During this episode of Why Change? co-hosts Ashraf and Jeff discuss inspiration, perseverance, and a return to normal. Ashraf shares the first part of a two-part interview with the band Distant Cousins, who wrote the theme song for this podcast. They talk about their music-making process and work with young people in schools. The episode concludes with the ideas of honesty and profundity and the impacts those concepts have on our work as musicians and educators.
In this episode you’ll learn:
How Distant Cousins approaches music-making as artists and with young people;
What DIY culture has to do with music and social change; and
The role of honesty in approaching work as musicians and educators.
Check out some of the things mentioned during this podcast, including:
Lights On song by Distant Cousins
Creative Generation’s work on Distributed Collective Leadership
ABOUT DISTANT COUSINS
Distant Cousins is an Los Angeles-based indie-pop band which actively produces hit music featured in television, films, and commercials while also working with young people in schools. Formed in 2013, the band is composed of Dov Rosenblatt, Duvid Swirsky, and Ami Kozak.
WHERE YOU CAN FIND DISTANT COUSINS:
This episode of Why Change? A Podcast for the Creative Generation was powered by Creative Generation. It was produced and edited by Daniel Stanley. Artwork by Bridget Woodbury. Music by Distant Cousins.
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Jeff M. Poulin
This is Why Change? The Podcast for Creative Generation. We are your hosts. I'm Jeff.
Karla Estela Rivera
Hola. Hola, soy Karla.
Rachael Jacobs
It's Rachel here.
Ashraf Hasham
What's good, y'all. I'm Ashraf.
Madeleine McGirk
And I'm Madeleine.
Jeff M. Poulin
Why Change is a podcast that brings listeners around the globe to learn how arts, culture and creativity, especially as applied by young people, can change the world, one community at a time. You're invited each week to learn and laugh while exploring the question Why change? Alright, let's get started.
Welcome to this episode of The why change podcast I am your host, Jeff M. Poulin. And I'm joined here by my co host Ashraf Hasham. Ashraf, how are you?
Ashraf Hasham
Yo, Jeff, I'm good. I'm actually in LA. You know, as some of the listeners know, I stay in Seattle. And I just needed to get out of town with the COVID vaccinations.I, because I work in art education, got my vaccine like two plus months ago, so we've been planning this trip since the day I got vaccinated. I kind of went home and I was like, I gotta get out of here. So I brought my rollerblades. I brought some books and went to Venice Beach in LA, and I'm still in Venice. It's amazing.
Jeff M. Poulin
That does sound amazing, I am so jealous that you are near the ocean. That is a rejuvenating thing for me. But I really hope that it helps you come out of the craziness of the last few months and really get into that space to read and to think, and to rollerblade. I love that I'm sure there's a lot of creativity that happens on the rollerblades around Venice.
Ashraf Hasham
Yeah, totally. And it's just like driving a car, right? Like you just have weird thoughts. You just gotta continue with and you work some stuff out on your own, right, there's something about physical activity in that way. And something about travel and motion in that way too. In fact, like the other day, I was, and actually this a conversation I had with the Distant Cousins who I interviewed last week, while I was on vacation, which was super fun. But I saw this young person with, you know, a Lakers jersey on who had this, this soccer ball, and they were trying to get into a basketball hoop and they were doing this move, like, I gotta say, like, 50 60 70 100 200 plus times. And I only saw maybe 50 of them, right. But they were there for a long time before me and probably a long time after me. But their resilience, they're trying, they're trying again, they're trying again, and again, like I just, there's some part of me that relates to that. And some part that’s like, I would never do that, right? Like, that's not quite me. And yet I was so inspired by the idea of somebody just taking the time knowing that it's gonna take a while. And then having this sort of outcome that you're aiming towards, right? Like there was a phone on the ground with a tripod. So somebody was obviously trying to go viral. And Venice is a place to see and be seen. So ain’t nobody mad about that. I'm just, it's just kind of fascinating to think about, like the ways that I persevere and the ways that somebody like this, who's trying to get a soccer ball into a basketball who perseveres, it's a different type of perseverance, you know?
Jeff M. Poulin
Yeah, absolutely. And it's like those micro moments of inspiration that push you through. I mean, I actually recently just had a situation I was involved with, with some young people in a theater. And, you know, just seeing these kids go on to a stage, a real life stage with a real life audience albeit a very small audience for the first time in like two years. And to see them, at first, to notice the negative impact of that they hadn't been on the stage in two years. So there were new elements of stage fright and self consciousness. But then to see the pure joy and the overcoming of those obstacles, when they made it on the stage. They performed their hearts out and then came off to applause. And, you know, that is something that certainly keeps me going. And I those types of, of inspiration moments, we talked about that a lot at Creative Generation of how do we amplify those, those sort of small little nuggets that might get otherwise lost in the big sweeping dialogues that happen in our work lives around, you know, reports and grant seasons, and, you know, job interviews and all of this, but there's like those little things that really make a difference, and that absolutely inspire us to keep going with our work day in day out.
