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February 3, 2025<\/p>\n
UPDATE<\/p>\n
New Orleans students showcase their creativity with iPad and Mac <\/p>\n
With all eyes on New Orleans, Apple community partners Ellis Marsalis Center for Music and Arts New Orleans put the city\u2019s aspiring young artists in the spotlight<\/p>\n
On a drizzly, overcast afternoon, all is quiet at the intersection of Bartholomew and Prieur streets in New Orleans\u2019 historic Ninth Ward. The quiet neighborhood around the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music (EMCM) feel worlds away from the historic French Quarter packed with jazz clubs, bars, restaurants, and markets.<\/p>\n
At 3 p.m., the tempo begins to shift \u2014 slowly at first, as youth ranging in age from 8 to 18 file through the blue building\u2019s front gate, instruments in tow. The hallways grow steadily louder with the sounds of laughter, footsteps, stray musical notes, and teachers greeting their students. The fledgling musicians begin cycling through their four classes for the day: piano, homework help, an instrument of their choosing, and coding \u2014 a required course that stems from the center\u2019s ongoing partnership with Apple.<\/p>\n
Launched in 2019, the collaboration with Apple has allowed EMCM to expand its curriculum, adding a suite of tech-focused courses that complement the world-class music education the center provides to students.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know some people wonder, \u2018Why is a music institution teaching coding?\u2019 For us, it\u2019s all connected \u2014 it\u2019s part of a digital tapestry,\u201d says Lisa Dabney, the center\u2019s executive director. \u201cIt\u2019s about closing the digital divide by giving students access to technology and introducing them to different types of diverse, long-term career opportunities, including pathways in music technology and beyond. In a community where many homes lack access to iPads and computers, this partnership with Apple helps us put the power of technology directly in our students\u2019 hands, opening doors to creative and professional futures they might have never imagined.\u201d<\/p>\n
Apple\u2019s support for EMCM is part of the company\u2019s broader long-standing commitment to uplift and amplify youth creativity in New Orleans through technology. As budding musicians at EMCM learn to code and mix new tracks with Logic Pro and GarageBand, students at Delgado Community College are producing their own podcast about local cultural icons, and young artists at Arts New Orleans have used iPad to design a new mural fans will see on their way to the Superdome this weekend.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe love to see technology and creativity supporting one another, and it\u2019s such a joy to see that in action here in my hometown of New Orleans,\u201d said Lisa Jackson, Apple\u2019s vice president of Environment, Policy, and Social Initiatives. \u201cCreativity, art, and music are in our DNA. Our teams are really excited to keep working with our amazing community partners and the talented young people who light up this city.\u201d<\/p>\n
EMCM\u2019s holistic and ever-evolving programming stems directly from its namesake, who wanted to ensure that the next generation had the chance to carry on the city\u2019s vibrant cultural legacy. This work felt especially important in the Ninth Ward \u2014 a neighborhood renowned for being home to many iconic musicians, civil rights activists, and educators \u2014 that had been disproportionately impacted by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the heart of the center\u2019s curriculum is our founder\u2019s belief that truly understanding music begins with learning to hear it,\u201d explains Dabney. \u201cPiano plays a key role in this process by helping students develop critical listening skills, connect deeply with music, and build a strong foundation in music theory. For this reason, piano has been a required class for all students, in addition to their primary instrument.\u201d<\/p>\n
That same foundational approach to learning now extends to coding and audio engineering courses. In the center\u2019s Mac lab, students use the latest hardware and software to learn coding basics with Apple\u2019s Everyone Can Code and Swift Playgrounds frameworks. And in the on-site music studio, they learn how to engineer their own tracks with apps like GarageBand and Logic Pro. Students also get access to their own iPad every semester, allowing them to take what they\u2019ve learned in their classes and build on those skills at home.<\/p>\n
The audio engineering courses \u2014 made possible through Apple\u2019s support \u2014 are among the center\u2019s newer offerings for high school-aged students.<\/p>\n
\u201cHere in New Orleans, we have hotels, we have clubs, we have conventions, and we have probably more festivals than anybody in the world. And all of them need audio,\u201d explains Dr. Daryl Dickerson, the center\u2019s longtime director of music education. \u201cThis is a job you can learn now, and for the rest of your life, you can do it. If you learn how to capture and edit audio at a young age, you can evolve that into a career.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Jacob Jones Jr., a high school senior who plays the saxophone, trumpet, and piano, Dr. Dickerson\u2019s Saturday afternoon audio engineering class has created a whole new framework for thinking about music.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can make a sound on an instrument, and that\u2019s great,\u201d says Jones. \u201cBut then when you play that sound back through the computer, you can expound on it, and play around and make something totally brand-new that no one has ever heard before.\u201d<\/p>\n
