We learn so much by observing our differences
Reflections on Constellations by Steve Mead
At its core, Constellations is as much an exchange programme as it is a research project. It comes from the theory that an international collective jazz music network can be made stronger through collaboration. That theory is put to the test by the exchanging of talent and this evaluation sets out to determine whether that theory can be said to hold true. One person who has been there from start to finish is Steve Mead, Artistic Director and CEO of Manchester Jazz Festival whose talent development programme ‘hothouse’ forms part of the Constellations exchange network.
One of the highlights that comes to mind when looking back on Constellations - I’m not thinking of something tangible or physical here - was the moment in time where all the artists and hosts met at the very first session. We were all in a big room, sitting in a circle and having all these conversations where everybody pivoted across each artist and host. That day felt like a cementation of the ambition for a lot of us, where everybody felt they had a part to play within it. Nobody had a model for a programme like Constellations, no preexisting framework, but here’s a group of equals that have all these values to bring for themselves. It was a rewarding and quite humbling feeling when we had this lightbulb moment, defining the challenges, and making a clear path that we could follow to make this collaborative learning experience together.
What changed quite quickly is the standpoint from which the pilot edition of Constellations came. It started out as a post-COVID recovery initiative, but that got superseded by the ambition to share knowledge through our international network, and to tackle matters such as musicianship in times of an economic crisis, or how to manage our need for resources when working internationally.
The benefits of being partners means we all understand each other’s external and internal methodology - Steve Mead
That didn’t consciously creep in; the ambitions we’d articulated in the funding bid were still the same, but everybody felt like moving on from Covid. That move was necessary as well, given how quickly we had to act after receiving the funds. By organizing all these exchanges and partnering with the European Jazz Conference and jazzahead!, there were a lot of intersections to set up in a short amount of time.
Thankfully, we’re no strangers to delivering under pressure -we’re all experienced hosts who are funded by agencies in our own countries and we’re accustomed to it. The requirements of funding, the sense of acting within this little time box with a start and a finish, where these things have to be done by certain dates; it’s a business model that perhaps isn’t reflected as much in the commercial world, where there’s a lot more fluidity, but having these shared challenges helped us tremendously. The benefits of being partners in Constellations means we all understand each other’s external and internal methodology, so we could rely and trust on one another. Having our own individual success stories makes funders feel reassured that we’re going to deliver the goods.
As for this pilot edition of Constellations, in a way we’ve kind of over-delivered on our promise. What we’ve done is demonstrate the value of being open to different ways of working with different nationalities. I feel that everyone involved is open to learning and changing, having reflected on what we learned from the Constellations experiences and seeing the value that these different methods could have on us individually. For example: I know I can come back to hothouse with a renewed perspective because we welcomed Ella Ronen, our first international artist into the programme. Doing that took a little bit of adaptation, having to explain how some things work in England such as how artists are treated and valued, and how funding situations and organisations work.We learn so much by observing differences between nations, and I think this is something that we need to keep doing. Going back to our original goals and tackling challenges with Constellations, I don’t feel like we have all the answers; at the end of the day, art will always ask more questions than it can answer. But we can try to address problems and come to terms with things like international travel and all that it implies for Constellations. I do think it´s quite important for a project such as this to celebrate the differences between the programmes, recognising the value of each of them and giving participants a unique experience. I want to stress that we have to keep going forward with Constellations though. The big challenge for us is to articulate its benefits to the wider world and to a public-facing audience, who are only peeking in from the outside. Exchanges and talent development programmes can be quite an internal operation for hosts and artists. It´s hard to track evidence of the long-term effects that these programmes have because of that, and because sometimes results will only evolve three, four or five years down the line. I think that’s the strength in the argument that we have to make - that it’s about long-term vision rather than short-term hits.