Category: Announcements

We are honored to be one of 109 projects in 54 countries to have been included in the 2020 Music As A Global Resource compendium. This resource documents and promotes music initiatives connecting communities and addressing critical sustainable development needs on international, national and local levels.

The inception of Music as a Global Resource began through the International Council for Caring Communities (ICCC), a Non-Government Organization (NGO) that has Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC) and works with various UN partners.

The Music as a Global Resource initiative has since participated in an ongoing series of high-level UN dialogues and conferences. Since then this creative holistic approach to solutions has continued and deepened through an ongoing series of six high-level UN dialogues and conferences.

The ClimateMusic Project is excited to announce the launch of a new campaign to inspire climate action: Play for the Planet! 

We invite musicians of all stripes–amateur as well as professional–to participate by providing a brief musical answer to the question: What do you want the future to sound like? And we invite non-musicians to view, share, and be inspired by the video responses! We have already posted videos by really remarkable artists, including Laura Brehm, Scarlet Rivera, and Heitor Pereira. 

We are asking participants to call out a climate action organization that they like so that these resources can be shared as broadly as possible.  You can learn more about The ClimateMusic Project’s growing network of action partners here. Check out our campaign landing page to view the latest contributions from musicians from around the world and to learn more about how you can Play for the Planet!  

Play for the Planet is affiliated with Climate Week in New York City, which runs from September 21-27. 

Our Solutions Partners provide pathways to action in order to help our audiences to learn more about the climate crisis, take action at home and locally, and to build community around the issue to accelerate action nationally.  This month, we are delighted to shine the spotlight on Interfaith Power and Light (IPL), which inspires and mobilizes people of faith and conscience to take bold and just action on climate change.  We caught up recently with IPL’s president, the Reverend Susan Hendershot, to talk about her work. 

For those who are not aware of IPL’s work, can you provide a short description of its mission and where folks can learn more? 

The mission of Interfaith Power & Light is to inspire and mobilize people of faith and conscience to take bold and just action on climate change. We work with individuals and congregations of all religious and spiritual traditions throughout the United States through our programs and policy advocacy, providing a moral voice on the issue of global warming. To learn more they can visit our website.

How are you moving your work forward during the Covid-19 pandemic? 

The issue of climate change is as relevant and important as ever, and we remain committed to providing resources and opportunities for action to our supporters. We know from emerging research that there is a connection between those communities that are most impacted by COVID-19 and air pollution. Scientists have also predicted the spread of disease because of a warming climate. Right now we are focused on policy advocacy around what is included in the recovery packages being debated in Congress, including a moratorium on utility shutoffs, increased funding for the low-income heating assistance program (LIHEAP), no bail-outs for fossil fuels, and investment in renewable energy and green infrastructure. We also have COVID-19 resources on our website .

Are you finding that people are receptive to talking about climate during the immediate crisis of the pandemic? 

Absolutely. In fact, we have found that climate remains a top-tier issue for our supporters, and that polling of likely voters also supports this.

Tell us a little about your background.  What led you to this work? 

I am ordained clergy in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) denomination, and prior to this work I was serving local congregations. The issue that I was most passionate about was the issue of hunger, so I wasn’t giving much attention to climate change. However, I read an article about the geopolitics of food that connected the dots for me between hunger and climate change, and I realized in order to solve hunger I needed to work on climate. Because I have two sons who are now young adults, I started to recognize the issues of generational justice—that their generation would be tasked with solving a crisis that they didn’t create. This has focused my work and given it meaning, because I’m working on their behalf. Since then I’ve come to recognize all of the intersected justice issues—racial justice, gender justice, economic justice—and how centering justice in this work is critical to its solutions.

If a reader would like her/his congregation to become part of the IPL network, what steps should s/he take?

There are two great steps that a person can take. First, definitely sign up to receive our emails. This will put you on the list to receive information about programs and action alerts. For example, you can find out about our Cool Congregations program offerings, and/or sign up to be a Faith Climate Voter in 2020.

Second, check our website to see if there is a state affiliate in your state. Our affiliates are working at the state and local levels to provide programs and advocacy on state policy, and you can connect with other supporters in your area.

