Tuesday, January 29, 2008

The Real Slumdog Kids

Ragas For Ragamuffins--Harmony For the Homeless. (see video above). Poor children of Bengaluru(Bangalore), India, listen with rapt attention to classical Indian music. To listen to stories related to this project, scroll down this page to the third black bar (More stories Vol.4) and listen to "Music for Untouchables", "Rag Picker's Daughter", "Good Intentions", and "Flower Children's Love-In".

During my four years living in Bangalore (I am from the USA) I discovered the tremendous love the local poor children had for music-- including classical Indian music, once they had the opportunity to listen to it on headphones. I would be surrounded by the kids all clamoring to listen to my headphones whenever I entered the street. So, I eventually hired a lady to make the music more available to the kids. As a result, many hundreds of poverty-level children got to listen to great music from their cultural heritage. I no longer live in India, but would encourage anyone desirous of spreading the joy of great music to children who would otherwise not have an opportunity to hear it, to do what they can to make the music available through headphones. It can be done for very, very little money.

No one is doing more to help chlidren realize their untapped potential than film director David Lynch. See the videos at: www.davidlynchfoundation.org.

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