Musician Changemaker Accelerator Academy: Spring 2024 Cohort
Social change incubator helping musicians make a transformational impact in their communities
WILDER, VT, JANUARY, 2024—Music to Life proudly announces the commencement of its third Musician Changemaker Accelerator (MCA) Academy with the introduction of the Spring 2024 Cohort. The Academy is a 6.5-month online incubator that partners with artists from around the country looking to take their music off the stage and into communities to make lasting social change.
The only incubator of its kind for musicians, the MCA Academy is a highly effective combination of entrepreneurship & social design instruction, 1:1 coaching, and strategic community engagement activities through which musicians build a theoretical and practical roadmap for making their concept a fundable reality. The MCA Academy was developed from best-practice accelerator models in the tech, non-profit, and music industries and has been positively assessed by Americans for the Arts consultant, Barbara Schaffer Bacon, and the Tuck Consulting Group (at Dartmouth College’s Business School).
The Spring 2024 Cohort comprises talented singer/songwriters from Maryland, Washington, Idaho, Missouri, Massachusetts, Michigan, Maine, Tennessee, and New York. Participating artists will strengthen their entrepreneurial, music-driven concepts to address a myriad of critical issues including the integration of cultural diversity into local communities, self-expression of immigrant artists, racial justice and activism, sustainable interactions with nature, suicide awareness, and the infusion of diversity into classical music.
Z Saj, a member of our Fall 2023 Cohort, shared their experience: "This Accelerator program has changed the trajectory of my career. I remain surrounded by like-minded artists and changemakers who inspire me daily. With the help of Music to Life, I forged a team and created an entire business—The Missing Piece Ent—in less than 5 months. This program goes by so fast!"
The MCA is valued at over $7,500 per artist. Each artist receives a participation stipend, acquisition funding to engage with a nonprofit collaborator and matching grant funding. The MCA is made possible by the generosity of The Mellon Foundation, The Warner Music Group / Blavatnik Family Foundation Social Justice Fund and Music to Life’s individual contributors.
To download a .pdf of these artists' projects and bios, click here. To learn more about the individual artists of the Spring 2024 cohort, visit their profiles down below.
