The main problem of course is organisation. Finding a venue for all the events, for practice rooms, for sleeping and eating accommodation and a good efficient team to support all the crazy problems that are bound to occur. The artistic programme is not easy either: finding the right personalities with a reasonable mixture of old and new. This is valid for the concerts too. As far as finance is concerned, teachers in Nashville usually have only their expenses covered. This creates a good feeling all round; people come because they find it a privilege to participate and benefit personally.
Credit should go to Tom Everett, the workshop coordinator, for its success but one must not forget the contribution of the excellent team and the willing participants.
In October 1984 the first Danish workshop took place near Copenhagen at the initiative of Carsten Svanberg. It was similar to the American pattern but in smaller proportions: two days long, with a few teachers. Nevertheless, the quality of this workshop was extremely high.
One should bear in mind that these two workshops were geared to a professional audience. Therefore it would seem preferable to have a suburban setting where the participants are 100% available for all activities.
The “International Trombone and Tuba Week” which was held in Metz in June was different as far as this aspect is concerned. The site is a regional capital in eastern France known for its musical activities. All the events were held in the city and were therefore available to the general public. The musical programme was highly interesting, more concert-oriented (perhaps often too long), but the anticipated audience did not materialise. Publicity appeared too late and people outside France didn’t know of such an important event till a short time before.
The workshop was again a one-man initiative. Gilles Senon, the local trombone teacher, took advantage of the fact that this was “European Music Year” and therefore financial assistance from the Council of Europe was available to realize a personal dream.
Artistically, the programme was superb and it was possible to find internationally known teachers. Unfortunately there were not enough participants for such a big event, the local audience wasn’t sufficiently enthusiastic and even the focus of some teachers was surprisingly financially oriented... Regrettably so, since these workshops are important from the human and personal aspect as well as the musical one.
The common denominator between all these workshops was the consistently high quality and vast artistic programmes which made them unquestionably beneficial to all participants.