Kid-Friendly Music

PERFORMING WITH THE HUDSON RIVER SLOOP SINGERS AT THE JEWISH MUSEUM IN MANHATTAN

OPENING OF THE WALKWAY OVER THE HUDSON WITH PETE, ROLAND MOUSSA AND CHRIS RHUE

THE RIVERTOWN KIDS AT THE GREAT HUDSON RIVER REVIVAL

COME HEAR PETE, DAN AND THE RIVERTOWN KIDS 

The Beacon Sloop Club’s Strawberry Festival      

June 12th, 12:15, Pete and Toshi Seeger Riverfront Park

Clearwater’s Great Hudson River Revival

Saturday, June 18th,  Croton Point Park  Time TBA

Pete, Dan, and Dave rehearse “Quite Early Morning” with the Rivertown Kids, for their Grammy winning album, “Tomorrow’s Children”.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pvext99IeM

Here is a link to Pete, Dan, and Dave discussing “Tomorrow’s Children” on NPR’s Talk of the Nation last August.  http://www.wbur.org/npr/129157668

See ‘Tomorrow’s Children win the Grammy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGFgCna8y0w

When the school administration banned singing in the hallways, the kids wrote a new song called We Sing Out (and kept on singing). Pete Seeger continues to inspire new generations!

Reach And Teach says:

Can you imagine a school, where the children have gotten so excited about making the world a better place, that they can’t stop singing about it? Between a 4th grade teacher, a local naturalist, and Pete Seeger, one group of kids began to believe they could change the world. And then, the principal issued a commandment: “No singing in the hallways!” How did the kids respond to that order? They wrote a new song called “We Sing Out” and kept on singing. That’s the second song in this incredible album which will inspire young and old alike to keep working on building a better world for ourselves and our neighbors. At 90 years of age, Pete Seeger continues to carry and share the torches of freedom and justice.

About the Album:

On his latest studio album, Tomorrow’s Children, the indomitable Pete Seeger continues his life’s work of communication and inspiration to action. This CD is like a joyful town picnic featuring Pete as a (global) village elder, assembling his neighbors to appreciate their past and present, to celebrate their triumphs against environmental threats, to swap old and new stories, to appreciate the natural glories surrounding them and to make sure that the following generations “carry it on” – the unifying spirit and power of music, the “folk process” of adapting or writing songs to respond to current situations.

The 19 newly recorded songs on Tomorrow’s Children testify to Seeger’s long-held credo, “Think globally, act locally.” Once considered a controversial outsider by some of the residents of his adopted hometown of Beacon, NY, the international icon of sociopolitical activism has since involved himself in local activities and issues and became accepted as a neighbor. His concern about the heavily polluted Hudson River that runs alongside Beacon inspired the construction of the 107- foot Sloop Clearwater, “America’s Environmental Flagship,” which sails the Hudson spreading environmental education and awareness.

When Beacon fourth-grade teacher Tery Udell invited Clearwater educator and singer Dan Einbender to teach her students about the Hudson, class sessions became songfests, and where there are songs, there’s Pete. He became a regular visitor to the kids’ classroom in 2007.

The classroom gatherings and performances inevitably led to a series of recordings by Pete, Dan, musician and CD co-producer (with Dan) David Bernz, the children (known as “The Rivertown Kids”), as well as adult musicians, high schoolers and even 14 grammar school percussion students. The result of such a disparate musical cast is a delight to the ears as presented on Tomorrow’s Children. Pete is on every track of the CD, singing, storytelling, playing banjo and 12-string guitar, but he shares the studio spotlight with all of his guests. Their voices, instruments and the songs they have adopted or adapted are woven into a colorful quilt depicting our nation’s history (“Take It from Dr. King,” the tribute to Pete’s fellow civil rights warrior performed on the “Late Night with David Letterman” show; “I See Freedom,” the true story of a runaway slave who settled in Beacon); the possibilities of an ecologically clean world (the newly co-written Seeger song “Solartopia” featuring guest vocalist Dar Williams), and the natural beauty worth preserving (“Down by the River,” “The River that Flows Both Ways,” and others). Perhaps most importantly, Tomorrow’s Children contains songs of empowerment and cooperation adapted or written by the kids themselves such as “We Sing Out” (“…so our voices can be heard,” with a melody borrowed from Tom Paxton), an updated version of the old gospel and union song, “We Shall Not Be Moved,” and a set of new verses to Seeger’s Biblically-inspired standard, “Turn, Turn, Turn,” added for the children by Pete’s wife of more than 60 years, Toshi.

No matter who’s singing the songs, the spirit of Tomorrow’s Children is pure Pete. The reflective title track extols “the dream of changing the world into something new . . . Our greatest joy was opening the way for you.” And as Pete sings in “It’s a Long Haul,” “It’s a job for the many/Not just for the few . . .haulin’ together and makin’ up a rhyme.” That sounds like Paradise to Pete – a common goal approached with unity of purpose and effort, and sneaking in some fun, too. You needn’t be one of tomorrow’s children to take these reminders to heart.

Pete, Dan, and the Kids open for Jeff Tweedy at Clearwater’s Spring Splash.

