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Sunday marked the kick off to the long anticipated partnership between the ����ֱ��, Case Western Reserve University and the Sphinx Organization as 32 young musicians descended on the CIM campus, filling its studios, performance spaces and practice rooms. Over the next two weeks, CIM plays host to the Sphinx Organization’s Performance Academy (SPA), which is dedicated to building diversity in the classical music world through educational programs, artistic development and arts leadership.

The aspiring young musicians will attend lectures, seminars and performances and will participate in master classes with both SPA and CIM faculty including co-head of CIM’s viola department and head of the strings division, Jeffrey Irvine, and co-head of the cello department, Melissa Kraut. The students will give culminating recitals on August 5 and 6 in Mixon Hall.

For SPA faculty Jennifer Arnold (BM '03; PS '05, Vernon), Karlos Rodriguez (BM '00, Harris), Karla Donehew (BM '06; MM '08, Cerone) and Mary Ann Ramos (MM '06, Aaron), this week will be a homecoming of sorts, as they impart the musical lessons to today’s young learners that they once developed in the very practice rooms and studios they used as students. This cycle of mentorship and learning is close to CIM’s continued charge of training the next generation of classical musicians.

“For nearly two decades, I have been a passionate advocate for the Sphinx Organization’s lofty mission," CIM President & CEO Paul W. Hogle said. “Now, in collaboration with our incredible partners at CWRU, I am proud that CIM will be a new home for the Sphinx Performance Academy, allowing CIM to link arms with Sphinx and my dear friend Afa Dworkin, to literally help ‘change the face of the American orchestra.’”

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