From Idaho to Panama: Music Across Borders

Idaho State University's Director of Orchestral Activities, Nell Flanders, expands global music education through regular collaborations in Panama, where she recently conducted the National Symphony Orchestra and seeks to build international partnerships.

Nell Flanders, Idaho State University’s Director of Orchestral Activities and the Conductor/Artistic Director of the Idaho State-Civic Symphony, has been traveling regularly to the Central American country of Panama through a collaboration with her alma mater, Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Ohio.

From 2016-2020, Flanders traveled to Panama once or twice a year to teach at the youth music camps of the Asociación Nacional de Conciertos, conducting the advanced orchestra and mentoring student teachers from Oberlin. When she came to ISU in 2022, she received an Internal Small Grant from the university to return to Panama in 2023 to teach an intensive conducting workshop and conduct the Orquesta de Cámara del Istmo, a small professional chamber orchestra.

In May, thanks to a travel grant from the ISU College of Arts and Letters, Flanders was able to return to Panama again, this time to conduct the National Symphony Orchestra of Panama, a large professional orchestra funded by the country’s government. 

“We performed a very ambitious program,” Flanders says. “This was the first time I had worked with the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Panamá, and the experience was fascinating. It was very moving for me to see players whom I've known as students since 2016 now playing with the highest professional orchestra in the country.”

Last year Flanders programmed a full season of Latin American music for the Idaho State-Civic Symphony. She describes Panama as an incredibly beautiful country with many young musicians who are eager for opportunities for serious study, despite the challenges presented by limited resources to fund classical music education. 

“I would love to bring students from Panama to study at ISU and for some of our current ISU students to join me in traveling to Panama to teach and to share what they know, as well as bringing colleagues from the ISU music department to teach and perform as soloists with the orchestras there,” she says. “To study together with people from other countries enhances the learning experience of our American students as well. Through the universal language of music, people connect with one another despite differences of culture and language.”

While in Panama, Flanders met with the head of the Cultural Department of the American Embassy in Panama and the conductor of the University of Panama, among others, to explore potential partnerships and partner organizations. She believes that change happens through people and the work that they do, and she hopes to also secure private funding to help bring ISU students to Panama and Panamanian musicians to study at ISU.