ZUMIX is a nonprofit group that gives music training to youngsters and adults in East Boston.

The nonprofit was based in 1991 by Madeleine Steczynski, the group’s present govt director, and Bob Grove, who had a mission to empower youth by way of music. They began orgnization as a summer time songwriting program with $200 and 24 college students of their lounge. 

ZUMIX was born because of the youth violence in East Boston through the ’90s. Steczynski and Grove wished to make an enduring affect of their neighborhood by connecting younger folks to the humanities. Greater than 30 years later, the group continues to be introducing youngsters in Boston to new kinds of music, alternatives for private expression and future profession paths. 

ZUMIX “is about serving to younger folks understand their full potential as leaders, musicians and human beings. We ensure that our pupil’s voices are part of what we do right here. Within the lessons we train and the initiatives they do,” mentioned Katie Gibson, improvement and communications supervisor for the nonprofit. Based on Gibson, by providing free group packages and discounted personal classes, the nonprofit performed an important position in offering musical training to the East Boston neighborhood. 

When Steczynski and Grove got down to create a program to assist youth of their neighborhood, they surveyed to see which expertise folks wished to study, and music was chosen as the highest class. 

“Madeleine determined she wished to offer a chance for younger folks to do one thing constructive within the neighborhood,” mentioned Gibson. Together with the remainder of town, East Boston confronted a set of challenges within the ‘90s. 

“There was a very large push within the ‘90s to offer issues for youngsters,” mentioned Corey Depina, program director at ZUMIX. “It was the peak of the crack period. And there have been social and financial disparities when it comes to fairness and entry. There wasn’t a number of alternatives for youngsters to not get blamed for what was happening.”. 

A number of years after ZUMIX started, its pupil inhabitants elevated and outgrew Steczynski and Grove’s lounge. The group moved round to numerous places earlier than there was a fundraising marketing campaign to purchase the Engine Firm 40 Firehouse in East Boston from town, which is the present location of the nonprofit. The packages supplied started to develop as nicely. 

The group now provides lessons in songwriting, radio manufacturing, stay sound engineering and musical theater. There’s additionally a program for adults known as Pay it Ahead, however its focus is on packages for kids ages 7 to 18. Its location within the firehouse consists of music studios, a stay sound room and a recording studio. 

The group’s mission will not be solely to encourage youth by way of music but additionally to show them worthwhile expertise. The packages supplied, together with coaching in stay sound engineering, give college students a basis of expertise they will use to get gigs across the metropolis to generate profits. 

“Our plan is to empower younger folks to construct profitable lives for themselves, and we try this by way of artistic media, know-how and music,” mentioned Gibson.

ZUMIX has strived for the final 30 years to create an area the place East Boston’s youth can really feel welcomed. “Having artwork and music as a device to deliver folks collectively all underneath the umbrella of training has been actually cool,” mentioned DePina. Moreover, “East Boston was a fortunate house to have an arts group to present this neighborhood that was thought of just like the armpit (of Boston) a phenomenal soundtrack.”

Based on Gibson, rising up in East Boston can have its challenges. “East Boston is correct by the airport. It’s traditionally a working-class and immigrant neighborhood. A few of our college students are new to this nation and are studying modify to a brand new metropolis and new nation,” mentioned Gibson. “East Boston has all the time been an immigrant neighborhood. A whole lot of our households wrestle to place meals on the desk. And a number of these elements contributed to the gang violence again within the day.” 

By way of sharing the enjoyment of music, ZUMIX goals to create an setting the place college students can study and really feel happy with themselves regardless of their challenges. DePina, as soon as a pupil earlier than working for the group, mentioned Zumix “turned an area the place I used to be supported, welcomed they usually helped me all through my entire adolescence.” 

Although the group recruits college students by way of town’s public colleges, this system’s presence is so robust in the neighborhood that many college students be part of by way of phrase of mouth. 

“ZUMIX is 30 years previous, and we’ve lots of people who find out about us within the neighborhood, by way of siblings or cousins. We’re pretty well-known. A lot of our college students come to us as a result of they know individuals who took classes right here or they’ve been to a live performance,” mentioned Gibson. 

ZUMIX will get funded by particular person donors, personal foundations (its largest supply of funding), state and native grants and company sponsorships. The group additionally places by itself fundraising occasions yearly, together with the Stroll for Music, an event when ZUMIX workers and members stroll by way of the neighborhood with a stay band. The group additionally hosts a fundraising gala each fall.

Moreover, in 2021 the group acquired a grant of $1 million from billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott. In an article for WBUR, Steczynski mentioned that ZUMIX plans to make use of the funds to advertise its long-term stability. 

“[ZUMIX] has advanced, with everybody’s enter, into one thing a lot larger than me,’ Steczynskitold WBUR. “With all my coronary heart, I would like it to stay on nicely past me. And this, I believe, is the primary actually vital factor that provides me actual confidence that it’ll.”

Workers on the nonprofit say they’re working to make ZUMIX a spot the place folks can higher their lives and neighborhood by way of the shared love of music. 

“Nonprofit work is about fulfilling a imaginative and prescient round core values,” mentioned DePina. “ZUMIX believes in our mission that younger folks have entry to arts and are handled as professionals and might see themselves as professionals doing one thing that they love.”