Alberta Invests in Arts and Culture： Funding for Edmonton's Cultural Infrastructure
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Summary
Learn English with Minister of Arts Culture and Status of Women, Tanya Friesen, Minister of Culture, and Status, Annemarie Petrov, President of the Francans Windspeare Center for Music and Founder of the Five Arts One Love Art Collective, and CEO of The Winspear Centre for Music, Anne Marie Petrov.
Transcript
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Good morning and thank you for joining us here today.
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And thank you to the amazing jazz trio of Tom Van Setters on piano, Andreas Wegner on bass,
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and John Gutner on drums, who kindly played the music to set the tone this morning.
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My name is Garth Roselaw, and I'm a member of the Legislature for Vermillion-Leutminster-Wainwright.
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And I'd like to begin by acknowledging the Windspire sits on Treaty 6 territory, a traditional
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meeting grounds gathering place and traveling route for the cree the soto the blackfoot the
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metis the dinnae and the nakota sioux this land also has deep importance to the metis people of
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alberta it's my pleasure to welcome our guests for this special occasion the honorable tanya
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fir minister of arts culture and status of women anne-marie petrov president ceo of francis
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windspeare center for music darren jordan windspeare board member and founder of the five arts
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one love art collective and joe tell tell chat tell chick and andrew bromberg the visionary
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architects behind the windspeare's next phase each of you have played an important role in bringing
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the dream of a revitalized windspeare to life and your partnership brings us here today for an
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exciting announcement i would like i would like i would now like to uh welcome the honorable tanya
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fir minister of arts culture and status hello everyone and thank you to my friend and colleague
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mla garth roswell for that introduction it is a joy to be here at the winspear center a cornerstone
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of Edmonton's arts and culture landscape for nearly three decades. The Winspear is a remarkable
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space for Albertans to come together for world-class concerts, brilliant symphony performances,
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family events, and community gatherings. It is also an important space to experience
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arts and culture and to create unique learning opportunities. Our government has been a proud
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partner of the wind spear for decades and we continue that support today i'm honored to
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announce that as part of budget 2024 if passed alberta's government is committing 12.8 million
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dollars over three years starting next year to the wind spear center to help support the third phase
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of their renovation and expansion project this funding will help the wind spear expand their
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space to include 550 seat acoustic performance venue indoor and outdoor community gathering
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spaces and multi-purpose music studios and classrooms this expansion will increase
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accessibility to arts performances and education for children and families and draw even more
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visitors to experience amazing music in a world-class venue the new state-of-the-art
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customizable stage will allow for community groups of all shapes and sizes to get theater
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seating built right for their audience's needs new classrooms mean that more students and young
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people from across the capital region can access after school and evening programs helping build
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a lifelong love for music and learning skills that help them no matter where their life takes them
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and this funding will help expand the wind sphere as a cultural hub that will help solidify Alberta
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as an arts and culture destination of Canada and North America. It will also provide local jobs and
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boost Edmonton's downtown economy. The expansion is expected to create more than 240 jobs during
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construction as well as approximately 100 jobs once it's complete and once completed it will
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attract more tourists to the area that will add an estimated $4.5 million to Alberta's economy
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in the first year. It is vital that we support our province's cultural sectors, including
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our screen-based sectors, the performing arts, visual arts, opera, ballet, book publishing,
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and more. In 2021, these cultural industries injected $2.7 billion into Alberta's economy
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and sustained over 19 300 jobs beyond the economic benefit this project means more albertans will
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have the opportunity to discover and participate in the arts and cultural opportunities that our
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province has to provide and i look forward to seeing the art and creativity that will grow
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in this space because when we build better communities we make alberta the best place to
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live work and raise a family and as annemarie and i were talking about beforehand you know how
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blessed i am to have this ministry of arts culture and status of women because
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what arts and culture does is it humanizes us it humanizes us it brings us together it builds
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community so thank you all for being here this morning to annemarie petroff the winspear center
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board the generous donors thank you for enriching our lives with arts and culture opportunities i
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look forward to the magnificent music that will soon fill these spaces and seeing the performances
