About to complete his term, Iván Curbelo, Director of the CIEM, specializing in trumpet, is focused on making the musical training they offer at the intermediate conservatory level official.
In an interview with Ekonomus, he breaks down the musical training that Lanzarote residents of all ages can access at the CIEM and highlights the role that music has had and has in the cultural essence and sense of community on the island of Lanzarote.
More than “600 students between 5 and 99 years old”
At the CIEM there are currently about 600 students, “of all ages, between five and 99 years old”, who have classes with 22 teachers.
Among the children, approximately 200 applications are received each year, so a draw is necessary to assign the 120-130 places that are available per course.
Adults enter directly, according to their level they enter level A, B or C (the most advanced), each of three years and two subjects per course: ‘Instrument’ and ‘Musical language’.
"Art and music are what keep us sane"
The most requested instruments are the piano and the guitar, but the school also offers electric bass, euphonium, singing, clarinet, double bass, flute, electric guitar, percussion, saxophone, timple, trombone, French horn, trumpet, tuba, violin and cello.
“This center is very well prepared, it is one of the best in the Canary Islands, but I think it has become small, it is necessary to expand the faculty and include specialties that we do not have such as oboe, tuba or bassoon”.
“One of the totems of the school is the group”
The Music School, not being regulated training, “is much more flexible and although we have a training very similar to that of the professional conservatory, we have more practices”.
“In fact, one of the totems of the school is the group. All the children participate in one, whatever the instrument: voice, strings, wind, percussion... modern music bands, orchestras, a parranda, everything. We have also made piano groups. Before, playing the piano was very lonely”.
Music, values and sense of community
“In Lanzarote the musical tradition is impressive, especially folklore, very rooted, and now what is standing out is music in all its dimensions. From classical music, jazz, rock, heavy metal, it doesn't matter, whatever you are born with”, Curbelo summarizes.
He also highlights the importance of music for young people from more disadvantaged neighborhoods and highlights the tremendous impact among the kids of initiatives such as Barrios Orquestados that emerged in Venezuela and is now also carried out in the Canary Islands.
“Through music, a sense of group, of community, is achieved"
“The organization of Barrios Orquestados in Arrecife asks us for instruments, we give them to them, they ask us for a location, we give it to them, everything we can, because it is a benefit for everyone. Culture is the greatest weapon a people can have”.
“For parents it is sometimes a sacrifice to bring the child to the center, but when they leave him here he learns values naturally. When he enters one of the center's bands, they see that they have to play listening to the other, respecting, and doing it well so that everyone does well”.
“A sense of group, of community, is achieved, which is being lost in society with divide and conquer. Art and music are what keep us sane”.
“It all started with a series of friends who liked music”
“It all started in the Circle of Friends of Music, in the 80s”, explains Curbelo.
“They were a series of friends who liked music and started giving classes to children, me among them. We were considered external students of the Las Palmas conservatory and teachers came to examine us” in Lanzarote.
“In 1992 the friends of the Circle arrived at this building, which was going to be a student residence, but which became a musical education center thanks to the Cabildo” of Lanzarote, which assumed the financing.
Going for the official status of intermediate studies
The official music studies are divided into three levels, the elementary conservatory, for the youngest and lasting four years, the professional, analogous to the training received in a secondary education institute and lasting six, and the higher, equivalent to university education, which consists of four years.
The Insular Center for Musical Education (CIEM) is divided into two entities. On the one hand, the elementary conservatory of Lanzarote, which offers official training for the first four years. On the other hand, the Music School, which, among other training, offers, unofficially, studies equivalent to the professional.
“We are carrying out a series of structural reforms in the building so that the studies equivalent to the professional conservatory are officially recognized”, explains Curbelo.
In terms of content, he does not believe that it is necessary to expand much more. “We already prepare all the children to enter the higher conservatories of the Canary Islands or the peninsula and they enter everywhere”.
Thus Lanzarote would become the third island with official music studies as secondary education. Something that now only exists in the two headquarters of the Canary Islands conservatory in Gran Canaria and Tenerife, as well as in two private centers, one on each capital island.
With the official status of its intermediate studies, the CIEM will be able to create synergies with the Pancho Lasso School of Art. “The students of artistic baccalaureate could do the music electives here for example, it would be an integrated center”, Curbelo anticipates.
