written by Gabriela Lena Frank
Yesterday, after almost a month of rain and floods here in California -- unreal and biblical -- Jeremy and I enjoyed several hours of very welcome sunshine. What struck us was how much life there was everywhere, a testament to how the earth wants to grow, to exist in health, to be a paradise even after the stresses humans have imposed on it.
Read Morewritten by Iman Habibi
In the wunderschönen month of May, the foliage in Ontario transitions (over a few days) from lifeless frozen grey to a tropical rain forest with a hundred shades of green.
Read Morewritten by Dustin Carlson
I have been playing the guitar now for over 25 years. The pursuit has always been one of attempting to unite my soul’s expression with the physical act of touching an instrument, in between my soul and the guitar exist the two realms of my mind and my body.
Read Morewritten by Michael-Thomas Foumai
Just out of school in 2014, I witnessed childhood friends, relatives, and peers who pursued non-musical careers make tangible changes and developments to improve their communities. Writing music gave me great joy, but I questioned if there was a purpose for it that was equally wholesome. The question lingered, could composing music enact change as a doctor treating a patient, an attorney representing a client, or a senator voting for public policy?
Read Morewritten by Gabriela Lena Frank
Dear Composing Earthers,
Since our last meeting, I’ve been compiling a list of questions that I’ve received over these past 18 months in various interviews, panels, etc., since I began publicly communicating my environmental alarm in earnest, not just casually. I’ll share two such questions I’ve received, one that comes up a lot, innocently, and one that has come up just once, hostile.
Read Morewritten by Matthew Evan Taylor
The green and white, two-story ranch house on Dandridge Road in the Hillman Estates neighborhood of Birmingham, AL was built by Herman (Steeplejack) A. Taylor Sr. and Earnestine C. Taylor in 1968.
Read Morewritten by Timothy Peterson
I’ll never forget my first encounter with Shaun Tan’s work. Back in 2015, I was enrolled in an undergraduate seminar on migrant literature, and one of the texts on the course syllabus was his wordless graphic novel, The Arrival (2006).
Read Morewritten by Iman Habibi
It has been years since I truly celebrated Norouz, the Persian new year, which welcomes the rebirth of nature with the spring equinox.
Read Morewritten by Gabriela Lena Frank
I hope everyone is doing well. I confess I have no great revelations today, so I thought I would share with you a discovery from a few months ago.
Last Christmas, I received a beautiful gift from my parents. They were up in Boonville from Berkeley, enjoying our (long-labored) remodel of our central room that all of you know. Christmas was already a day or two past, and I didn't immediately follow when Mom gave me an old shoebox, nonchalant-like. The contents rattling around inside turned out to be Maxwell cassette tapes, the kind from the 70s with the extra boxy cases and orange stripes. When I opened the cases, my editor Dad's handwriting, familiar and precise, electrified me.
Read Morewritten by Erika Oba
Back when I was an environmental studies student at Oberlin College in Ohio, many of my colleagues and mentors were involved in activism protesting mountaintop removal coal mining. It is a hugely destructive practice with wide ranging ecological and public health impacts, and the Appalachian mountains have been particularly harmed by it.
written by Nicolàs Lell Benavides
As the parent of a toddler, I love watching him learn about the world. He seems to be happiest when he’s outside. He runs his hands through soil, holds up leaves to the sky, rolls in grass, and loves to eat fruit straight off the tree. He loves silly music, and finds trash and street cleaning days thrilling, running to the window to watch the trucks. He can’t speak in full sentences yet, but we understand that he has lots of questions, and the list of things he wants to know about is only growing. He loves to help and be helped, and he doesn’t have a concept for what it means to be talented, accomplished, or even proficient. He just asks, then tries.
written by Gabriela Lena Frank
Before all else, I want to thank you all for the wonderful meetings and Weekly Musings from the past few months. When I first started scheming up Composing Earth here at GLFCAM, I knew that its success would depend on the willingness of participants to engage personally and intellectually. Truthfully, the sum of all of your thoughts and sharing has far exceeded my hopes, and I’ve learned so much. Thank you for your commitment especially considering your busy lives.
written by Samantha Boshnack
Cycle 9, CoEarth I
Pressure on women to have children is a hard subject to write about. For instance, while I was writing this essay, I was filled with self-doubt about whether I’m being too sensitive about this issue.
Read Morewritten by Iman Habibi
GLFCAM Lucy and Jacob Frank Fellow, Cycle 4 + 9, CoEarth I
It has been years since I truly celebrated Norouz, the Persian new year, which welcomes the rebirth of nature with the spring equinox.
Read Moreby Gabriela Lena Frank and Rebecca McFaul
We just can’t catch a break. That’s the thought going through every Californian’s mind in 2020, a truly unbelievable year. In this state, a long-time “contested Eden” of opportunity, Californians have been engaged in an awful feat of juggling: COVID-19, long overdue racial reconciliation, its senator in a brawl of a presidential race, and otherworldly wildfires… Wildfires in canyons, wildfires from freak dry lightning storms, wildfires lining major freeways and incinerating urban neighborhoods, wildfires that cast a smoky dark red glow of alarm over the entire West coast. The haunting rain of ashes—remnants of ruined homes, schools, cultural centers, and dreams—is not entirely filtered by the dutiful face mask encountering virus and soot.
Read Moreby Gabriela Lena Frank
In the middle of the day, I can expect that solar lights and car headlights will turn on and the crickets will chirp as if it's dusk on Mars. What is this world?
Read Moreby Rebecca McFaul
….opening hearts and minds is, and has always been, the work of artists.”
Read Moreby Gabriela Lena Frank and Rebecca McFaul
In Boonville, California, a composer wakes from another nightmare, one of many lingering remnants of trauma wrought by two years of apocalyptic wildfires. Having left her native Bay Area to build a permaculture homestead in the rural north, she has missed concerts to stay behind with her husband during fire emergencies, and asked for extensions on pieces due. The two have become regulars at classes at the local fire station, and she watches her spouse toil daily clearing brush and felling trees to mitigate danger. On her mind, always, is Paradise, a nearby city of thousands that became a ghost town in a matter of hours in the Camp Fire of 2018. She, too, worries.
Read Moreby Gabriela Lena Frank
At the time of GLFCAM’s founding, I didn’t anticipate that one day, environmentalism would become a crucial part of its mission, that I would tie the activities of music-makers directly to Mother Earth.
Read More
