Can a handful of committed artists turn their own grassroots concerts into a thriving, interconnected music scene? It happened in Baltimore, and it can happen in your town, too.

People sometimes ask me why I care so much about diversity, and I have the easiest response. I am a black, white, Jewish, Jehovah’s Witness, Irish Catholic who plays the violin. I am the definition of diversity.

I wondered about my own female role models in music – Marin Alsop, Julia Wolfe, Kaija Saariaho, Laurie Anderson. Was there a common thread that made them particularly inspiring to me? Or did they bring me some new idea of musicianship that I could not have gotten anywhere else?

Inspiration can come from anywhere – mathematics, birdsong, dark chocolate. Once it arrives, we have to know how to turn it into expressions and ideas.