Flag Day Jun 14 2012 - Two Call To Song Sing-along Events

Friends…Please add your voices to BWC’s Annual Food Drive & NYC Sing-along of This Land Is Your Land. And perhaps stay for a Woody Guthrie Call To SongFest as described below. Hope to see you, Ron  

 THIS YEAR: FLAG DAY THURS JUNE 14 - TWO *FREE* BLENDED EVENTS
    EVENT #1   7:00pm     ANNUAL GREAT NYC CALL TO SONG
    EVENT #2   7:20pm     A “MOSTLY WOODY” CALL TO SONGFEST See below for more details or go to www.calltosong.org

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EVENT #1  7:00pm Annual Great NYC Call To Song

a 5-Minute City-Wide One-Song Sing-along of THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND

To celebrate our nation and combat hunger

Flag Day, Thursday, June 14 at 7pm

Gather with us on the Jefferson Towers Plaza

700 Columbus Ave (bet 94 & 95 St)

Or organize your own neighborhood sing

Lyrics to “This Land” Provided

Please bring 1 or 2 cans of food for the hungry.

NYC Council Member Gale Brewer Hopes to attend.

coverage by NY1 Cable TV is also possible.

Followed by

  EVENT #2  7:20p A “Mostly Woody” Call To SongFest

Commemorating Woody Guthrie’s 100^th Birthday

OPEN MIKE & SING-ALONG

Introducing Hudson Valley Sally (www.hudsonvalleysally.com)

HOST: RON DRESSLER

Jefferson Towers Community Room

7:20-9:10pm

Song Sheets Provided!­­

All Instruments – Mandolin, fiddle, Pipes, etc. Welcome & Wanted!

SONGS WE MAY BE SINGING - MOSTLY (BUT NOT ALL) BY WOODY 

THIS TRAIN * THE CAR SONG * CLEAN-O * DEPORTEE * DO RE MI
GOIN’ DOWN THIS ROAD * HARD TRAVELIN’ * UNION MAID
HARD, AIN'T IT HARD * PASTURES OF PLENTY * PRETTY BOY FLOYD
REUBEN JAMES * ROLL ON COLUMBIA * TALKING DUST BOWL
WHO’S GONNA SHOE YOUR PRETTY LITTLE FEET * BANKS OF THE OHIO
OLD JOE CLARK * PASSING THROUGH * SO LONG, IT’S BEEN GOOD TO KNOW YOU 

Sponsored and produced by the 501c3 nonprofit, BWC (Better World Chorus)

Great NYC Call To Song This Flag Day, June 14

The weather is going to be perfect in NYC for Great NYC Call To Song This Flag Day, June 14 when we sing "This Land Is Your Land" to the WSNR-AM 620 radio broadcast. I will be leading a crowd in front of the Jefferson Towers Cooperative, 700 Columbus Ave between 94th & 95th St on the Upeer West Side of Manhattan. The District 6 NYC Council Member, Gale Brewer is expected as well as TV coverage. Those participating will be bringing cans of food for the hungry. The following is the introduction I recorded for the radio broadcast:
   
      "I’M RON DRESSLER LETTING YOU KNOW THAT EVERY YEAR ON FLAG DAY, JUNE 14TH - BWC INVITES ALL NEW YORKERS TO CELEBRATE AMERICA AND TO HELP IN THE FIGHT AGAINST HUNGER, BY GOING ONTO THE SIDEWALKS OF YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD - OR WHEREVER YOU ARE - AND IN A SPIRIT OF HARMONY AND COMMUNITY, JOINING TOGETHER TO SING JUST ONE SONG, THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND, IN A HUGE CITY WIDE SING-ALONG.
     IF YOU’RE LISTENING TO THIS BROADCAST INSIDE YOUR HOME OR VEHICLE, OPEN YOUR WINDOW, TURN UP THE RADIO AND SING OUT WITH THE REST OF US TO THE RADIO BROADCAST.
     YOU KNOW, THE BEAUTY OF SINGING TOGETHER GOES FAR BEYOND THAT WONDERFUL JOY OF SINGING THAT INFUSES OUR BEINGS AS WE RAISE OUR COLLECTIVE VOICES TO THE SKY. WHEN WE SING TOGETHER, WE DON’T ASK EACH OTHER OUR RELIGION, POLITICS, PHILOSOPHY, HERITAGE, GENDER PREFERENCES, ECONOMIC STATUS OR PAY ATTENTION TO SKIN COLOR, LOOKS OR AGE.
      ON THE CONTRARY, IN SINGING TOGETHER, WE COME TOGETHER IN A COMMON SPIRIT OF HUMANITY, REGARDLESS OF - INDEED, IN CELEBRATION OF - OUR DIVERSITY, SOMETHING SORELY NEEDED IN THESE TIMES OF EXTREME POLARITY.
     AS OF THIS MOMENT BWC IS JUST BEGINNING TO BUILD PARTICIPATION ACROSS THE CITY. BUT IF YOU’RE LIKE ME AND BELIEVE IN THE WONDER AND POWER OF SONG, WITH YOUR HELP, THE CALL TO SONG CAN GROW TO A CHORUS OF A MILLION NEW YORKERS EACH YEAR. GO TO WWW.CALLTOSONG.ORG OR THE CALL TO SONG FACEBOOK PAGE TO FIND OUT WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP. "
     As alway, yours in the wonder and power of song. Ron

