About Innovative Giving Enhancement
Mission: Innovative Giving Enhancement unites musician, nonprofit and arts patron communities through musical retreats, cross-cultural collaboration and global benefit performances.
Vision: A world transformed through cross-cultural musical collaboration in service of global community.
Innovative Giving Enhancement “IGE” is a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit public charity founded in 2014. IGE is governed by artists and arts patrons for the benefit of musician and nonprofit communities worldwide.
On conclusion of the prototype 2013 Venice Immersion, IGE orchestrated three successive Venice Immersions in 2015, 2016 and 2017. In October, 2018 IGE conducted the Barcelona Music and Art Immersion and in October 2019 the Lisbon Music and Art Immersion.
Future Music and Art Immersions are scheduled for Prague, Buenos Aires and Budapest, as well as in Kaua’i.
What is an IGE Music and Art Immersion?
Music and Art Immersion events are top tier musician retreats and the primary vehicle for IGE philanthropic activities. Immersions bring together North American Musical Ambassadors, Global All-Stars, arts patrons and nonprofit partners who together form community while advancing the IGE mission and values.
IGE events are seminal era defining musical moments. Participants experience multiple historic concerts of curated cross-cultural supergroups. Concerts range across cityscapes forming a tapestry of extraordinary venues.
Intimate IGE Music and Art Immersions dissolve boundaries among musicians and fans, performers and spectators, participants and environments.
Why are IGE Immersions 10 days and 9 nights?
Immersions are abroad, travel times are considerable and it takes a few days to adjust to time differences. The period reflects our artistic and philanthropic vision as well as our view of the minimum time necessary to form a cohesive community. Given years of formative work, the dramatic range of historic venues and utterly unique experiences, shorter events would neither permit the substantive creative arc nor serve our philanthropic goals. We would much prefer to extend rather than shorten the Immersion!
What are IGE local partner charities and how does IGE select them?
IGE operates in concert with a broad coalition of local charities with compatible missions in each Immersion city. These essential relationships provide access to remarkable venues and insider experiences largely off limit to individuals or other organizations. Nonprofit partners join with IGE in community. Together, IGE with local partners shape the Immersive experience, while providing avenues for meaningful contribution.
How does IGE engage with the local musician communities?
Multi-genre Global All-Stars join with IGE Musical Ambassadors during Immersions. These remarkable local and regional musicians perform independently, with their own acts and in concert with Musical Ambassadors. Musical Ambassadors and Global All-Stars form the international artist collective as they together create the Immersive soundscape at the heart of the event.
What types of charitable activities does IGE engage in?
As an educational nonprofit, revenue funds IGE programming. The Immersion is the principal vehicle through which IGE promotes its mission and achieves it philanthropic goals.
Recent IGE partners and donation recipients:
Kaua’i, Hawai’i: Kaua’i Hospice
Venice, Italy: Conservatorio di Musica Benedetto Marcello di Venezia, Centro Culturale Don Orione Artigianelli, ACIT Venezia – Palazzo Albrizzi-Capello, Laboratorio Artisti Outsider Venezia, Artistic residencies for Italian master musicians
Barcelona, Spain: Street Child, Hospital de Sant Pau, a world heritage site, Reial Acadèmia de Ciències i Arts de Barcelona and MEAM, Museo Europeo de Arte Moderno. Two dozen artistic residencies for Spanish master musicians
Lisbon, Portugal: APCC – The Associação para a Promoção Cultural da Criança (Association for the Cultural Promotion of Children) is a national, non-governmental, non-profit Portuguese organization which develops leisure activities of a socio-cultural and educational nature for youths and children.
Other 2018 Donations: Hanalei Initiative, Earthjustice, Rex Foundation, Beautiful Lives Lost Portrait Project, AltruVistas
IGE Board Members
Michael Becker, President
Michael Becker founded IGE in 2014 on retirement from nearly three decades of international teaching in Nepal, Japan, China, Switzerland, Ecuador and most recently, Portland, Oregon. Prior to teaching, Michael worked as a socially responsible investment broker, advertising account executive, and groundbreaking natural foods restaurateur.
Given lifelong love for travel, decades as an ex-patriot, and significant experience creating and implementing extraordinary international travel experiences for students and adults, Michael synthesized his expertise and various interests into the creation of an entirely unique public charity for benefit of musicians and artists, international arts nonprofits and local communities.
Matt Kebbe
Matt is a CPA, who has been working with the founder of IGE for over a decade. His background in compliance, combined with volunteer work on other board of directors provides him the experience to help assist IGE to achieve sustainable future growth. Matt is passionate about music and the artistry and community IGE are what really gets him excited about being involved.