Musical Workshop Labyrinth Reinstated

In recent weeks, the organizers of Musical Workshop Labyrinth announced the end of the popular musical instrument workshops due to lack of government funding. Now, the situation has improved and the workshops are coming back. "I’m very happy to be able to inform everyone that recent developments with regard to the Musical Workshop Labyrinth have been very positive,’ said musician and organizer Ross Daly. "As many of you already know The Musical Workshop Labyrinth encountered a very serious financial problem recently and was forced to announce the cessation of all of its activities and indeed its closing. We announced this in emails, blogs etc and the news spread very rapidly all over the world.

As a result, many people and organizations sent emails to the related Greek government offices expressing their extreme displeasure with this development and, especially here in Greece, the whole issue received an enormous amount of publicity which, in turn, generated a huge spontaneous outpouring of support. Indeed even I myself was astounded by the sheer amount of support that was expressed for the Musical Workshop Labyrinth and of course all of us here are very grateful for that support because it made a difference."

The latest development is that the mayor of the Municipality of Heraklion (Crete’s capital city) Mr. Ioannis Kourakis decided to establish a cooperation with the municipality of Nikos Kazantzakis, with the purpose of supporting and indeed extending the activities of the Musical Workshop Labyrinth. "This is a very positive development given that the municipality of Heraklion has enormous capabilities and resources at its disposal and Mr. Kourakis seems determined to treat cultural issues seriously," continues Daly. "His initiative is especially to be commended given that Houdetsi (where the Musical Workshop Labyrinth is located) is not actually in his area of jurisdiction and he could have easily avoided the problem without incurring any criticism whatsoever. Instead, however, he chose to offer the support of his municipality thus displaying a broader vision for culture and art on Crete as a whole and not just for the city of Heraklion.

This cooperation has many possible dimensions which will be discussed, worked out, and announced during the ensuing weeks. For the time being that which we can announce with absolute certainty is that our summer program of seminars and master-classes will take place as usual. The entire program of seminars and master-classes will be announced on the following sites on Wednesday 15th of April."

More at www.labyrinthmusic.gr