Once you’ve established a relationship with a congregation, how do you engage with them? What does IPL offer that that might be different from other climate advocacy organizations?

IPL has a very unique approach to our work, because we engage at multiple levels on climate change. We run programs that teach people how to lower their carbon emissions in their homes and places of worship, and in fact we just launched a new carbon calculator designed for congregations that is one-of-a-kind. 

Secondly, we focus on policy advocacy at the federal level, and with our 35 active state affiliates around the country we can also provide advocacy at the state and local levels. We are the only faith-based climate organization working at all of those levels.

And, in 2020 we are also focused on a voter mobilization campaign to turn out faith-based climate voters at the polls in November (or, more likely, to mail in their ballots.) We know that in order to enact comprehensive climate policy in 2021, we need to elect climate champions to Congress as well as to state legislatures. You can access our voter campaign  here.  

What intrigued IPL about working with The ClimateMusic Project? 

Well, first of all, I love music. I listen to some type of music every day, and I think that’s true for a lot of people. Right now I’m thinking of people singing from their balconies in Italy while they were in lockdown as a way to connect with their neighbors and their community. It’s emotional, spiritual, and engages our senses. Of course, most spiritual traditions use some type of music within their worship services, and sacred music has been around as long as religion has existed. Maybe even before.

And, we also know from research that children who are involved in music also do better when it comes to math and science, engaging and stimulating those parts of the brain. So I can’t think of anything better than bringing together music and science to help people better make a connection to climate change. The music, the visuals, it really provokes our thinking in ways that mere charts and graphs never will.

What gives you hope? 

I really love this quote from Rebecca Solnit on hope. She says, “Hope is a belief that what we do might matter, an understanding that the future is not yet written.” In other words, what I choose to do today—any actions large or small—create the future. The outcome is not predetermined. It’s true, we need to act quickly in order to stave off the worst impacts of climate change, but we do have the ability to create a thriving Earth home for both current and future generations IF collectively we choose to do so. I believe that people of faith and conscience can lead the way.

Thank you for your work and partnership. 

Please join us on Wednesday, April 22, 3:00 p.m.-4:30 p.m. EDT for a free online event with The National Academy of Sciences that will explore the intersection of music, climate science, and community action.

The program will feature clips and a discussion of a previously recorded performance of Icarus in Flight, an original chamber work by acclaimed composer Richard Festinger, performed by the award winning Telegraph Quartet. Icarus in Flight is a science-guided composition that models three human drivers of climate change – population growth, fossil fuel use, and land-use change–over two centuries, from 1880-2080 based on widely accepted IPCC data.

To register for this free event, please click here.

Panelists: Richard Festinger, Icarus in Flight composer, San Francisco; William D. Collins, James and Catherine Lau Chair in Sustainability, Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of California at Berkeley; Coordinating lead author, WG1 AR6,  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; Amanda Staudt, Director, Board on Atmospheric Science and Climate and Polar Research Board, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Washington, D.C.;
Laurie Goldman, Director, Public Engagement, The ClimateMusic Project, San Francisco, California Moderator:
Barbara Stauffer, Chief of Community Programs, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

This program is part of The ETERNAL Experience series taking place throughout spring 2020 at NAS, organized by LabX and Cultural Programs of the National Academy of Sciences

On March 31st we were delighted to have had the opportunity to screen a version of “Climate” for 120 people via a Zoom event in collaboration with Francesco Cara (Climate Reality Project, Milan, Italy) and the International Institute of Architecture, based in Switzerland.

The event, “Il clima che cambia” (“The Changing Climate”), launched a five-week series of short films and conversations on the climate crisis. This first event included the participation of Serena Giacomin, meteorologist and climatologist of the Epson Meteo Center and President of the Italian Climate Network, as well as an opportunity for the participants to engage on the topic. Laurie Goldman, a member of our Executive Team, gave an overview of our work in Italian!

We are excited to announce that The ClimateMusic Project is receiving media coverage by several global newspapers and radio stations, including a profile this week in The New York Times! Read the article here and watch for additional upcoming international coverage on our In the News Page.