Moving Into High Gear – Setting The Foundation To Go Viral

To get 1 million NYers to go onto neighborhood sidewalks to sing “This Land Is Your Land” at 7pm on Flag Day, June 14, we need to go viral. So this week BWC is setting the stage: recruiting followers and issuing updates for this blog, the Call To Song Facebook Page and Twitter (@calltosong) . We will also ask each of the 51 NY City Council Members and the 5 Borough Presidents’ Offices for help and support in this effort. You, the reader, can help by simply spreading the word and encouraging your respective friends and network to follow the Call To Song blog, Facebook Page and Twitter.

Want to help out even more? Click Here or see  the Volunteer Page on the Call To Song website, http://www.calltosong.org/. With your help and support we can have 1 million people of diverse background and all manner of stripes singing together in harmony - and providing a $1 million impetus for hunger relief in NYC.

This Land Is Your Land!

The 2010 Flag Day Great NYC Metro Call To Song - All Boroughs Represented

Thanks and kudos to all of you in the five boroughs who sang out with us during the Great NYC Metro Call To Song at 7pm on Flag Day, June 14, 2010, especially those who gathered  at 700 Columbus Ave and  Paddy Reilly’s Music Bar in Manhattan, West Williams’ Each1Help2’s group  at Burnside Ave & The Grand Concourse in the Bronx, the NYJTL Aces Club at PS42  in Queens, the Brownsville  &  Red Hook Recreational Centers in Brooklyn and Dennis McKeon’s Where-To-Turn’s group in front of Tug’s Restaurant in Staten Island.

We hope you had fun and will join us every year at 7 pm on Flag Day.

A special thanks to John Fisher and Jenny Boyd Murphy of Walkabout Clearwater Chorus who sang with me on WSNR-620AM as we led the city in "This Land Is Your Land."

Next year, with your help, we truly can get one million New Yorkers singing together – celebrating America, promoting harmony, and helping to raise $1 million for hunger relief in NYC.
Then NYC can be an example for the rest of our nation, showing that people of all manner of stripes can sing together and, despite differences, can first agree to disagree and then agree to agree, so we can get things done and move our nation forward.

So start getting your friends and neighbors, houses of worship, blocks and apartment buildings, schools & colleges, parents, community organizations, Mayor Bloomberg and our city officials -and tell the NYC Public Schools Chancellor to involve all of our schools’ kids & parents.

If you can do that, the Guinness World Records will declare NYC as the largest one city chorus ever, and tourists will come from all over the world every year to hear us sing.

