Gustavo Dudamel will join Clare Adamson, MSP, Convener of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee, in conversation at the Scottish Parliament on August 25.

The special discussion is hosted by the Festival of Politics in partnership with the Edinburgh International Festival (EIF), where Dudamel and the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela will perform their first international concerts together since 2017.

The Festival of Politics event will focus on this year’s EIF themes, including community, hope, and perspective, to answer the question “where do we go from
here?”

Dudamel has been an advocate for the power that music and the arts have to transform lives and will speak in support of the work of Sistema Scotland. He will address an audience including more than 150 young musicians from Sistema Scotland’s Big Noise programs who will travel from across the country to attend the event.

The conversation will be followed by performances from musicians of the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra and Big Noise Raploch, part of Sistema Scotland.

In a statement regarding his appearance at the Scottish Parliament Dudamel said, “Speaking to you as part of the Festival of Politics, here in this space where legislation is debated and made, is a powerful reminder of how important it is to support the arts. The laws made in this room are not just words on paper, they have a profound impact on the lives of every citizen. El Sistema is a social project first and a cultural project second, with the ultimate aim of making music fully a part of society – an imperative that affects the life of every person. I have made it my personal mission not to rest until music is truly a fundamental human right, for everyone. El Sistema has endured through seven different governments in Venezuela – it is not about politics, it is about the shared belief that art must be a part of the fabric of society. This is what I grew up believing, and what I continue to believe, and what I have seen over and over again in my life
around the world – and especially here in Scotland, with the extraordinary young people of Big Noise.”