MY STORY

There are well-worn paths in this life, traveled by others, strewn with bread crumbs and clearly marked, but occasionally someone will come along who resists the easy road and sets out to find their own way. Someone who always wants to know more, who always wants to keep changing and exploring. Someone who desires to live as many lives as possible.

A self-described awkward child, gap-toothed with big feet, Amanda Gookin first tasted grace with the cello. Never doubting her goal of becoming a professional cellist, she gave performances in her living room to imaginary packed concert hall audiences, visualizing a future in which her music would transcend the early adolescent and become transformative, demonstrating her true voice. It would be years, though, before she suspected she might have more than one voice, and more than one road to take.

Pivoting off a graduation gift of three weeks in Europe, and already beginning to question her musical career goals, Amanda extended her trip to three months, and then returned shortly to permanently reside in Barcelona, Spain. There, she developed her own after-school English learning curriculum, teaching children from ages 3-13. Putting her cello ambitions temporarily on hold, with her guidance the students would put on plays twice a year, building the sets and working together on writing the script, and performing songs entirely in English.

It was through this program that Amanda learned to trust her faith in a life she would build for herself, in her own way and with her own potential. Eventually returning to the cello, musical opportunities started coming her way and she focused her energies and talents on a freelance performing career. She won the “Most Musical Performance” award at the Podiums XII Chamber Music Competition and spent a glorious two years in Spain before returning to the States and New York City in pursuit of a master’s degree and a richer performance life.

Once she settled in NYC, though, Amanda felt that familiar itch again, the idea that music might not be enough, or that perhaps she’d missed out on the possibility of living a life other than that of an artist. Her first job back was a part-time sales associate job in an upscale dog boutique, reviving an early interest in animal science. Inspired by her time in Europe, living independently and making her own way, she adopted a personal philosophy: Jump now, learn to swim.

Applying for and landing a job as a veterinary technician, Amanda found herself at home in scrubs and sneakers, sitting in on her first day for a feline spay and fascinated by the experience. She immediately thought:

“I have not done enough. I have not lived enough. I do not know anything. I need to know more.

Even as she loved her work and actually considered going to veterinary school, Amanda kept her eyes open and spotted a gig as a solo cellist, accompanying an all-female performance of Romeo and Juliet. Expected to improvise and/or compose her own music, a new and daunting experience, Amanda once again jumped first, and she would go on to write music for five more plays and eventually begin composing for film.

And still there was more life to explore, more passions to indulge and, always, more work to be done. Amanda began volunteering at a crisis hotline and ultimately was offered a position as Coordinator of Volunteer Recruitment.

After two years back in NYC at this pace, Amanda traded in her scrubs for a job managing a folk musician’s union, Local 1000. She worked in a small office for two and a half years in the corner of the Local 802 building, learning about pension plans, health care, Emergency Relief Fund, and the good and bad of union organizing.

Shortly before New Years 2010, Amanda embarked on her next big venture to start PUBLIQuartet. Calling together the original members to a Starbucks in midtown Manhattan, little did she know that years later, PUBLIQuartet would become a string quartet in the forefront of the new music scene. They improvise, write their own music, commission new works, and work across genres from jazz to classical to electronic music. She initiated a composer commission program and co-produced their GRAMMY-nominated album, Freedom and Faith.

If it weren’t for the skills she learned as a vet tech, English teacher abroad, composer, volunteer, and recruitment coordinator, she would never have learned how to coordinate large groups of people, problem solve, multi-task, write grants, be organized, and have faith in herself. In June 2019, Amanda departed from the group to pursue new projects and a life of activism through music.

New goals began to loom, including teaching at the college level. While pursuing her Masters Degree at Purchase College, Amanda met new mentors who sparked her creativity, gave her the confidence to begin her first solo project, and was offered a faculty position to teach courses on career development. This opportunity led to another, and now Amanda teaches courses on entrepreneurship and women in music at both The New School and SUNY Purchase, leading courses on experimental performance, social leadership, and women in music.

Graduate school gave Amanda ample time to think, and while by the fall of 2014 she’d become a full-time freelance musician, more paths loomed. Always an activist and a feminist, Amanda felt that her musical life was no longer connecting to this part of her. One day while in the car, Amanda heard a recording on public radio of Kshama Sawant giving a speech about the need to raise the minimum wage in America. Amanda was taken by this speech. She thought: 

“Why can’t classical musicians be outwardly political, too?”

After participating in the Institute for Musicianship and Public Service at Community Music Works in Rhode Island in the 2015, she met like-minded musicians who wanted to intersect their art with helping their community. She found her people. Amanda decided to start a commission project, the Forward Music Project, that was deeply rooted in social justice and women’s rights and commissioned seven composers to write solo pieces that touched on their own personal story or an issue that affects women and girls. The pieces she received range from sexual violence to empowerment, and she performed many of these works for the Dream Unfinished, the activist orchestra’s chamber music series.

Since then, Amanda has commissioned 18 new works for Forward Music Project and has performed this project on stage all over the world at The Kennedy Center in DC, The Wallis in Los Angeles, OK Electric in Tulsa, and Classical:Next in Rotterdam.

And while questions remained for Amanda, about her ability to influence, about her skills as a soloist, and particularly about her aggressive push to have her voice heard on any number of social and political issues, she continued doing what she always had. Jump first. Learn to swim.

At the same time, 2016 served notice to America that progress was threatened by familiar demons, and with the rage of the loss of her mother and an ominous future of continuous racism, sexism and bigotry, Amanda once again found her voice. This project is just the beginning of bridging her music and the need for progress within her community.

Musician. Union leader. Veterinary technician. Activist. Innovator and educator. Passionate advocate for the least among us, and for the power of music to affect change.

And whatever Amanda does in the future, wherever she goes and whenever she arrives, it will be on her terms and along her path, as it always has been. And roads? Where Amanda’s going, we don’t think she’ll need roads.

– Beauchamp Artist Services