Feel Good Friday - Music Maker Relief Foundation

It's Friday and time to celebrate with more music. This organization came to my attention courtesy of my brother - thanks, Jon!

Today's group is the Music Maker Relief Foundation. Their aim is to preserve the musical traditions of the South by directly supporting the musicians who make it. They partner with traditional artists over the age of 55 with a yearly income of less than $18,000.

Their Musician Sustenance program provides grants to help with monthly bills for medicine, food and housing, while their Musical Development program works with musicians to develop their talents, book stage shows and record their works. Not only does this give the musicians earned income from performances and royalties but it introduces them to new audiences around the world.

You can learn more about the organization in this 4 minute video: Music Maker Relief Foundation.

Since their founding in 1994, they have partnered with over 300 artists, issued over 150 CDs and reached over a million people with live performance in over 40 states and 17 countries around the globe. It's a home grown Buena Vista Social Club!

Go to the Music Maker YouTube Channel if you want to see some of the live performances. Call me when you've found the one of the grandma who plays the guitar behind her head! For real. (I can't share the links to everything can I?)

If you've got an idea of a group or person I can blog about - let me know.  Next week, the Feel Good Friday thank you shout out may go to you!

Feel Good Friday - Landfill Harmonic

Several of these Feel Good Friday posts have been focused on people making art from trash.  Well this week, trash becomes music.


In the town of Cateura, Paraguay, most residents earn their living sorting through the trash and selling the bits that can be recycled or reused. They also pull out parts to make musical instruments for the local children who play in "The Recycled Orchestra".

I encourage you to watch the trailer for Landfill Harmonic, a documentary film in production, that follows the stories of a few of the children in the youth orchestra.


It's 3:27 minutes long and will make you want to a) dig out that musical instrument you've had in your garage since 5th grade to see if you can still play it, b) pull bottles and cans out of your recycling bins to build a drum set and c) keep an eye out for the release of the film.

If you thought the story of the boy making windmills in Malawi made you cry, I'm just warning you now, you might want to have a Kleenex handy.

Enjoy it?  Well then, share this link with your friends, post it on your Facebook page, "like" Landfill Harmonic's Facebook page  and start checking the movie listings in 2014 so you can be the first on your block to see the film.

If you've got ideas for other projects, people or groups you'd like to see mentioned in a Feel Good Friday post - send me a message and let's make it happen!

Feel Good Friday - GreenHouse

Last week we learned of a young girl in South Carolina growing fruits and vegetables to donate to food banks in her community.  This week, we go to New York to check in on a horticultural training program behind bars.

Since 1996, the Horticultural Society of New York has run GreenHouse.  Based on Rikers Island, it's dedicated to reducing the recidivism rate by offering men and women who are incarcerated an innovative jail-to-street program using horticultural therapy as a tool to prepare them for reentry. 

GreenHouse provides remedial education, skill development and vocational training in horticulture. Hands-on experience includes designing, installing and maintaining the multi-use gardens, and the design and construction of garden fixtures. Upon graduating from the program on their release, they have the option to join the GreenTeam, a vocational internship program. 
There is also a new education program, Project Jailbird, which has the prisoners spot, describe and record migratng birds that stop at the feeders placed throughout the garden.  While there is no Birdman of Rikers, the goal is to contribute the Rikers data to the Great Backyard Bird Count, managed by Audubon and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

How is the progam working, you ask? Prisoners in the general population at Rikers Island have a 65% recidivism rate, those in the GreenHouse program? 10%.  I am going to water my plants as soon as I finish typing.

You can read more details about the program and people in it in this article by Maria Finn or go online to check out Doing Time in the Garden, a comprehensive guide to in-prison and post-release horticultural training programs written by James Jiler, the former Director of the program.

Love what The Hort is doing and want to learn even more and see some of the Rikers gardeners? Check out their video Changing Lives.