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that will grace the stage inspiring albert albertans for generations to come thank you
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thank you minister fur we are grateful for your support of arts culture and heritage and community
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spaces in our province and for championing the important role that plays that play in the lives
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of all albertans i would now like to invite anne-marie petroff president and ceo of wind
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spare center to say a few words thank you mla rosewell well to say the least it's an exciting
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day for us today thank you minister i too welcome everyone to the wind spear as we embark
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upon the next stage of our wonderful wind spear expansion project phase three right here in the
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heart of edmonton's arts district i'm deeply proud to serve as the president and ceo of the wind
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spear center at this moment in time as many of you know the wind spear expansion has been ongoing
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since 2019 when we broke ground and we are thrilled with the progress made and the opportunities this
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new space will bring to our city. I thank our partners in this project, the province of Alberta,
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the City of Edmonton, and the Government of Canada for their generous support to help make
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this dream a reality. Let me express my deepest gratitude to the Honourable Tanya Furr for being
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here today and for the province's generous funding. This new commitment of $12.8 million
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dollars will make a huge impact on this transformation. Minister, I recognize that
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Budget 2024 is a responsible plan for a growing province and with today's announcement, our
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government recognized not only the priorities of food, shelter and all the necessities of life,
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but as Minister first said, also the government recognizes the need for arts, culture and those
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things that give meaning to life. I want to add how much your support will contribute to
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revitalizing this essential part of Edmonton's downtown and also allow us to make the Winspear
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Centre truly a world-class centre for everyone where many more Albertans will have the opportunity
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to connect and enjoy the many kinds different kinds of music that they love. We look forward
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to working together with your office over the next four years. I know there were a couple
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introductions made but I want to recognize two more people that I know are in the crowd today
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because projects like this don't happen with the volunteers in our community,
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and the volunteers for the Windspear Centre are a very, very hard-working board of directors.
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So I'd like to recognize our third board members, and you've heard that Darren Jordan is a member
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of our board, but also I want to recognize Robin Hurd. And most importantly, I want to recognize
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our past chair, who's also had a significant hand in the current construction of the Windspear
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Decades ago Dr. Francis Winspear imagined the Winspear as a true
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cultural hub where everyone could gather to play enjoy and share music
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but budget constraints at that time reduced the size of the building
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so what we did is we made sure that we maintained the quality of the building
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but we did have to contract a little bit both at the front and at the back of
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building and then what remained was a parking lot. The Winspear expansion now, this expansion
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completes the dream that Dr. Francis Winspear had. His vision was of a Winspear that not only
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served the community but was integrated into it and that is a pillar of this new work that we're
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doing now. The new Winspear will be a hub for Edmonton's arts community with over 50,000 square
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feet of new space, space designed for everyone from elite performers to amateur musicians,
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from the young musicians in our YONA program, that is the Youth Orchestra of Northern Alberta Systema,
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to our talented rusty musicians. Now when I say talented rusty musicians, I mean these are not
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the musicians of the orchestra, but these are musicians, amateurs in the community who also
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have played instruments throughout their lives and continue to play them. They may be doctors,
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they may be teachers, they may be housekeepers, but they still play instruments and they play
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alongside our musicians from the orchestra on the stage and hence we fondly and lovingly call
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them the Rusty Musicians. I need a point of clarification. The new Windspear will offer
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an attraction right in our city's downtown with immersive experiences, gathering places,
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and many more performance opportunities in the new 550-seat performance hall that the
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minister recognized that we will be calling the Music Box. This expansion project was made possible
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not only with the support of governments of Alberta, Canada, and the City of Edmonton,
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but with additional funds from very generous donors and dedicated supporters in our community.
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And I might add, I know that there are more commitments to come.
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We're thrilled to see their vision come to life. Some of these individual supporters were
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gracious enough to join us today and we thank them from the bottom of our hearts.
