Members of the DaPonte String Quartet, a 30-year-old American Otri quartet, have been hit hard in many ways by Friends of the DaPonte String Quartet, the NGO they formed but their employer. Release them all with an unexpected pull.
Not for any reason.
As recounted by cellist Miles Jordan, the Foundation’s Board of Trustees has been trying more and more to have a say in his group lately, because the list of playing composers is not considered diverse enough.
“They said that the music we play is not diverse enough because there are not enough women and people of color among the composers. It is true that most of the music is played by dead white European men, but we have learned that.”
Jordan commented.
Friends of the DaPonte String Quartet announced that after the musicians were fired, he would change his name to Chamber Music Maine and plan to work with new artists.
But the story is not over yet. This is because the NGO was created primarily by musicians to have a legal channel to receive the support of their fans who lived and worked through it. This is because the non-profit form of the foundation allowed classical music fans to write off the amount of donations from their taxes. The foundation is named after the band to clarify the donors of the funds.
But the board of trustees who fired them and changed the organization’s name kept all the money.
Quadruple series now Wrote a post on Facebook That the NGO operating under the new name still feels legitimate to keep the donations earmarked for it, to which it does not yet have access. But they did not give up, and a new foundation was set up to raise funds and they will continue to give concerts and teach, as they have done so far.