HERE ARE SOME EXCERPTS FROM “TOMORROW’S CHILDREN”

01_Quite_Early_Morning_(With_Spoken_Introduction)

We_Sing_Out

TO ORDER A COPY OF “TOMORROW’S CHILDREN”    www.appleseedmusic.com/ 

For more information go to- http://rivertownkids.org/

A SHORT BIO OF DAN EINBENDER

Dan Einbender graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in Theatre Arts and radio, television, and film production. While still a student, his interest in performing led him to help found the Amazingrace Coffeehouse Collective. The collective was born during the student upheavals that swept across American campuses following the Kent State massacre. Over the next 8 years the collective produced hundreds of concerts with virtually every major folk artist, and with many jazz, blues and comedy greats.

He moved out to Eugene, Oregon, where in 1975 he helped found and direct the Eugene Community Center for the Performing Arts in the WOW Hall, a lodge building crafted in the early 30’s by the Woodsmen of the World, with an intricately constructed “floating dance floor”. It has now achieved historic landmark status and is still Eugene’s favorite dance hall.

An opportunity to return to performing brought him up to Portland, Oregon where he served as an Artist in Residence for the cities’ Metropolitan Arts Commission. He was assigned to perform for community agencies serving a wide range of age groups, including the Parry Center for Children, a residential school for emotionally disturbed kids, and the Volunteers of America, at their Daycare Center/pre-school and health clinic for senior citizens. He began to understand the power of music to soothe and inspire people, and that led him to New York City to study Music Therapy.

He brought his love of performing for all ages into to his work as a Certified Music Therapist. Over the next few years he worked in the SNF at New York’s Cabrini Hospital, at the Lorge School, a day school for emotionally disturbed kid, and with ex-mental patients for Hospital Audiences. He moved upstate to a job at the Burke Rehabilitation Center, working with brain damaged, Alzheimer’s, and dementia patients in a drug trial supervised by Dr. Oliver Sacks; also at the Sunny Hill Children’s Center, a private school for autistic and schizophrenic children; and with physically and developmentally disabled people of all ages for Northeast Westchester Special Recreation.

In the eighties he connected with his childhood hero, Pete Seeger, and began working for Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, the environmental education

WITH THE HUDSON RIVER SLOOP SINGERS AT SOUTH STREET SEAPORT

 and advocacy organization founded by Pete and his wife Toshi. He spent the next few years teaching and singing on the boats and banks of the Hudson, and performing with Pete and many other musicians at numerous festivals, and on many recordings. He learned a lot working with Pete, including the power of music to create community and affect political change. He has taught Hudson River history and ecology for organizations throughout the Hudson Valley, as well as writing and performing his own music at numerous schools, libraries, and festivals

His songwriting career has been bolstered by several grants from the New York State Council for the Arts, including a “Meet the Composer” grant to mount a production of his original musical “Just a Matter of Time”, and another working with members of the Hudson Valley Philharmonic, to create a song writing and music composition curriculum for local schools.

In The summer of 1989 he took a break from Clearwater to become one of 43 crew members on the Soviet/American Sail for Peace, a trans-Atlantic “advertisement” for peace and cooperation between the two super powers. Many of the Russians played musical instruments and everybody sang, and he quickly bonded with his Russian counterparts. Crew members toured each other’s respective countries, staying in the homes of ordinary citizens, and performing together at numerous public events. The 46 day sail across the Atlantic deepened his understanding of how music can overcome many of the barriers that separate people.

Upon returning, he worked with funding from the Federal Department of Education’s Magnet School Program, to create a new environmental education and wooden boat building program, designed to unite two adjacent but racially isolated school districts. Students created two elegant 26 foot “Whitehall” rowing gigs, Wysquaqua and Legend, which are still  in active service at waterfront events throughout the northeast.

He shared his song leading and song writing skills in workshops and in-services for staff from many organizations, including: Westchester County Parks and Recreation; the Light House for the Blind; the Girl Scouts of America; and classroom teachers from schools all over the country.

He has appeared on radio, television, and as bassist, percussionist, or backup vocalist on the recordings of numerous musicians. His award winning song, “It Really Isn’t Garbage Till You Throw It Away” has been recorded by dozens of artists, including on his own CD, “Dinner Alone is a Bore”. It’s also featured on Pete Seeger’s new recording, “Tomorrow’s Children’, produced by Dan and his partner Dave Bernz, and recently released on Appleseed Records. It features the “Rivertown Kids”, a group of elementary and middle school students from Pete’s hometown of Beacon, NY, who have been working and performing with Dan and Pete over the last four years. The Kids have written many songs themselves that explore the rich history and natural wonders of the beautiful river they live beside, as well as the problems of pollution and social justice they will have to face as they grow up. Several of their songs are featured on this new recording. The recording has been nominated for a Grammy as this year’s best new recording for children.

PERFORMING WITH STUDENTS AND TEACHERS AT HELLEBAEK FRISKOLE.  THE MONTH-LONG TOUR DURING LAST NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER INCLUDED SONG WRITING WORKSHOPS AND CONCERTS AT SCHOOLS, LIBRARIES, COFFEEHOUSES, AND ARTS FESTIVALS  THROUGHOUT DENMARK.  (Photo’s by Inga Geist)   

Link to Danish concert info: Koncertplakat_Dan_Einbender