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Like so many other organizations, the pandemic posed serious challenges for the completion of
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the Winspear project as we were well in construction and left us with a significant
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gap in funding with this new support from the province for this phase three and the unwavering
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support of our donors and community we're building momentum to enter this the final stages of our
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expanded windsphere we are confident that nothing else exists quite like this new and revitalized
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windsphere and we're thrilled to welcome you to see inside of our building and to see the progress
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later this afternoon or later this session thank you
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thank you ann marie and i can't wait to see and hear what the what the new phase
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of the windsor center will bring you obviously have great passion for this building and it comes
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through i would now like to invite darren jordan windsor board member and five artists one love
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good afternoon everybody what a pleasure it is to be here
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mr firth thank you uh thank you everybody uh that took the time to come
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jordan i am the founder of five artists one love
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what is five artists one love well give me a moment i'm going to tell you all about it
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five artists one love is a an annual multi-disciplinary art show and a music production
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that started in 2007 so at 16 years it's one of edmonton's longest running and most anticipated
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black history month events it celebrates it honors the creativity and the vibrancy
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of the cultural diversity within edmonton's black communities and edmonton is the focus um it
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it needs to be said uh black history month is in february is the coldest
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shortest month of the year um and let me tell you uh we need something to warm our souls at that
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time and five artists one love is hopefully filling that uh that that spot um it's been
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described as something that resembles a party at the UN and is comprised of three events.
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Those events are, number one, an art exhibit at the AGA at the Art Gallery, the Albert Gallery of
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Art, runs from January to April. There's an exclusive one night gala at that gallery and
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there is an exhilarating immersive musical experience at the Windspear for the last three
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years. We've had a long journey. We've been to a number of other places when we first started out,
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but we ended up at the Windspear, and this is where we've been for the last three years, and
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we're very happy about that. Five Artists, One Love was born out of necessity. You see, as a younger
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Black visual artist, I didn't see any representation of people in my community
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in the galleries in the city i learned that many people in my community felt that there was no
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place for them in the more established creative spaces it made sense they didn't see themselves
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or their experiences reflected in any scene out there so my mantra became if there is no scene
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if you can't find a scene then make a scene and um we got started we started small at first
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uh it was a very small gallery uh that we started in on 124th called the two gallery
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does anybody know dutch's bakery okay it's that building um best macarons and the best
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bread pudding you've ever tasted um it's true um the music venues that we followed
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that we used afterwards i included the yard bird suite uh the leadcore theater at the aga's
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community space the citadel and and finally grant mckeon's trifle theater which was our home for
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a few years um and it was wonderful uh but i have to tell you in my heart i had my sight set on
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the wind spear um i didn't think it would happen for a very long time and it was almost like a
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a hockey player a young hockey player having his sights set on the nhl i don't know i don't play
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hockey uh but i know that a brother can dream and so that's what uh that's what we did we dreamt um
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we dreamt that it would happen and uh and it did i mean imagine what it would be like to be in a
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place like this where you could feel the energy in a space that echoes the music from people like
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john legend who is here wynton marcellus and even edmonton's own eso um we we developed this
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wonderful multicultural fan base uh throughout that was along the ride along with this sharing
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with these um as we had these these soulful collaborations uh we did everything from spoken
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word rmb opera strings hip-hop soul and motown and so much more and these performances these
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performances resonated with our city and and people came and they watched and they enjoyed
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and they became joy celebrations of culture and community that would spill out into the night
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uh long after the show was done um it was one evening where uh hen marie showed up after one
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of our shows and everybody was in the back room and they just randomly started singing
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a boys to men song uh end of the road i don't know if you know that but it was everybody choirs
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volunteers um all types of people singing and i remember um annemarie walked in at that moment
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i don't know maybe she liked the song uh i don't know maybe she liked the vibe but
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we got an invitation to join uh the wind spirit and uh and we've been here for the last three
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years. So a big thank you to you. It was an absolute game changer. And everybody that has
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been participating in the show has been, has felt blessed, has felt blessed.
