Connection and Community

Music is our universal language – a common thread that ties us all together. We create musical experiences that help to connect Quad Citizens with each other and build a stronger community where all can thrive.

Accessible and Inclusive Experiences

Music is for everyone. We break down barriers to ensure every person has access to the power of music. Diverse and inclusive experiences create a culture where all Quad Citizens feel a sense of belonging and ownership.

Local Musicians and our Music Scene

Local musicians are the core of our creative scene. Our community is full of talented, hard-working, homegrown musicians. Not only do we prioritize hiring local musicians directly, we also work to build an economy and culture that values local talent and creates more opportunities for musicians to build lasting careers.

The Power of Music

Music drives our culture. It improves quality of life and well-being for anyone it touches. It makes the Quad Cities a more exciting and fulfilling place to live. It is also a powerful economic engine that supports jobs, uplifts businesses, and fuels regional success.

Simply put: Music makes our lives better.

We build partnerships both within and outside of the music scene and advocate regionally for the power of music, building local pride in our community and drawing wider attention to the power of music.

OUR VALUES

Given our mission, vision, and strategic priorities, we identify these values as crucial to our success as a community development organization. These values are a statement of how we wish to interact with our community, those we serve, our partners, and each other.

 It is through these values that we effect positive change in our community. They are a filter through which every big and small action is evaluated, and a daily guide for how staff and volunteers go about our work.

Without representation, we cannot understand relevancy.

Without relevancy, we cannot build meaningful relationships.

Without relationships, we cannot generate powerful results.

REPRESENTATION
We prioritize representation in our organization at all levels – participants, audiences, volunteers, staff, partners, and leadership.

Our community has a powerful diversity of lived experiences. Without representation of the diverse perspectives present in our community, our effectiveness as an organization suffers, and we are less equipped to enact positive change. We recognize that true representation also includes a shared ownership of our decision-making process.

RELEVANCY
We ensure that each program or decision is relevant to those we are trying to serve.

To achieve relevancy in programming, we first must ensure that – as an organization and as individuals – we have listened to and learned about as many perspectives as possible. That learning process guides our decisions. All decisions and programs are based on meeting the needs and interests of the people we serve.

RELATIONSHIPS
In every action, we consider what will strengthen and deepen our long-term relationships.

We avoid one-off, transactional interactions. We are enacting community-wide change, and we are in it for the long haul. To successfully improve our community, we build as many long-term, mutually beneficial relationships as possible.

RESULTS
As a mission-driven entity, we exist to generate positive changes in our community.

We create programs and take actions with desired outcomes in mind. We are open to unexpected outcomes, but we remain focused on achieving our stated goals. We regularly evaluate our results as objectively as possible, using our mission, vision, strategic priorities, and values as our guide.