently, in Toronto, I had the rare opportunity to hear the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra, part of El Sistema, the extraordinary program in Venezuela which provides music lessons and orchestral training to children in that country.

While we frequently talk about how music provides “the soundtrack of our lives,” how it can create a mood, or entice a shopper in a store or a patron in a restaurant, El Sistema shows the power of music to transform lives.

Begun more than 30 years ago by the visionary Dr. José Antonio Abreu, El Sistema provides free music lessons six days a week, four hours a day to children from Venezuela’s poorest barrios, who might otherwise get involved in crime and drugs. From modest beginnings, the program now reaches more than 250,000 children, some beginning at age two, with a goal to reach 500,000 by 2015. The top orchestra in the program, the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra, with players from 12 to 25 years old, has been called one of the top five orchestras in the world by the Times of London.

Dr. Abreu was in Toronto to receive the Glenn Gould Prize, which honours the memory of Canada’s greatest classical musician. In conjunction with the Glenn Gould Foundation, the SOCAN Foundation organized a day-long symposium called The Promise of Music to discuss how the lessons of El Sistema can be applied to Canada. Taking part were many youthful performers and songwriters, singer Linda Ronstadt, the renowned Canadian jazz pianist and now Senator Tommy Banks and acclaimed musician/neuroscientist Dr. Daniel Levitin. The day was inspirational, reminding us of how music can transform the lives children by teaching them the social skills to work together to achieve a common purpose, and to develop the self-confidence and pride that comes from mastering an instrument.

For more information, visit www.socanfoundation.ca or google “El Sistema Venezuela” and follow the many links. I’m sure you will be as inspired as I am.