Oshawa Music Week is returning for its 26th year at Durham College, offering a platform for local musicians, businesses and the community to come together over music.
Organized by the Music Business Management (MBM) program, Oshawa Music Week began as the Reel Music Festival in 2000 and has since become a key part of the cultural scene in Oshawa.
MBM students and faculty say the annual flagship festival is not just coursework but a learning experience. Deborah Mossa, a second-year student in the program, is a sponsorship and partnership manager for this year’s festival.
“Oshawa Music Week is important for us because it brings us from a place of being little kids to [growing] up to become adults and professionals and realizing that there is a future in this as long as you work for it,” she says.
Mossa is also a singer-songwriter with her debut single, ‘Vittime D’Amore,’ released in July last year under the name Dess Jour.
She says the various events at Oshawa Music Week offer exposure to emerging artists in a city “with a very strong community around music.”
“You need to learn how to be on the stage, how to get rid of stagefright, how to perform in front of a crowd, connect with the crowd, [and] master your craft,” she says, “and this festival allows all the small artists to come out and try to, you know, connect with a new audience and create bigger opportunities for themselves.”
Professor Daniel Gallinger says the festival is an extensive learning experience requiring students to hone “their interpersonal skills with communication and relationship building.”
“It’s not just so much putting on the show as it’s everything in the background that’s happening, all the marketing, all the media and contracts, all the communication that they have to put in,” says Gallinger.
Some of their main responsibilities include coordinating with artists and venues on one hand, and with internal stakeholders such as the college and the Durham College Student Association (DCSA) on the other, he says.
As a former student of the program who organized the festival 16 years ago, Gallinger says the next step is to scale it further.
“Convergence, obviously, is a new festival series in Oshawa happening in September,” he says. “That’s kind of the next step for us, you know, having something grow to that extent where we have a ton of foot traffic and, just an overall impact in the community.”
While Oshawa Music Week has accrued a legacy and presence in Oshawa and Durham Region, funding remains a challenge to any potential expansion.
MBM students held a fundraising bake sale and performances in The Pit on Feb. 27.
Mossa says without sponsors “we have almost no money.”
“The college could maybe show us a little bit more support in terms of funding for starters, and in terms of promoting the event itself,” she says, adding it showcases value to prospective students and their parents.
Oshawa Music Week will be held from April 7 to 11 with eight events throughout the week. Follow on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and visit the website for more updates.