During my effort to promote the music video Singing to the World, I discovered Christine Schanes, a blogger for The Huffington Post who is the director for The Center For Justice and Social Compassion (CJSC) and Children Helping Poor and Homeless People (CHPHP). She had written a blog about the Dalai Lama, who was making a visit to San Diego (his next stop after Hawai'i), so I thought it would be appropriate to share our music video with her. She loved it, and responded by asking us to create a song and music video about homelessness, promising to feature whatever we came up with in an article for The Huffington Post. I knew this would not be an easy subject to write about, made more difficult by the fact that Lana'i City has very few, if any, homeless people. Despite its challenges, the students were enthusiastic, and wanted to take on the challenge.
I talked over the project with the language arts teacher, Sandy Patterson, and we decided to have the students start the process by writing an essay on homelessness--much like how our peace song was created. Brooke Belista, a student in the class who had a big part in writing the lyrics for our first two songs, was inspired to take the assignment home, and came up with what wound up being the entire first verse, and a large portion of the chorus. I was very impressed with the depth in her writing, and it motivated me to dig deeper with the music. The rest of the lyrics were a collaboration between many different students--they even had a part in altering the melodies I came up with. In the end, it was a true team effort by the class, and we wound up with a very moving song that we hope can make a difference in the fight against homelessness. Currently, we are in the process of putting together a music video that can best capture the sentiments of the song.
Brooke was just getting started--she began writing song after song--it seemed as though each day she came up with a great original idea and had lyrics ready for me. The first one she gave to me was Being Green, a natural follow up to Every Day is Earth Day. She took a very simple idea and gave the lyrics a fun, unique twist--I hope the music captures the spirit of the words.
In the meantime, Brooke had several other ideas for songs, including Smile, We're Better Than a Class, and Happy Mother's Day. I enjoy working multiple projects at once, so I was happy to be so busy writing songs. In the back of my mind, I knew I wanted to create a full album of songs with the Lana'i Class of 2020. I expected it take at least a year, as it usually takes a while to develop songs when collaborating. Luckily for me, I had the full support of the classroom teachers I was working for: Jerod Savage and Sandy Patterson, and was allowed to use class time to work on the songs with the students. Thanks to them, we were able to finish a lot of writing during the school day.
As more and more songs started coming together, I made the decision to go ahead and record an album with the Lana'i Class of 2020 before the end of the school year. I knew that I would need a lot of help, especially with the recording process. My wife was kind enough to offer us the use of her office to record our first song, Singing to the World. However, I knew it would be difficult coordinating more recording sessions where the band wasn't playing. I found out that on campus there is an actual recording studio, which high school English teacher Karen de Brum uses for one of her media classes. I spoke with Karen about our project, and she generously allowed us to use the studio as much as we would like--even while she was having class (the studio is sound-proof and in a separate room, which is located in her classroom).
Somehow, after many, many hours spent recording during school (and some after), we were able to record an entire album of nine songs. This never would have been possible without the use of the studio, so a big thank you goes out to the school and Karen de Brum for giving us access.
I decided on the title of Songs For a Better World for the album: all of the songs have a message and a goal to make the world a better place. It aligns perfectly with my goals as a songwriter, and is exactly what I had in mind when I started this website and blog.
The album will be released Saturday, June 30th, at the Pineapple Festival in Lana'i City, where the Lana'i Class of 2020 will be performing selections from their CD.
Thanks goes out to Jerry Brocklehurst, who mixed and mastered the entire CD on short notice--I couldn't have done it without him. Also a big thank you to my brother, Adam Glickstein for helping to creatively put together students' artwork into a very nice design for the CD. Next, thanks to Travis Turqueza, for his photography work and helping to put artwork together for the album (cover, inserts, and back cover). Lastly, thanks to my wife Kerri, for putting up with all of the long hours and late nights spent working.
Coming up right behind the CD will be a DVD of all of our music videos, so please watch for that sometime in the near future.
We hope that these songs will inspire everyone to do something (even if it is small) to help make the world a better place.
