Launching the future of classical.
Project Date: 2006–2023
Team: Refresh / Metropolis
Metropolis Ensemble is an up-and-coming orchestra that features the brightest young talents in the classical world. With a strategic focus on producing innovative concert experiences, commissioning exciting new works, releasing award-winning studio recordings, and launching a new generation of artists, Metropolis is transforming the relationships between music, artist, audiences, and patrons.
I direct the web, marketing, and creative efforts for this nonprofit professional chamber orchestra, bringing together the talents of an emerging collective of performers and composers across New York City.
What would a house sound like if it could sing?
It’s questions like this that drive the creative process for Metropolis Ensemble. I've served in several roles (marketing director, consultant, founding member) alongside the Grammy-nominated artistic director / founder Andrew Cyr since the nonprofit's inception in 2006. Together, we have shaped a seamless audience experience over the years:
Email, social media, and a wealth of online preview content to drive guests to attend concerts and events.
An innovative in-person approach to hospitality and engagement at each critically-acclaimed concert.
Freely available online archives of the entire concert post-show, including curated photos, audio, video, and other behind-the-scenes content.
An unique constellation of digital-first projects created during the COVID-19 pandemic to support hundreds of artists working remotely on innovative newly commissioned works.
An emerging generation of virtuosos.
By bringing together the very best and brightest young composers and instrumentalists, Metropolis Ensemble empowers emerging classical talent with the right resources to create new platforms and launch sustainable careers.
A veritable who’s-who of the next generation of classical artists, I’ve had the honor to promote and collaborate with creative women and men who embody virtuosity, artistic integrity, and spirit in all they do.
Through its unique collaborative process, Metropolis Ensemble is constantly reinventing itself with bleeding-edge cultural innovators and artists. Every presentation’s concept and many venues are different; and most of Metropolis Ensemble’s music is new.
So the online ecosystem for this organization needed to be extraordinarily dynamic, flexible, and comprehensive. Each Metropolis project features video, audio, photos, behind-the-scenes posts, interviews, and exclusive online features that led to many times the viewership of the local shows themselves.
The future of classical music.
Musicians and composers in the Metropolis community also contribute to a larger cultural conversation in myriad ways: teaching young students music appreciation and composition, performing in local schools, hosting new music discussions on broadcast media, curating concerts through Metropolis' resident artist program, and establishing a pop-up event space in the heart of NYC.
Metropolis is also building a formidable membership base who share their enthusiasm, volunteer time, and patronage throughout the year. They are redefining what it means to be involved in a 21st-century orchestra that doesn’t fit the mold of the traditional classical scene.
It's an exciting decade for classical music and Metropolis Ensemble is leading the way with a refreshing and joyous perspective.
“Armistead is a multi-talented designer, educator, outreach guru, web-programmer, and amateur pianist — he’s an inspiring person to work with! I collaborated with him from the conception of a new project or commission and visual ideas evolved from these conversations. As a result, designs for each project spoke to both the musical aesthetic of the project and to what that particular concert experience would be like.”
