A celebration of original music from a group of talented young musicians is set for next week.
Waking Life Records presents their album release concert featuring original music from the Chatelech grad class of 2005 next Thursday and Friday. Three shows are planned: June 16 at 7 p.m. and June 17 at 4 and 7 p.m. at the Chatelech school theatre. Tickets are available at Talewind Books, Pier 17, Roberts Creek General Store and Coast Books, $10 for adults and $8 for students/seniors.
The CD, a double disc album featuring 28 songs, is being sold for $10 and will be available starting June 16 for purchase at Talewind Books, Pier 17, Roberts Creek General Store, the Gumboot, Lucy's, Palmeros, Radio Shack in Sechelt, Shell in Wilson Creek, Coast Books, Halfmoon Bay General Store and Mason Place Convenience Store. All proceeds from the concert and album sales will go to charity.
"Our music is very easy listening and will be enjoyed by all audiences," said producer and musician Daniel Kingsbury. "We'd like people to get past the stereotype that all teenagers play is heavily distorted guitars and rap music. All the music on the album is original. We wrote, produced and recorded it all ourselves. We hope the whole community will be supportive of our efforts."
Waking Life Records is an independent record label founded and established by a group of Grade 12 students from Chat.
The idea to record and produce an album of original music came in December of 2004.
"The project evolved out of endless jam sessions and serenades, a particularly impressive annual school talent show and a realization that the Grad Class of 2005 had an unusually large amount of talented and passionate young musicians. So Waking Life Records was born," said Kingsbury. "Initially, the dream consisted of recording in the video productions room with primitive and basic equipment and producing an album that we could make copies of ourselves and sell within the school. On the first day back to school after the Christmas break, our recording idea was discussed with Karen Tigert, the school's music teacher, who enthusiastically agreed to support us. She pulled out brand new microphones and recording equipment from her office and gave us a small room within the band room that would become our own recording studio and office. This was way beyond our expectations."
It was decided then that the group would create a full-scale, double-disc album of the best quality possible.
"We began to lay out a plan to reach our final goals: the completion of a double-disc album of entirely original music, the professional printing and pressing of 500 copies of our album to be sold around the Sunshine Coast and the planning and performance of album release concerts in mid-June," Kingsbury added. "We also thought it would be best to donate all the proceeds from album and ticket sales to a charitable cause. After some research, we decided to make our donation to the Sunshine Coast Community Services Society with the idea that the money would be put towards programming for youth.
"Our hope is that youth at risk will be given the opportunity to take music lessons with these funds and that they will be empowered to create original music and given the ability to record it. Basically, we see our project as youth helping youth."
The project officially began the first day of the second semester, but it wasn't until spring break that the musicians actually began recording. The first month and a half was spent writing music, planning, fundraising and waiting for additional and integral equipment to arrive in the mail.
By the time spring break rolled around, the group had set up and learned how to use a fairly impressive recording studio.
"To our good fortune, the school granted us permission to pack up the studio and take it home during spring break," Kingsbury added. "So off to Roberts Creek we went and installed the studio in a tiny cabin on a friend's property. The long journey of recording began in the cabin, and several days later, when it was time to return to school with our equipment, we had broken the ice. From then on things got serious and we recorded in our studio every day possible. Often many of us would be at school for 10 hours a day working on the project. "A lot was been learned in the last few months and we encountered some interesting situations working together with so many different personalities. But in spite of all the stress and drama brought about by this mammoth task, we fulfilled our goal and we are proud."
