Justice Through Music Releases Song And Video, Happy Springtime, Bush Is Over -- A Take Off Of The Lennon Song, Happy Xmas, War Is Over
A Message from Velvet Revolution:
"Dear VR Supporters,
The co-founder of Velvet Revolution, Justice Through Music, www.jtmp.org, a non-profit that works with famous bands to educate youth about peace, voting and civil rights, released a new song, Happy Springtime, Bush Is Over, featuring the band Op-Critical and the children’s choir, Harmonic Angels. www.op-critical.com. The song is a take off of the John Lennon tune, Happy Xmas, War Is Over, with new lyrics and a modern sound.
“Like Lennon more than 30 years ago, we are hoping for a quick end to an era of darkness,” said Storm from Op-Critical. “So we are psyched that Justice Through Music worked with us to get this song out so quickly,” he said.
In the original tune, Lennon used the Harlem Children’s Choir to sing the chorus, and Op-Critical brought in the Harmonic Angels, who really put the song over the top.
“We are making a statement with this song that we will not live in fear and by imagining peace we will create peace. This is a real tribute to the message and spirit of Lennon, and we want every person on earth to be inspired by the song and video.” said Craig Gillette, spokesman for JTM.
The video accompanying the song features the band and choir and includes new footage of Yoko Ono’s Imagine Peace billboard and her Peace Prayer Trees on the Washington, DC Mall. It is getting thousands of views on YouTube and on JTM. The song is also getting hundreds of plays per hour on www.myspace.com/opcritical.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE VIDEO ON YOUTUBE!
Gillette hopes that the video will go virtual across the Internet so that the message of peace is spread far and wide. Other organizations that are spreading the word:
www.bushisover.org
www.A28.org
www.afterdowningstreet.org
We think you will enjoy this song and video! Tell all your friends, embed the video, and favorite it.
All the best,
VR"
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
Friday, March 16, 2007
Up To Date....
As some of you know by visiting my web site, I have been working rather diligently on a cycle of songs slated to be performed in the next fourteen months or so.
Most of my previous posts here give somewhat of a picture into why and how I’ve come to take this project on.
I have to admit that I’ve had my days of wondering, “What the heck have I gotten myself into?”
Why do I think like this? Because the gears are all turning and all of the other things that need to be happening are also in play. Triangle Gay Men’s Chorus is eager to work on the piece, I’ve applied for a fellowship from the NC Arts Council - that’s still up in the air, though - and the chorus has made the project part of it’s annual funding grant. So I’m pretty much locked in and it is a bug commitment!
But when I look back and remember why I’m doing it (see the most recent five or so posts) I calm down. In the end, I didn’t get myself into anything. The only thing I did was let God into my life and say “Not my will, but yours be done, Lord!” So what I have to do is live in to that.
But also acknowledge that there is no “I” in this. It is about God’s message, not mine. It is about God’s music and His hand and His Love - not mine. I am not alone in this - not just because I know that my brothers in the chorus and my brothers in Christ and my church are here with me, but above all because I know that His Hand is in this.
I have my moments of dreaming how wonderful the day will be when this work is performed and how people will like it and it will touch them - I, like many other normal human beings, will really want to bask in that as if it were all my doing. That is where many artists go, I think - the human ego loves that. But I will try my best to remember that it is God’s work - I am just the instrument.
It gets tough sometimes when the music or the words don’t happen - or they don’t make sense. That’s when I have to step away from the computer or the piano and go for a walk, or a drive and just stop thinking - stop trying and just let it happen.
So, last week I finished the outline. I know that I have nine songs in the cycle. I even know what those songs are. I have all but one of them in their basic musical score form.
The one I don’t have just happens to be my oldest song. My first love song to my first true love. I have it in a form where I can get it into a score, but to bring it to the current time and arrange it for men’s chorus seems odd for this song.
For me, it is such a personal thing, this one and a half minute tune - Back then, I laid out in words almost every simple metaphor I had for love at the time. Then when the object of my affection died, I added a spoken part in the middle about how he taught me what it meant to be loved and how he was still a part of me and he’d taken a piece of me with him.
That middle section is not to be spoken in the new work, though. Instead, a new set of lyrics will be placed there.
Like all of the other songs, there will be sacred text there. A brief glimpse at God’s love for us. A simple reminder to me that this is not just mine - it is a gift from Him to me and from me to Him.
Most of my previous posts here give somewhat of a picture into why and how I’ve come to take this project on.
I have to admit that I’ve had my days of wondering, “What the heck have I gotten myself into?”
Why do I think like this? Because the gears are all turning and all of the other things that need to be happening are also in play. Triangle Gay Men’s Chorus is eager to work on the piece, I’ve applied for a fellowship from the NC Arts Council - that’s still up in the air, though - and the chorus has made the project part of it’s annual funding grant. So I’m pretty much locked in and it is a bug commitment!
But when I look back and remember why I’m doing it (see the most recent five or so posts) I calm down. In the end, I didn’t get myself into anything. The only thing I did was let God into my life and say “Not my will, but yours be done, Lord!” So what I have to do is live in to that.
But also acknowledge that there is no “I” in this. It is about God’s message, not mine. It is about God’s music and His hand and His Love - not mine. I am not alone in this - not just because I know that my brothers in the chorus and my brothers in Christ and my church are here with me, but above all because I know that His Hand is in this.
I have my moments of dreaming how wonderful the day will be when this work is performed and how people will like it and it will touch them - I, like many other normal human beings, will really want to bask in that as if it were all my doing. That is where many artists go, I think - the human ego loves that. But I will try my best to remember that it is God’s work - I am just the instrument.
It gets tough sometimes when the music or the words don’t happen - or they don’t make sense. That’s when I have to step away from the computer or the piano and go for a walk, or a drive and just stop thinking - stop trying and just let it happen.
So, last week I finished the outline. I know that I have nine songs in the cycle. I even know what those songs are. I have all but one of them in their basic musical score form.
The one I don’t have just happens to be my oldest song. My first love song to my first true love. I have it in a form where I can get it into a score, but to bring it to the current time and arrange it for men’s chorus seems odd for this song.
For me, it is such a personal thing, this one and a half minute tune - Back then, I laid out in words almost every simple metaphor I had for love at the time. Then when the object of my affection died, I added a spoken part in the middle about how he taught me what it meant to be loved and how he was still a part of me and he’d taken a piece of me with him.
That middle section is not to be spoken in the new work, though. Instead, a new set of lyrics will be placed there.
Like all of the other songs, there will be sacred text there. A brief glimpse at God’s love for us. A simple reminder to me that this is not just mine - it is a gift from Him to me and from me to Him.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
