Landfill Harmonic: Amazing Instruments Built from Trash,In the slums of Cateura.

" MY life would be worthless without music"


Landfill Harmonic: Amazing Instruments Built from Trash

In the slums of Cateura, Paraguay, everyday struggles don’t involve rush hour traffic, gas prices or unpaid vacation days. Rather, living itself becomes a primary concern, as poverty strikes this area of the world especially hard. However, within this community built surrounding a landfill, an extremely unique development has risen for its children.

Its residents, who recycle the trash of the landfill and sell it to make money, have constructed a full orchestra of instruments from these thrown away items. Now, the children of the community have formed a full orchestra and are able to play music together.

youtu.be...



From the trash, sort of like making lemon-aid from lemons, shows you want mankind is capable of when they set their minds to it.

reply to post by Stormdancer777

What a moving story with crafty innovation. The instruments sound really good. I got mixed feelings of course, seeing how some people live and their environment. Not that I am unaware such places exist, but to actually get a peek into the culture and ecology. Always good to see the power, connecting, healing and inspiration music provides...apparently anywhere and with limited resources.
Nice find and thanks for bringing it onboard.

Some pics for those that can't watch vid:



ETA:

Thanks to the orchestra, we were in Rio de Janeiro! We bathed in the sea, on the beaches of Ipanema and Copacabana. I never thought my dreams would become reality," said Tania Vera, a 15-year-old violinist who lives in a wooden shack by a contaminated stream. Her mother has health problems, her father abandoned them, and her older sister left the orchestra after becoming pregnant. Tania, though, now wants to be a veterinarian, as well as a musician.

The orchestra was the brainchild of Chavez, 37. He had learned clarinet and guitar as a child, and had started a small music school in another town in Paraguay before he got a job with an environmental organization teaching trash-pickers in Cateura how to protect themselves.

Chavez opened a tiny music school at the landfill five years ago, hoping to keep youngsters out of trouble. But he had just five instruments to share, and the kids often grew restless, irritating Chavez's boss.

So Chavez asked one of the trash-pickers, Nicolas Gomez, to make some instruments from recycled materials to keep the younger kids occupied.

www.newser.com...

Peace,
spec

I absolutely adore this! The first quote you have rings so true.

As a hired musician around 20 years ago, an older cousin and his wife come to one of my gigs. One thing I really dig is watching the ladies dance while I'm performing (I dig it even more when they come and dance with me as I'm playing --- but that's been a rare occasion).

The day after the show, he made a comment that stayed with me until this day. He said: "you know cousin, you do something that makes people meet and fall in love together!", and he's absolutely right! Music has a type of power that I just can't explain... I can only express it through performance.

I loved this video and I wish at least half the world felt the same about music than I do... if that were the case, we'd be a much happier and more beautiful civilization...

Thanks for sharing this video Stormdancer777! I felt its importance!

That was a beautiful inspiring video thanks for sharing it.
Now check out this guys coca cola trumpet

Astounding - what a great and wonderful example of the loving potential of human beings.

"Well - we shouldnt throw away people either."

Thanks.

Beautiful.

We need more threads like this on ATS.

reply to post by Stormdancer777


BEAUTIFUL OP S&f THANK YOU!

However, nothing really changes...

In the early '50s cash-strapped Brits began to play Skiffle - tunes on homemade instruments -- tea chests fashioned into standup basses, guitars made from cigar boxes, washboards for percussion, and an occasional acoustic guitar or piano. Skiffle served as an introduction to music making for tens of thousands of war-impoverished youths in the UK who could never have afforded proper instrumentation.

It was Lonnie Donegan's 1956 recording of Leadbelly's "Rock Island Line" that established skiffle, a smash that lead to a three-year skiffle craze in Britain. During that time future members of Led Zeppelin, The Hollies, The Beatles, and The Rolling Stones cut their teeth on the style, but as the rock craze replaced it and instruments became more affordable, these musicians formed rock bands based on the likes of Johnny Burnette's Rock and Roll Trio and Buddy Holly's Crickets.

reply to post by AscendedGodMan2012A star for your nod to good ol' Rockabilly!

Neat...

Instruments from recycled stuff isn't that new though. I remember checking similar stuff out on pre-history of rock music. Some depression era steel guitars were made like this, from found bits and pieces. (A few blues legends supposedly learned to play the way they did on home-made guitars before they became famous.) Later on, other developments with steel guitars lead to the creation of the electric guitar - early models of which were pretty much ad-hoc too.

And I'm sure this kind of thing goes back even further, just something to do with human ingenuity.

Sometimes what's really surprising though is the quality of sound that can be had from junk (doesn't occur often, but some combinations of bits and pieces have a sweet spot and seem like they're made to go together), particularly considering what people pay to get a similar timbre from instruments made using more traditional materials and methods.

Now if one of these people in Paraguay has access the internet, they could probably make some money selling these unique instruments. It's a niche market (scratch-made instruments), but one that does exist.

Really enjoyed this thread.

Also his comment in the video about: you hear that people shouldn't throw away trash, but they shouldn't throw away people either.

That is the Scarsity Program, in third world or developing/struggling countries, and in our own, so many people living below the level of needs being met, even close to home, or those struggling just above the poverty line for their families, size, where needs are just met in a spartan way, but there is no extra. No dreams developed, no future other than plugging into the slave jobs if you have health, but thrown off on the heap pile if its gone. Kept unable to live your joy, develop your gifts, thrown away.

I denounce and renounce this world. We need to notice those around us, and work to empower every single person and child.

reply to post by Stormdancer777

Here's a beautiful instrument you might not have heard of...Tankdrum. It's made from a propane tank. It's tuned to a pentatonic scale and no matter how I play it, it produces a lovely harmonious tone. My eight year old can even bang on it and it sounds wonderful!
I bought a double-side D#13 tankdrum at Tankdrum.com a few months ago and everyone loves it even though I am not the best player. I researched these instruments extensively upon purchasing. I ended up getting a Tankdrum, and I am so glad I did! Anyway, here is a link to a drum like mine (not me in the video) in case you would like to hear a tankdrum in action.