Bookchurch's program to save sheet music!
Book donation boxes often come with other great items, like records, DVDs, old bookmarks, and more!
This is especially prevalent when it comes to music! Books, sheet music, concertos, and the occasional photocopy of an original or rare piece are often discarded or donated.
Rather than let it go to waste, we specifically find locations that are interested in saving music-and perhaps teaching it to the next generation of musicians!
*While Bookchurch doesn’t directly work with these items, we are happy to help find those that do. (See our coming article on damaged books and the arts community for more info on creative solutions waste reduction.)
Bookchurch founder, Louis Torres, was excited to meet and network with many like minded educators and organizations at the Love of Literacy Luncheon at the Santa Barbara Women’s Club this last week.
“Thanks to the wonderful luncheon put on by the Santa Barbara Education Foundation we were lucky to cross paths with Renee Hamaty, a former concert pianist and private music instructor. After a brief chat, we realized that her expertise in music, especially the piano, would be the perfect venue to introduce people to the wide array of existing music!” says Torres. “I expressed an interest in continuing music education, as well as lessons for kids, and she lit up!”
Bookchurch already donates to Murphy’s Vinyl Shack and has begun a new donation partnership program with RockShop Academy. But with so many recent book donations from our generous community, we have also received a large amount of classical music and material that is older, ranging from publication in the late 1800’s through to the late 1970’s.
This music encompasses the classic composers, and holds a wealth of knowledge, from beginner-accessible instructions to complex concerto pieces, we wanted to make sure that these went to someone who had the knowledge to review the collection and get it to the people who would really wanted to discover it!
This was the opportunity to gather and set aside over 200+ music books meant specifically for the piano. Bookchurch volunteers spent the weekend sorting music donation boxes and curating collections, resulting in a range of books and pieces across multiple classical composers (and even some more modern blues and jazz.)
