MARYLAND SCHOOL FOR THE BLIND CD PROJECT

 

PROJECT BACKGROUND

 

Irene Light, the Director of East Coast Productions for the 501 (c)(3) charity Theatre Arts Festival for Youth sent Valerie Smalkin, of Silly Goose & Val, to conduct a songwriting workshop for six blind teens at the Maryland School for the Blind. TAFFY paid Val for the first visit, and at the end of that session, Val was so impressed with the students' work that she sought additional funding for 4 more workshop sessions. Val donated another 6 sessions to refine the students' work. Val will hold 10 (as-yet unfunded) choral sessions this Fall with students at the Maryland School for the Blind and Maryland School for the Blind Statewide Outreach Service to prepare them to go into a studio and record their songs.

 

SONGS

Three songs have been completed. The rough mixes being used to teach the songs to the blind students and children are from the West Los Angeles Children's Choir.  Here they are singing Dance of Freedom.

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SPOKEN WORD

The students' original poems, unedited, will be included on the CD as Spoken Word pieces with music by the Grammy Award-winning composer/producer, Paul Avgerinos.

 

DONORS

   TAFFY Presents, a division of the 501 (c)(3) Theatre Arts Festival for Youth, through Irene Light, Director of East Coast Productions for TAFFY

1. New York Lyricist, Mike Greenly serves as a consultant and generously donated $1500 to manufacture the CD.

2. Songwriters David Kinnoin, Jimmy Hammer, Sahffi Lynne, and Val Smalkin are donating time and talent to write and arrange accompaniments.

3. Studio engineers Mark Stocker of 4:30 Entertainment and Rob Smith of Stages Music Arts have donated studio time to record the songs written by these teens.

4. Kabir Sehgal has agreed to write the CD liner notes and acts as my advisor.

5. Dirk Joseph is donating the CD artwork.

6. Paul Avgerinos is opening his Grammy award-winning music library to us to use in our spoken word pieces.

7. The West Los Angeles Children's Choir, directed by Barbara Klaskin Silberg mrsmusicent@aol.com

8. West Los Angeles Children's Choir/MrsMusic.com will be recording vocals to add to the "Dance of Freedom".

 

NB.

http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Dave_Kinnoin and http://www.loosetoothmusic.com

 

BENEFICIARIES

The first run of CDs will be given to the Maryland School for the Blind, and all other proceeds from the CD will go to the benefit of the Maryland School for the Blind or other schools for the blind who choose to use it for fundraising purposes. An additional 500 CDs will be sold at cost to donor Mike Greenly to use for publicity purposes.

JOIN US?

 

To join the team contact: Val Smalkin c/o val@smallkinmusic.com