So, here’s our little secret: we’re having more fun than anyone.
In 2009, as a pre-cursor to the founding of OneVoice, Robbie Schaefer musically connected two schools with one another: The Brain Tree School in Kyanga, Uganda and the Shipley School in Bryn Mawr, PA. In 2011, OneVoice expanded upon that template to connect the Shepherds Jr. Primary School with 29 schools and kid-powered organizations across the U.S.–a project that culminated in the building of Shepherds Secondary School, which opened this past February in Tanzania. At our annual Board meeting in December, 2011, it became evident that OneVoice was ready to stretch again.
The Board saw that it was important to deepen our relationships with East Africa and the U.S. while expanding to communities in other parts of the world as well.
And so, OneVoice, OneHeart was born. This project will take us from The Kakenya Center For Excellence (www.kakenyasdream.org), a school for girls in Enoosaen, Kenya, to schools in South America/Caribbean, and finally, the U.S. Our intention is, as always, to share, learn, and teach music, and to use that creativity to connect these schools with one another.
This year, we will also help the schools to create a collaborative recording–one song created by many schools around the world. In addition, we will for the first time, be adding a visually artistic element to our visits. Painter and visual artist Jolene Hemeon will be joining OneVoice in this endeavor, and traveling with us to help each child to paint a heart–their own heart–as well as one larger shared heart that mirrors the collaborative song we will be recording.
Together, the hundreds of hearts from three continents will be brought back to the U.S. for a year-end multi-media exhibit in Washington, D.C., which will include the individual and collaborative paintings, video, photos and music of and by children from across the globe. The exhibit, and the artwork, will serve to raise funds for Hearts For Kids (thapk.org), a non-profit in Kenya that “provides life-saving surgery, support, resources and hope to families of underprivileged children in Kenya and East Africa suffering from heart defects and disease”.
Imagine. Children from all over the world expressing their hearts through art and music, in order to literally heal the hearts of other children. OneVoice. OneHeart. We are all connected.
Power to the (little) people