In 2017 Ensemble Correspondances began to radically address the environmental impact of its performing and touring. Three years on they've launched an association to support others in doing likewise.

Sébastien Daucé, Founder and Musical Director of Ensemble Correspondances, and Céline Portes, General Manager, explain what lies behind this innovative and important initiative.

How to combine growth and sustainable development?
Within a few short years, Ensemble Correspondances has seen a significant increase in concerts in Europe, Asia and the United States. This development required us to ask ourselves some very important questions: how can we continue to play and share with the world 17th century French music the ensemble’s specialty, performed by very few other ensembles – while being as environmentally friendly as possible?

A first environmental charter
2017 saw the creation of a number of major lyrical projects involving 80 artists on stage. That is when we launched the first version of our environmental charter, with the following guidelines: replace plastic bottles with ecological water bottles, ask hotels to remove plastic samples and reduce bedding and cleaning, travel by train within a radius of 1000km, ask venues for short-distance catering... We tested the charter with the musicians, who very quickly became ambassadors for it within the ensembles in which they played.

Even if it requires a new way of thinking to encourage train travel that is two to three times longer than a short low-cost plane trip, this environmental charter has become a key force for cohesion and adhesion within the ensemble. This charter is particularly interesting because it has gone hand in hand with building a positive social structure for the ensemble and establishing a great dialogue with the musicians' representatives.

From individual to collective
Nevertheless, we quickly saw the limitations of the charter being only implemented only by ourselves. As a very small team of four permanent employees, it meant continually convincing venues to use eco-responsible catering, often pay more for train transport and get our service providers to sign up (hotels, transport, technical services, etc.). Each tour we had to start this negotiation from scratch. We realised to change this we had to act at another level.

We regularly addressed the subject when ensembles and orchestras gathered to find a collective impetus. Then last year we decided to go a step further and launch a working group on the subject. So thus it wasn't the current health crisis of Covid-19 that pushed us into it, but it helped and fuel to the fire: on June 15, 2020 this working group launched the association ARVIVA - Arts vivants, Arts durables, which brings together a wide variety of structures, companies, venues, agents, all relevant in the field of performing arts. Beyond the various manifestos and appeals that have flourished during the pandemic crisis, we wanted to build together a sustainable tool that accompanies all participants in the performing arts in their ecological transition, without exclusion. Instead of an impracticable common charter, we have elected to create a 'Guide for Action' that allows each member to make its own carbon assessment, and build its own charter adapted to their own challenges. Thus everyone can benefit from the tools shared on the resource platform we have created.

A lobbying force
We wanted to welcome all members motivated by this challenge and we bet on human intelligence and endeavour to reach our goals for everyone to create similar structures and charters that worked for their business. For an association initially founded by musical artists, we have been so proud to welcome many multidisciplinary venues, theatres and dance companies, proof that the collective tool is enabling us to go beyond the individual steps taken by organisations standing alone. Now that there are several of us, we are going to be able to better influence our service providers: the hotel industry, for example, who is not yet up to this major challenge, ie there are no environmental criteria on Booking.com or TripAdvisor ...

Environmental issues in the midst of a health crisis
In the cultural desert created by the wave of cancellations due to Covid-19, Ensemble Correspondances decided to set up a tour that sums up all the issues our charter wanted to address: we had just arrived in Normandy in January 2020 and it was important for the Ensemble to answer the need for culture in this territory. Within a month, we reached out to local heritage, craft and agriculture sites to set up a small tour, with no more than 30km between each place and the ability to travel on foot or by bike, thus creating a link between musicians, local cultural heritage and the best local craftsmen.

A new way of thinking on a local scale, recreating social connections during a crisis that forces us to socially distance ourselves – bringing us back to our core goals of connecting with local communities.

What about our international future?
The restrictions caused by the pandemic have not prevented us from thinking internationally: culture must flow and be shared across borders. However, the model of the globalised musician touring the world's great halls frantically has had its day: international tours must be 'intelligent', probably longer, rarer and slower than today. And it is above all singular and original projects that must circulate first: if Brahms's 3rd is played by all the great orchestras of the world, the need to have those orchestras touring it internationally seems less important. On the other hand, an ensemble specialising in English Renaissance polyphony must strive to be able to share this music especially in territories where this particular music would never be played!

The world of tomorrow?
While everyone agrees that the health crisis owes much to the increased globalisation which has also caused the environmental crisis, it is not certain that our work on ecological transition will come out of it any easier. The balance of power with the places that programme us, who will have also experienced a sharp decline in resources, means that they will not be able to prioritise tools and resources allocated to the environment. We will have to double our efforts to persuade and use the weight of our new collective to help drive this.

Here at Correspondances, we are rather confident about the future. This is because the musicians of the ensemble see how our approach ties in with living a better quality of life; although creating this takes a little more time it gives greater meaning to the deeply meditative 17th century sacred music we present and it invites us to rethink the century in which we live and perform it.

Sébastien Daucé, Founder and Musical Director of Ensemble Correspondances

Céline Portes, General Manager of Ensemble Correspondances

Follow the link to find out more about Ensemble Correspondances's Environmental Charter