Our on-going collaboration with the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Technology and Applied Composition Program (TAC) culminated again this year with a concert of student ClimateMusic compositions. This year’s show took place at San Francisco’s Exploratorium on the evening of May 9th.

TAC Studio Director Taurin Barrera’s Theory of Musical Synthesis students grappled over the semester with the realities of climate change, as introduced by our very own Dr. Alison Marklein. Alison prepared multiple narratives about climate change drawing from the science and backed by data for the students’ exploration and use, and composer Erik Ian Walker talked with the students about his experience in composing Climate as well. Each student then wrote custom software to translate historical climate data and predictive data models into electronic instruments and musical parameters. With this data as the seed, the young composers premiered a range of remarkable compositions exploring the urgent issue of climate change through sound.

We will be posting a few recordings from the show soon! In the meantime, here are photos of just a few of the performances.

We are honored to announce that Dr. Whendee Silver and Dr. David Ackerly have joined our Science Advisory Committee.

DR. DAVID ACKERLY

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY

Dr. Ackerly is the Dean of the College of Natural Resources (CNR) and a faculty member in integrative biology with research interests in climate change impacts on biodiversity, integration of phylogenetics and ecology, and conservation biology in relation to 21st century climate change. He has most recently been working on programs that bring together multidisciplinary teams to explore broad research areas including the effects of climate change on biodiversity, the integration of phylogenetics and ecology and novel approaches to conservation biology. In the past decade, as a senior fellow at the Berkeley Institute for Data Science and member of the Berkeley Initiative in Global Change Biology steering committee, he has been increasingly involved in data-intensive projects. David received his B.A. in biology from Yale University in 1984 and his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1993. He is a fellow of the California Academy of Sciences and the Ecological Society of America, as well as a recipient of the Berkeley Graduate Division’s Distinguished Faculty Mentor Award.

DR. WHENDEE SILVER

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY

Dr. Silver is the Rudy Grah Chair and Professor of Ecosystem Ecology and Biogeochemistry in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management at U.C. Berkeley. She received her PhD in Ecosystem Ecology from Yale University. Her work seeks to determine the biogeochemical effects of climate change and human impacts on the environment, and the potential for mitigating these effects. The Silver Lab was recently awarded the Innovation Prize by the American Carbon Registry. Professor Silver is a fellow of the Ecological Society of America and was named a University of California Climate Champion for 2016 for outstanding teaching, research and public service in the areas of climate change solutions, action and broad engagement.April 4, 2019

ClimateMusic at the Exploratorium, May 9th!

Join us for an evening of exploration at the intersection of music, technology, and science! We have been working with students from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Technology and Applied Composition Program this semester to see what happens with you mix our science team with really creative and talented young composers. The results will be presented at a public concert at San Francisco’s Exploratorium starting at 9:00PM on May 9th! This will be a fascinating evening with eight separate performances over the course of an hour. We look forward to seeing you there!

We have the honor to announce that Arup Fellow and Director of Global Foresight + Research + Innovation at Arup, Dr. Chris Luebkeman,is joining our Leadership Council. In this capacity he will add his broad expertise and global perspective to a group of distinguished advisors who counsel The ClimateMusic Project on all aspects of its development.

Dr. Chris Luebkeman

At Arup, Chris works with some of the world’s leading companies to develop a better understanding of the opportunities created by change in our built environment. He promotes the highest standards of design and technical skill to ensure that Arup is one of the world’s leading practitioners in its chosen fields. He is an active participant in conferences ranging in scope from those of the Design Futures Council to TED and the World Economic Forum. Chris worked with the LTA of Singapore to craft their Autonomous Vehicle adaptation strategy, Qualcomm on their Connected Street Program, and with the executive council of the MTR of Hong Kong on their strategic plan 2030. His architectural practice focused on low-impact zero-energy homes; his engineering practice on mobile and deployable structures, and his teaching practice on the integration of building systems.

Chris has served as faculty member at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, University of Oregon, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Welcome, Chris!