Leader Interview: Sebastian Ruth, Recipient of the Lewis Prize

In January, The Lewis Prize for Music — a newly established philanthropy that’s ambitiously investing in music leaders to facilitate positive change and increase access to music education — announced its inaugural class of awardees. A total of nearly $2 million is being awarded to leaders of music programs and organizations across the country.

We had the opportunity to connect with Sebastian Ruth, who received one of the inaugural awards to chat about his work as an artist, educator, and community leader.

Sebastian Ruth is a violinist and violist, and he serves as Community MusicWorks’ is Founder & Artistic Director. A graduate of Brown University, Sebastian has been a member of the Wild Ginger Philharmonic and the Boston Philharmonic. Sebastian has performed in Providence, Boston, Los Angeles, Banff, and New York, and with members of the Borromeo, Muir, Miro, Orion, and Turtle Island String Quartets, and with pianist Jonathan Biss and violist Kim Kashkashian. Influential teachers include Eric Rosenblith, Rolfe Sokol, Lois Finkel, Pamela Gearhart, Mela Tenenbaum, and Kim Kashkashian. In 2010, Sebastian immersed himself in an exploration of gypsy and klezmer traditions, including a residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts.

Creative Generation: How do you describe the work that you do?

Sebastian Ruth: I work as a musician, educator, and an organizer in a community. The organization I work for, Community MusicWorks, has an ensemble in residence, the MusicWorks Collective, that performs concerts and works with young people doing free music instruction in string instruments, based out of a storefront in a city neighborhood in Providence, Rhode Island. The mission aims for transformational opportunity for young people, their families, and musicians, and over the past 23 years we’ve been setting a precedent for careers in music that center social justice and deep community investment.

CG: What is your origin story? How did you get to do this type of work?

SR: I grew up near Ithaca, New York with parents who were passionate about music, but not musicians themselves. My parents were interested in philosophic study and spiritual practices, and I think I learned from an early age the importance of seeking the wider meaning behind the activities and events of our lives. My high school was an experimental public alternative school that gave students a great deal of autonomy in creating their course of study based on interests. 

Starting Community MusicWorks came out of a set of questions about how my colleagues and I could make careers in music that combined a commitment to social justice, musicianship, and education, with the partnership of young people, all to the effect of positive and transformative experiences for all of us in a community.

CG: What was the most significant change you have seen in the work that you do?

SR: I think the most significant change I have seen has been in the ways young people, especially in our teen program, grow to become critically engaged with the world and current issues, tight-knit and supportive with each other, and influential with peers and adults about issues that matter to them. Over the course of our 23+ years, these young people have then gone on to be influential figures for others in their lives, including younger students. 

The change that comes from deep investment in youth is in the ripple effects of how they then influence their communities as adults, and I feel like we’re now starting to see that.

CG: How do you think your work, and its ripple effect, is changing your community and the world?

SR: We think of our mission primarily as building cohesive urban community through music education and performance. When young people grow up in a loving, supportive community made up of committed peers, mentors, adult musicians, parents, and community members, they come to expect and therefore create similar communities in other ways in their lives. The ripple effect is that young people are then motivated to create nurturing community in their lives, whether based in music or not, in a world that is ever more interconnected, but where true experiences in community can be rare.

CG: How can investment, like The Lewis Prize, help the field working at the intersection of arts/culture, education, and social change?

SR: In addition to the catalytic financial boost from the Lewis Prize that will help CMW realize new ambitions for our programs, the visibility generated by the Prize sheds light on good work at the intersection of arts, education, and social change. Already I am hearing questions from our local community about our work that reflects a change. I think people see the Lewis Prize as a major award in a field that many didn’t know exists. 

CG: What advice do you have for other changemakers around the world?

SR: The main advice I would have for anyone working on social change ideas is that the core work needs to be within each of us. None of us works in the abstract, and none of our positions are neutral. I think we always need to be investigating our own assumptions, biases, and motivations, to be sure that our work is truly in service of people and their needs. 

This is not to say that good work shouldn’t be fulfilling and joyous for those doing the service— in our field of music-making, the best work happens when there is a collective joy and fulfillment. But we should always be conscious of what our work means and whose needs are being met.