Outside of his classes, Jones often finds himself using the skills he\u2019s learned in Logic and GarageBand on his iPhone whenever \u2014 and wherever \u2014 inspiration strikes. \u201cGarageBand is really essential to me, because I\u2019ll hear something and be like, \u2018Wow, I just got to get it out.\u2019 I\u2019ll go on my iPhone, open GarageBand, be able to play out that melody, record it, and even make a whole song out of it,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n
This same spirit of creative experimentation is fostered in the school\u2019s coding courses, where students like Donte Allen, 14, are encouraged to merge their passion for music and the arts with the foundational technological skills they\u2019re acquiring in class.<\/p>\n
Allen has had a passion for music since he was in diapers. \u201cMy dad has a picture of me from when I was 6 months old with the trumpet in my carseat,\u201d he notes with a smile.<\/p>\n
But learning how to code has opened up new creative interests.<\/p>\n
\u201cSwift teaches you the fundamentals, and you can go on from there,\u201d he explains of his newfound affinity for coding. \u201cYou can build your own apps, make your own games, and make your own stories\u2026 Music and Swift both help with my creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n
This type of exposure \u2014 across a wide range of creative and technological mediums, often with surprising points of intersection in between \u2014 is what it\u2019s all about for the center\u2019s faculty.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese students want<\/em> this type of education,\u201d says Dr. Dickerson, whose next endeavor will be bringing podcasting classes into the center. \u201cBut if it\u2019s not presented to them, they never get it. And it\u2019s the same thing with music and everything else we do around here. So we\u2019re always trying to present them with something new.\u201d<\/p>\n Beyond the football fervor already enveloping the Superdome, students from Arts New Orleans are putting the finishing touches on a project of their own. Their garden-themed mural, which will cover an exterior wall of the Orleans Justice Center along Interstate 10, highlights stories of previously incarcerated locals while also imparting a message of hope to the community.<\/p>\n The 6,600-square-foot piece was designed by participants in the Young Artist Movement (YAM), Arts New Orleans\u2019 arts education and workforce development program, which works primarily with students ages 14 to 22. Through YAM, founded in 2016, local youth learn the mural-making process from guest artists and are then given the opportunity to create their own across the city. The participants will also complete the installation of the mural.<\/p>\n The design process for this particular mural began in the Procreate app on iPad. Using Apple Pencil, the 19 students designed the digital images that appear on the mural\u2019s panels. Lead artists Journey Allen, Gabrielle Tolliver, and Jade Meyers then organized the final designs, and sent them to a mural cloth company to have them ghost-printed on large swaths of mural cloth. From there, the pieces are painted and will then be installed along the wall using a specific gel medium.<\/p>\n Allen, a visual artist and arts educator who serves as Arts New Orleans\u2019 director of youth education, has enjoyed watching the students blossom. \u201cI love to see the ones who are intimidated at first by the materials,\u201d she shares. \u201cBut then when you connect with them and they begin to open up, the artwork becomes a source of transparency, a source of trust, where they share with you a little bit of who they are. Some of them never even really drew or painted before, and here they are creating this huge mural. They ask, \u2018When are we going to do the next one?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n For some of the young artists, the project holds an added layer of meaning \u2014 they came to YAM through its arts diversion program, an alternative to prosecution and incarceration for youth facing low-level, nonviolent offenses. Founded in 2021, it draws on the healing and restorative qualities of artistic expression, with the goal of students having their charges dismissed upon completion.<\/p>\n Arts New Orleans is also piloting a standalone arts diversion program this spring to help meet participants\u2019 unique needs. \u201cThere are many things that they need to engage in, conversations that need to be had, that we can\u2019t have amongst the main YAM group, which are kids who have not been impacted in the same way by the criminal justice system,\u201d Allen explains. \u201cGiving them their own program gives them a true opportunity to expand and move beyond whatever it is they are facing.\u201d<\/p>\n The idea for YAM and its arts diversion program was sparked by now-retired Judge Arthur Hunter and Xavier University professor Ron Bechet, who is also an artist. Through his career as a police officer, a lawyer, and finally as a judge in his native New Orleans, Hunter had a firsthand look at the factors that lead to young people getting swept into the city\u2019s criminal justice system and saw the potential for art to provide an alternate path.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not just the art \u2014 it\u2019s an economic opportunity as well, where they should be able to make a living using their talent,\u201d explains Hunter, a board member at Arts New Orleans. \u201cThat\u2019s just as much a part of it as seeing that beautiful picture on a canvas.\u201d<\/p>\n For Hunter, the timing of the mural\u2019s unveiling couldn\u2019t feel more fitting. \u201cThis project will be not just a culmination, but also I see it as the beginning of more art throughout the city, letting people know in the city, in the region, in the state, around the country, and around the world what kids can do in the city of New Orleans when it comes to art,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Press Contacts<\/p>\n Rachel Wolf Tulley<\/p>\n Apple<\/p>\n rachel_tulley@apple.com<\/a><\/p>\n Apple Media Helpline<\/p>\n