The Grand Canyon Music Festival’s Native American Composer Apprentice Project

Last summer, the team from Central Sound at Arizona PBS had the opportunity to travel through northern Arizona with the Grand Canyon Music Festival’s Native American Composer Apprentice Project (NACAP).

Showcasing the growth of the Grand Canyon Music Festival’s outreach efforts, an upcoming speical highlights the fully-fledged Native American Composer Apprentice Project (NACAP) which provides levels of access to music education that is scarce in rural areas.

In the fall of 2023, Central Sound followed NACAP’s resident quartet throughout the Navajo Nation to schools involved in the project, capturing the process as well as interviewing students, performers, and composers.

The goal of NACAP is to provide opportunities for young Native American students to find their musical voices, and the upcoming special highlights the two current NACAP composers, one of whom won the Pulitzer Prize in Music and the other is an alumnus of the project.