IPR tours Europe

For ten days in September and October, Interlochen Public Radio hosted 40 listeners on a tour to some of the most magnificent musical places in the world - Vienna, Salzburg, and Bratislava. The tour celebrated the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth and showcased sites that were significant in the composer's life.

The group attended seven concerts, including a festival of Mozart and Strauss at Vienna's Schönnbrnnn Palace - in the very hall where Mozart presented many of his premieres. They also enjoyed an untraditional new production of "The Magic Flute" at the Vienna State Opera. Along with a riverboat trip on the Danube, the itinerary included trips to the Esterhazy Palace in Eisenstadt, where Franz Josef Haydn was court composer. A short trip forty miles east of Vienna took the IPR listeners to Bratislava, the capitol-city of Slovakia, where they attended a thrilling performance of Shostakovich and Khachaturian played by the Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra.

The tour was hosted by IPR General Manager Thom Paulson and Music Director Dick Wallace, and resulted in nearly $20,000 in gift income for the station. "As members of the Interlochen Public Radio family, our lives are enriched daily by the enduring music of Mozart," said Paulson. "Visiting the places where he lived and presented, in the company of fellow music lovers, was an experience of a lifetime."

Thanks to the overwhelmingly positive response from tour participants, IPR is planning future trips abroad.

Listening to the river:

IPR partners in a $1.4 million grant from the National Science Foundation

Interlochen Public Radio (IPR) is helping teenage journalists and scientists develop their storytelling skills and understanding of the local environment as they produce independent radio segments for broadcast on IPR - showcasing the sounds and resources of the river.

Partners in this project include the Northwestern Michigan College Great Lakes Studies Institute, the Land Access Information Association and the Great Lakes Children's Museum. Together They received a $1.4 million grant from the National Science Foundation to implement a comprehensive science education project focused on the Grand Traverse Bay watershed.

In the first stage of the project, students ages 14 to 17, will join adult volunteers to explore and document the local watershed using state-of-the-art mapping and multimedia technology. Their findings will be used to create a new immersive museum exhibit for the Great Lakes Children's Museum. Some students may work with IPR staff to produce recordings for possible broadcast.

"Hopefully, by making these teenagers the ‘guides' to the watershed for radio listeners and museum goers, they'll embrace the watershed and take more ownership of it," said Peter Payette, IPR news director. At the end of the three-year grant, the project partners hope to have created a model for watershed-based education that can be used nationwide. More about the project can be found at www.listeningtotheriver.org.