John Meldrum’s Story
The Power of Song from a Citizen of the World
It all started in Ghana in the summer of 1995. I'd been playing High Life music in Paris for 5 years with some terrific Ghanaian musicians, and when my wife and I were invited to visit their country, I wrote a song to sing with some school children in a village near Kumasi. It is called " Brother, Brother " and it shows how one song can help change many people's lives, including my own.
" Under the sun, under the moon / We breathe the air, one on one, me and you,
There must be a way, to live in Peace / No gun, no fight, no war, no poverty. "
I have sung this song with 650 children from 26 different countries at the UNESCO auditorium in Paris for the 1998 Children's Summit, and also with a choir of 500 children and adults at the Voix sur Berges Festival in 2008 and 2009.
I'm an American composer living in Paris, France for over 20 years and have worked in many different styles with musicians from all over the world. I recently spent over three years researching, composing and orchestrating a large scale work, "The Peace Oratorio" based on the lives of Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King. Sung in English, this song cycle for choir, soloists, string orchestra and a band received its premiere performance on March 28th, 2009 at the Rencontres Chorales Festival here in Paris.
My goal with this work is twofold. First, it is to tell the story of Martin Luther King and his commitment to non-violent protest that brought change to the United States in the fifties and the sixties. Along with Gandhi and Mandela, the arc of the life of MLK is an excellent way to show people in different places that there is a credible alternative to prejudice, hatred and violence.
Secondly and most importantly, my goal is to mix singers in the choir from different communities that might not normally sing together, thereby using the power of song and the act of singing together to overcome fear of " the Other ". We are currently working towards a performance of The Peace Oratorio for World Peace Day on September 21st, 2010 here in Paris with members of a children's choir, a gospel choir, a classical choir, a gay and lesbian choir and a Basque men's choir. All of the different singers get together to create a unique sound and the special feeling that singing together gives. Hopefully, well after the songs have been sung, the feeling of community and belonging will linger in the hearts and minds of the singers as well as the audience.
My personal commitment is to excellence in singing. Practicing together, blending voices in tune with the music, choir members incarnate a living, breathing example of how disparate communities can live and work together peacefully. The songs can be learned with MP3s, lyrics and scores available on the website http://www.peaceoratorio.org.
I hope to perform the work with local choirs in different parts of the world that best represent the need for positive change that singing together can help bring about. Telling the stories of Martin Luther King, Gandhi and Nelson Mandela in song will be a testament of hope and an inspiration to people to set aside their differences and to create harmony from strife.