On NPR News’ All Things Considered, world-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma announced the grand prize winner of the Indaba Music contest, “Celebrate and Collaborate with Yo-Yo Ma.” In celebration of his latest album release “Songs of Joy & Peace“, Yo-Yo Ma extended the invitation to the world and shared the joy of collaboration with Indaba’s international community. He recorded the melody of the traditional song, “Dona Nobis Pacem (Give Us Peace)” and challenged musicians everywhere to collaborate virtually with him by adding their own counter-melody or recording an entirely new set of variations. (Check out our previous post “A Duet with Yo-Yo Ma“.)

Members of the Indaba Music community, including musicians from all over the world, were challenged to record a counterpart to Ma’s cello or create a set of variations based on the main musical theme. The grand prize winner will receive a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to record with Yo-Yo Ma. Musicians had until December 31, 2008 to submit their piece. Ma challenged musicians to be creative and inspire him by submitting versions that move beyond the classical genre.

After listening to over 300 contest submissions, Ma has chosen not one, but two winners. The contest winners were Toshi Osawa with “Yo-Yo Ma-tal” and Kevin McChesney with “Pikes Peak Ringers – handbells”. Yo-Yo Ma’s comments on Toshi “I thought this piece was virtuosic, well-constructed, and most importantly, fun! The structure is very well thought-through yet it has the spontaneity of improvisation, and that combination is very hard to do.” Yo-Yo Ma’s comments on Kevin “This is a lovely, very impressive arrangement, especially harmonically. The intricacy is stunning. It’s also performed impeccably well, and handbells are really difficult to play.” Congrats to the winners!! (Also check out Tina Guo in the runner up category.) Listen to the winning pieces.

Celebrate and Collaborate with Yo-Yo Ma