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We've done three shows here at the Winspear. Every show that we do has a theme, and hopefully
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it touches people's hearts. The first time we got back, we had just returned from COVID. Everybody
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had been locked down and we wanted the first big shows um to be in the wind spear and definitely
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the first big show in our black community uh to do anything and what we did was we basically
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played the songs that helped people get through that pandemic that was what the celebration was
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um the next one was in june and we did something that had not been done before we celebrated a
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holiday called juneteenth has anybody heard of this before yeah so we had done that it
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It commemorated the end of slavery in North America,
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because there's a unique story that connects us
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The last one that we did was called The Joyful Noise,
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where we needed to just sing and enjoy each other's company,
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I just want to say, this new expansion means a lot to myself, to organizations like ours. It gives opportunities for people to have access, access to a space that is world-renowned, a world-class space that will change the narrative for a lot of these new
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and upcoming organizations um i i'm just gonna i'm gonna i have so much but i'm gonna skip ahead
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because um time but what i want to do is just share the last point that i have um this expansion
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means a lot for our children a lot for our children and what i mean by that is that uh
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we get to show them excellence in a space like this excellence being created by people that
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look like them and that is important it is essential because inclusion begins with
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representation so i cannot wait to see this amazing expansion and i want to say thank you
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to everybody that is a part of it and is supporting it we hope to see you soon thank you
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thank you darren and congratulations on achieving your dream and i wish you all the best success
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going forward you're a real get her done kind of guy so well done and thank you to everyone
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that ends the speaking part of our announcement i will now turn the mic over to garrett kohler
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ministry press secretary for a question and answer session after that i will invite you to have a tour
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of uh of the building and the new construction so we'll turn it over to garrett thank you very much
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minister back up to the podium thank you um we'll go to the lines there's no one on the lines i see
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Please state your name, outlet, and one question, one follow-up.
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So when this project was initially announced, it was the budget, or the full funding, full
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What's the total amount that this project is going to cost?
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Yeah, so let me follow up with you on total costs when we get all the funding in from
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or the amounts from the federal government and city as well.
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Our contribution for the provincial government of Alberta
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for this phase three is $12.8 million over three years,
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starting next year, providing that budget 2024 is approved.
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All right, name, outlet, one question will follow up.
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about why choosing the Windspear Center Extension
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You're right, there's a lot of amazing projects
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to choose from, and I think what was so amazing
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It's not only the amazing 550 seat acoustic theater,
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but it's their focus on having more community spaces,
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community programs classrooms educational opportunities their focus on making it an
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open inclusive environment for everyone their focus as you know darren was talking about the
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importance of bringing more children and kids into art like anything else earlier you're exposed to
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something the sooner you can develop a love for it and we want our government wants that to include
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arts and culture and it's amazing for the economy as well the amount of pre and post construction
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jobs and what it means not only for local Edmontonians and surrounding area but what
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it means for the boost in tourism and visitors to a world-class facility like this thank you
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for my follow-up yes I just like to take this chance to ask if any of the speakers speak French
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Mais, en fait, si vous pouvez simplement faire un petit résumé de l'annonce en français,
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puis qu'est-ce que ça signifie pour vous, ce serait très bien.
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Today, the announcement is that there are about 12,8 million dollars in the province of Alberta
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to our project, the expansion, I don't know how to say it in French, but I don't know
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how to say it in French, but for me, in the business, it's a bit complicated.
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The reason why it's important is that it's a project in the heart of downtown Edmonton.
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Whereas we have been a magnificent performing arts center at a world-class level, which
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is outstanding not just in Edmonton, not just in Alberta, not just in Canada, but in North
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america one of the premier performing arts facilities the challenge we've always found
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is that we're not open to the to the public during the day and we know that there's so much uh
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interest and and desire to learn music and that's why this is so important and that's why we're so
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grateful to the province to also share in this vision of making music accessible to the community
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literally building community through this project
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we have time for one more question are there any other questions from the floor name and
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outlet and one question one follow-up please hi christina lachlan city news um so as you were
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saying that you have the funding for the next three years for phase three is there a plan a
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date that you guys have in mind for grand opening or the completion will be completed yeah i believe
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it's summer 2025, correct Annemarie? Annemarie, summer 2025 is when we're projecting completion.
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We're looking at the 25-26 year. We're aiming for 2025, but it depends on some of the other
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levels of government and other contributions fulfilling the gap. So that's why this is so
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significant for us today. Right, well with that, one big round of applause for the Windspear Center.
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thank you very much for coming and we're going to go back to our wonderful jazz trio