Mission

QuEMCO: The Queer Early Music Choir and Orchestra is organized to foster an affirming, inclusive, and equitable community through the rehearsal, study, and performance of early music from the Baroque period and earlier. The organization is committed to achieving the highest attainable artistic standards in historically informed performance while providing LGBTQIA+ individuals and their allies with a safe and welcoming environment in which to create music together. Through performance, education, and community engagement, QuEMCO seeks to preserve and promote the rich heritage of early music while contributing to the cultural enrichment of the communities it serves.

Vision

QuEMCO: The Queer Early Music Choir and Orchestra envisions a future in which the richness of early music is understood through a more complete, inclusive, and historically accurate lens. The organization aspires to illuminate and elevate the works of composers whose contributions have been overlooked, marginalized, or undervalued because of gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, socioeconomic status, faith tradition, disability, or other forms of systemic exclusion. Through artistic excellence, scholarship, and performance, QuEMCO seeks to foster a musical culture in which all composers are recognized on the merit of their work and in which audiences encounter a fuller and more representative history of early music.

Values

The values of the Organization are as follows:

• Vulnerability

• Safety

• Affirming

• Academic Rigor

• Stylistic Excellence