As part of its mission to bring arts and culture programming to all parts of Washtenaw County, A2 Jazz Fest will bring a free "Traveling Sound Museum" to two locations in Ypsilanti in May in collaboration with the Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum. Each event will involve a multi-generational instrument-making contest, an exhibit on the physics of sound, food, and prizes.

The first event takes place over two nights, from 5-7 p.m. May 15 and 16 at Odindi Freedom School, inside the neighborhood resource center at 2057 Tyler Rd. in Ypsilanti Township. The second event takes place from 4-7 p.m. May 22 at Ypsilanti Community Middle School, 235 Spencer Lane in Ypsi Township.

Anna Gersh, administrative director for A2 Jazz Fest, says that as families move around the exhibits, she'll assign visitors to multigenerational teams. Those teams will collaborate on the design of an instrument, and sound engineers with tools will be on hand to help bring those ideas to life.

A panel of community members will assess the resulting instruments based on a few evaluation points, like whether the instrument can be both loud and quiet, and whether you can play a song on it. There will be no individual prizes, but each school gets $500 for participating. 

"We hope but don't mandate that they'll use that $500 to do another project that combines science and music," Gersh says. 

Gersh says she has been wanting to do more with A2 Jazz Fest's educational programming since she came on board with the organization last year. A2 Jazz Fest did a trial run for the sound museum concept last September, in partnership with the Ypsilanti-based Michigan Firehouse Museum, at Ypsilanti Community Middle School. Gersh says that event went well.

Gersh notes that both the traveling sound museum and A2 Jazz Fest's recently launched John E. Lawrence All-Stars program are born out of the "strong mentorship tradition" among musicians in the region. 

"We have a lot of expertise and a lot of teaching relationships in Washtenaw County, but there's just a lot more we can still do," she says. "Part of our mission is trying to leverage this rich support for the arts that is in Ann Arbor and push it out to the rest of the county."

For more information, visit A2 Jazz Fest's website.

Sarah Rigg is a freelance writer and editor in Ypsilanti Township and the project manager of On the Ground Ypsilanti. She joined Concentrate as a news writer in early 2017 and is an occasional contributor to other Issue Media Group publications. You may reach her at sarahrigg1@gmail.com.

Photo courtesy of Anna Gersh.