History

In 2009, violinist Angélica Durrell met MacArthur Fellow Aaron Dworkin, who encouraged her to create a path to achieving greater diversity and inclusion in music. Two years later, motivated by her own story of struggling as an immigrant student from Ecuador, she founded INTAKE Music, now known as INTEMPO.

Conceived as a much-needed bridge between the arts sector of Fairfield County, CT and immigrant communities and communities of color, INTEMPO began with two teachers and 40 students. Since then, INTEMPO’s staff of teaching artists has more than doubled and its programs and concerts have reached thousands of students and community members.

Today, INTEMPO is known as a welcoming space for multilingual music education, cultural exchanges, and creative expression.

We take pride in our collaborations with community partners, including the Stamford and Norwalk Public Schools, the United Way of Western Connecticut’s Cradle to Career initiative, Carnegie Hall Play USA, Norwalk Youth Symphony, all of which are working to inspire, teach, and empower youth in our region.

INTEMPO has been recognized at the local and national level for the quality of our programs and our efforts promoting arts equity. INTEMPO received the 2022 Accelerator Award by The Lewis Prize for Music, the 2021 Core Mission Grant from Impact Fairfield County, the 2019 Adolf Busch Award, and was named a finalist in the 2016 and 2017 National Youth Arts and Humanities Program awards by the President's Committee of Arts and Humanities. We’ve also received major grants and awards from Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute, the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture, Spread Music Now, and the Sphinx Organization, one of the most highly regarded national organizations for fostering diversity in the arts.