Tayla Alexander Photo: CC BY-SA 4.0 / KimWriting
The life of a musician has never been an easy one financially and right now, due to Covid-19, times are extremely tough.
19-year-old soprano Tayla Alexander (a student of the Waikato University music programme) has launched her own foundation aimed at supporting young NZ musicians.
The Tayla Made Foundation is a national charitable foundation under the auspices of the The Perpetual Guardian Foundation.
As a young classical singer, Tayla says she quickly became aware of the hurdles faced by students such as herself early on in their careers.
“It can be incredibly difficult financially," she says. “So many of my peers [at the University of Waikato] are scared, quite frankly, that they’re going to fail and they don’t have the opportunity to apply for competitions or grants because they can’t even pay for competition entry fees, or a dress or a suit, or singing lessons.”
“Sometimes just $200 can go so far for a singer who’s… struggling to pay rent and petrol.”
The grants available range from $500 for beginner-level singers (Year 12 and 13 and first-year university students) and up to $10,000 for high-level singers, with the cut-off point being age 25.
Already there has been a huge response to the foundation.
Tayla Alexander has also opened up a Givealittle page asking arts lovers to 'help save classical music from extinction by supporting young emerging artists'.
