Apply
Applications for SoCal 2024 are now closed. Check back here in February for SoCal 2025. The cost is $1275 for on campus, or $725 for off campus (Tuition: $475, Room and Board for on-campus participants: $800, Campus Use Fee for off-campus participants: $250).
Refer to our Frequently Asked Questions for recent information.
We have a target cap of 26 groups, so be sure to apply by April 1st. Also, we are requiring everyone to be in a pre-formed group that stays together the entire week with the exception of one “pool day” where participants will be mixed into different groups for the day. However, if you apply as an individual, you will receive assistance in forming a group for the week.
Deadline for applications is April 1st.. You will hear from us by April 30 whether you are accepted or wait-listed. Your acceptance will be guaranteed upon receipt of your payment by May 31. If you are accepted, we will send further information and instructions on how to pay your tuition and room and board.
First-Time Applicants: If this will be your first time participating in the workshop and you are applying as an individual, send us sample recordings of yourself playing, preferably in a chamber group. You can email sound files in any standard sound format to Leo Marcus at leomarcus2@gmail.com. This is not necessary if you are already in a pre-formed group.
SoCal 2024 Theme: Music for Solace
The past year was tumultuous, both globally and locally within our SoCal Chamber Music Workshop community, with the recent loss of our beloved founder Ron Goldman.
Because music has always provided refuge during difficult times, it seems fitting that our theme this year should be music for solace. We intend for this theme to inspire your group to select music that brings comfort from misfortune, sorrow, or grief.
How should we choose repertoire?
We ask that your group choose to play pieces that speak to individual members, each of whom might experience and process emotions differently — perhaps, for example, in reach of joy and laughter, in expression of inarticulable feelings, or in release of bottled-up anger or woe. Choices can be a response to specific events or to all that is generally happening around us.
Here are some classic examples: Shostakovich 8 (fury), Mendelssohn Op. 44 No. 1 first movement (triumph), Brahms Op. 8 trio first movement (strength), Dvorak piano quintet scherzo (lightness, humor), Schumann Piano Quartet Op. 47, Andante Cantabile movement (love); Beethoven String Quartet Op. 132, 3rd movement (redemption, hope, healing, eternal YES to life).
How should we prepare and perform that repertoire?
As you prepare individually at home, we urge you to think about how your piece expresses emotion — fear, grief, joy, longing, or other — that can bring solace to the listener (and, indeed, to you as a musician).
As your group prepares together at SoCal, we encourage your ensemble to share with your morning coach the reasons for choosing your piece, to enable the coach to elicit effective expression. We encourage you as an individual to articulate to your fellow musicians and coach how you might best partner with the composer to achieve this expression in your own part.
Finally, during afternoon pod sessions, we encourage one of your group to briefly introduce your piece and explain why you chose it. (Note that adherence to the year’s theme will not impact selections for the Participants' Concert.)
Facebook: Please follow our “I Live for the SoCal Chamber Music Workshop” facebook group for updates.
Financial Aid: A limited amount of financial aid is available for those who are accepted to the workshop. More details will be provided regarding how to apply with your acceptance email.
