A hello from the PCR’s Creative Director Ben Finley

The international and intergenerational Westben Performer-Composer Residency (PCR) is a supportive and vibrant meeting ​space​ welcoming all kinds of listeners and music makers who have some hybrid of compositional and performance practices. PCR—digitally and in person—is a ​place t​o exchange and connect diverse musical backgrounds in community.

For the past two years, Westben’s PCR has had the in-person capacity to accept 11 applicants. This year, with COVID-19, Westben flipped the adjudication script and invited anyone who applied to join. 62 were able to participate. These multi-geographical performer-composers, all in isolation, digitally collaborated across 10 countries and many time zones, including: Argentina, Mexico, Germany, Iran, Tunisia, Panama, China, Netherlands, and all across the United States and Canada. Participants were assigned to one of 13 unique ensembles of intersecting interests. They collaborated from June 1st-June 30th, 2020. They started by getting to know each other and their environments, creating work from their local soil. With the organizing of facilitators Ben Finley, Sarah Belle Reid and Davy Sumner, each ensemble has co-created a 15 minute multimedia work to share with you here.

This is not an ordinary time. COVID-19 has rippled a tremendous impact. How do we digest the tragedies of this pandemic? What can music provide to our ailing cultural ecosystems? What artistic and environmental partnerships may be possible? Although many digital adaptations have already been made, this digital residency experiment asks: can music help cultivate meaningful connections to navigate and re-orchestrate our (often alienating and oversaturated) digital public spaces? ...For this moment and post pandemic? How can we listen and respectfully engage with each other as we ground in our local environments?

We are in a historic reckoning of the ongoing realities of anti-Black and anti-indigenous racism in our societies. We are also witnessing a moment where people are coming together to imagine, organize and participate in an anti-racist and decolonized world. We need creative and adaptive musical institutions that make space for all of us. Although still in its infancy, the PCR aims to support creative musical communities as we, musicians and humans, figure out the many possible roles we can take to grow mutually supportive living communities. This global residency is an (imperfect) experiment towards creating a more equitable, caring and inclusive musical ecosystem.

As Westben sits in a wondrous rural setting of rolling hills, music from this residency usually comes directly from The Barn. As a committed artist-run year-round centre, Westben is thrilled to offer a digital venue to house and cross-pollinate creative musical hives into the future.

PCR is a call to being open to listening to each other’s musical souls and shared humanity. Let’s respond to the injustices we see in our communities and model compassion, empathy and community in our human ensembles—and take that beyond our time together here. Although these are challenging times, the PCR believes that we listen to each other, support each other and co-create new digital music making spaces, we may build invaluable tools to weather many future challenges. Join us!