The Great NYC Call To Song Is Going Live On WSNR-AM 620 Radio 7PM June 14

     Things were looking rather grim for the prospects of getting a radio station to broadcast "This Land Is Your Land" at 7PM on Monday, Flag Day, June 14. BWC contacted just about every AM and FM radio station whose signal covered the NYC Metro area. Not one station would broadcast for us. Not public radio, not college radio, not music radio, not news radio.     Then Dr. Barry Heyman, BWC Board Member par excellence, got in touch with Bronx cable TV producer, director and host, Sheran Tavarez, who got in touch with me to put me in touch with Zev Brenner of Talkline Communications, who said he could sell BWC time on WSNR-AM 620, reaching all five NYC boroughs, for Call To Song. Who knew you could "buy" radio time?
    So BWC bought 10 minutes, from 7:00p to 7:10p on Monday, June 14, and I, Ron Dressler, BWC President and resident banjo player, with the help of John B. Fisher and Jenny Boyd Murphy of Walkabout Clearwater and possibly Joel Landy of NYC Friends of Clearwater, will be leading all of NYC in singing "This Land Is Your Land" from a WSNR-AM 620 studio.  (The broadcast will be streamed on the Internet : go to  talklinecommunications.com and click on the "listen Live 24x7" icon) 
    Join us for this one-song, city-wide sing-along,help promote harmony and togethernes, celebrate what's good - and can be good - in America, and ehlp raise $1 millions to combat hunger. Further details and song lyrics at BWCny.org.
    YITWAPOS (Yours In The Wonder And Power Of Song)
    Ron
ps - Now that I know BWC can buy radio time if we can't get a radio station to broadcast for us, BWC can declare the Call To Song to be an annual event. We will start working on the 2011 Call To Song and would love your help and input. Follwo us on Twitter and Facebook (click on the links in this blog) and spread the word.

Lots To Write - Summary To Date

As I said in my first posting a month ago, I am a neophyte when it comes to social media. Some of the questions that occur to me in spreading the word about Call To Song are:

• How often should I post on this blog, should I tweet, and should I post on my Facebook page?
• Should I comment on other Facebook friends' walls - and how often?
• How much individual soliciting do I have to do to get followers before the process becomes self-generating?
• Should I use RSS feeds? If yes, how should I do that?

There is no question I need a volunteer with social media expertise.

 

I will try to post briefly daily re the following:

1. The Call To Song Fest, a monthly old style hootenanny on NYC's Upper West Side.
2. Updating the BWC website myself to include the Call To Song Fest, endorsements, and links to the Facebook Page, this blog, and Twitter.
3. Reaching out to: NYC's block associations and community boards, celebrity singers, unions and associations, political parties
4. Getting (and not getting) volunteers.
5. Getting (and not getting) fundraisers to work on commission only. 
6. Getting a radio station to broadcast This Land Is Your Land at 7pm on Flag Day

Yours in the wonder and power of song,
Ron
   

BWC IS CALLING YOU TO SONG

Hi. I’m Ron Dressler. I’m starting this blog because I think I have a way to help bring our nation together in these highly polarized and fractured times. I have no connections, resources or funding. But I do have an idea.
It’s a simple idea, really, involving only a tiny sliver of time and very little effort on the part of most Americans. Read on and perhaps you’ll agree and want to join the effort.

How does a guy who is without resources or funding and who is not independently wealthy attempt something as lofty as trying to bring a nation together you ask? Perhaps this is how:
• First, he comes up with the idea.
• Then he quits his job to give his entire waking life to the vision.
• He decides to start small and begin with just one city and the surrounding area.
• He awakens BWC, his dormant 501(c)3 unfunded neophyte non-profit formed to harness the power of song for the common good, and issues a Call To Song™.
• He puts the idea on Facebook despite not knowing a thing about social media or Facebook itself.
• He starts a Twitter account despite not knowing a thing about social media or Twitter itself.
• He starts this Call To Song™ blog in hopes that someone will read it.
• He asks you to please FOLLOW THIS BLOG,  to become a FAN of the "CALL TO SONG" FACEBOOK PAGE, and to FOLLOW CALLTOSONG on TWITTER.

Do please spend a moment more and read the Call To Song™ description that follows. Oh, and one more thought:

“A nation that sings together can talk together. A nation that talks together can build together. A nation that builds together moves forward together. Such is the wonder and power of song. “

Yours in the wonder and power of song,

Ron

ps Please follow us on Twitter and become a fan of the Call To Song Facebook page.

THE GREAT NYC METRO CALL TO SONG™

BWC (Better World Chorus™), our 501c3non-profit, was created with the idea of uniting people through song as well as fostering volunteering and fundraising.

We at BWC are thrilled to announce our newest plan of action, Call to Song™ which calls for one million people in and around New York City to come outside of their homes and apartments onto their sidewalks for 5 minutes at 7 pm on Flag Day, June 14th, 2010 to sing "his Land is Your Land"to a live radio broadcast along with their neighbors, family and friends. And if you can’t come outside, just crank up your radio and sing out your window – or car – with the rest of us.

This 5 minute one song sing-along blast will bring together people of all manner of social, political, economic and ethnic stripes, and will bridge together all the communities of Metro NYC’s many diverse neighborhoods – as well as celebrate America – and will help raise $1 million for hunger relief in greater NYC.