The Ensemble 101, Kickstarter and free LilyPond music/knowledge

[address@hidden]

Hey LilyPond users,

I'd like to tell you all about a tour of France and Ireland that my group, the Ensemble 101, is planning.  Aside from using beautifully typeset scores courtesy of GNU LilyPond, we'll be doing several workshops with composition students in France and Ireland on contemporary creation with LilyPond.

One big goal of the tour is to show that free software, freely downloadable music and free pedagogy is a viable model in the arts.  Instead of locking things up and having people pay to access them, we believe in a world where we make things freely available (music, knowledge on LilyPond, etc.) and people who appreciate our work make donations so that it can continue.  It's obviously not a widespread model, but we're all passionate about it and we hope it can succeed.

So check it out!  The website is:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/751757415/ensemble-101

Kickstarter works best when many people chip in a few bucks.  The minimum donation is $1.  So, in addition to giving what you can, make sure to pass the link along to anyone you think would be interested!  I'm passing the link along to everyone I know who likes vocal music and who supports the free diffusion of culture, software and knowledge.  I hope you'll like what we're doing and that you'll do the same!

All the best,

Mike

P.S. Many thanks to Stan Sanderson and Janek Warchoł for the very nice quotes about our music!  We feature them on the Kickstarter site.