Ashraf Hasham
Yes, we're just you know… so I recently started managing our grants team, and I'm working really close to at the Seattle Office of arts and culture. I'm really close, really working with our impact assessment manager. And we're like, how do we like to tell the story about how the good these grants do? We put out so much money into the community every year and we get asked about these stories, but how can we get ahead of it? Like these grant reports come in, how about we just take, we boil it down to a sentence, two sentences, three sentences, right? Max. And part of it's the story of how we showed up in the community. And maybe it's, it's definitely not city centric, right? We don't want it to be funder centric in that sense. But we do want to say that like this, this group was trying to get these kids on the stage for a long time. And if it wasn't for this funding to come through, they may not have been able to do it, or the support that we gave them and connecting them to the parks department that had a stage open, that got to be able to lend it for that occasion, right? Like the stories of how we were able to build together something that couldn't have happened in people's zones. And sometimes that's just money. Sometimes it's a lot more than that, right? But, but let's tell a story in a sentence, let's have a whole book of sentences, right? At the end of the year, we have a whole file full of them. And we can share them with the City Council and the mayor and with stakeholders and with advocates so that we can say, “Hey, we want actually more money going into our arts and culture as we recover as a sector” right? So thinking about these bigger things, how do we actually continue, like you said, inspiring ourselves, and telling the story in a way that actually amplifies and doesn't just gas us up, but actually is a lot more strategic?
Jeff M. Poulin
Yeah that’s really interesting actually, to think about that. There's a whole process about figuring out the story to tell because that's something that has always blown my mind, right? When you work within some of the type of work that you and I do, working with funders or evaluators, or on sort of the tertiary levels, right, not not actually being the artist that works with young people, but supporting the whole infrastructure that allows for that really magic moment to happen. And in that, I always find it somewhat baffling. When you see some really amazing work happening, and you say to this person, like, that's incredible, I want you to share totally what happened. And it's like, it doesn't even faze them, because it's just what they do. That realization, when you see that light bulb go off to say, like, no, actually what you've been doing for five years, ten years, is incredible! To then see them be like, oh, wow, it really is. And to see… and it's not your right, it's not like gassing anyone up. But it's that light bulb going off realizing that like they are powerful in their work, and they are making a difference, and that other people can learn from them. And that's actually something I know, you mentioned, you talked to the band, distant cousins who are based out of Los Angeles, singing the theme song of our podcast. And, you know, right at the start of the conversation, which our listeners will hear in just a moment, but they have a realization that they themselves are teaching artists, which is a term that you and I use probably every single day to describe artists who use their artistic practice as an educational means with young people. They're not like certified educators in schools, but they are working artists who teach through the arts. And it's really interesting, because to hear that kind of light bulb go off in your dialogue, and then to hear them continue to use that language moving forward to describe their work is that exact moment of empowerment that I find so interesting.
Ashraf Hasham
Just gotta name it, you gotta label it, something that's dignified, and kind of sexy and badass, right? Like it works.
Jeff M. Poulin
Absolutely. So tell us a little bit about this interview. And then we'll let our listeners dive in.
Ashraf Hasham
Yeah, so it was super, it was, I mean, it was badass for a lot of reasons. I connected with them in a lot of ways, too, because, and I mentioned this in the interview, but I used to run a nonprofit music venue that was run by young people called the VERA project in Seattle. And it's DIY, all ages, non profit in the sense that it's volunteer run. I mean, there's definitely staff like I was, I was an executive director. We had program staff. But the center was run by young people, like young people were doing doors, and they were taking tickets, and they were doing hospitality, and lights and sound and also security and also hospitality, right? Like, they did everything. And it was all volunteer run, in that sense, right? And there were a couple of young people, key young people that got paid every night to make sure that the checks were written and that the place closed up and locked up, and they kept keys, right, like it was just all trust. And in that same sense like I'm talking to these rock stars, actually. 50,000 streams a month on Spotify, which actually is kind of a big deal. And these are the types of musicians that make like really inspiring, at least to me, really inspiring hopeful music in that sense that it's the kind of stuff that I want to listen to whenI'm on Venice Beach, right? Like it's the stuff that's like, actually I put on my external speakers and blast it while I'm on my rollerblades because it's just a good time. It's anthemic. It feels good. It's bangers as I call them several times in the interview, which again the band was a little bit uncomfortable by but I think they got used to it. They're gonna maybe use that along with the word teaching artists, those terms to describe themselves, right? But I really love that we talked about how their creativity, the way that the program in the classrooms ‘Cousins in the Classroom’ started, and how it expanded during COVID, which is a story we've heard a couple of times before. But it's fascinating to know that the little seeds you sow everywhere some of them grow and bloom in ways we never knew how. We talked about honesty, we talked about universality in music, right? Like the idea of being true to yourself actually will relate to way more people than just yourself, and to trust that. I was really inspired by, we talked about weaknesses and strengths and how collaboration helps us mitigate each other's weaknesses and add to each other's strengths. We talked about the way that that balance of those collaborative relationships help think about sort of gut instincts, and then help other people who tend to think it out, stop taking it out, right. Like it kind of helps people. It fits people's needs in a way that is a little bit elegant and a little bit kind of, it moves all the time, right? You never know what your needs are any individual day. And yet, it seems like these three, meet each other's needs every single day, regardless of what those needs are. That vulnerability they bring into it the yes and fives. Yeah, it was a great conversation. What, I know you heard it, too, What did do you think?
Jeff M. Poulin
I did, I thought it was really phenomenal for all of the reasons that you just described. And truth be told, it was such a powerful conversation, that it ran a little bit long and we had to break it into two parts. So for all of our listeners out there, in just a moment, you'll hear part one of Ashraf’s interview with Distant Cousins, and then in a few weeks, we'll release part two. So without further ado, listeners, please enjoy this conversation with Distant Cousins.
Ashraf Hasham
Hello, welcome Distant Cousins. I am thrilled to introduce you to the Why Change? podcasts. You know, we always call all of our guests why change rock stars but actually you are rock stars and not just any rock stars, y'all are composers, producers, singer songwriters, multi instrumentalists, teaching artists and like a really big deal in the folk pop world. Y’all also work with students to make music, increase cultural understanding, and build community bonds through a classroom project called Cousins in the Classroom. You've been known to incorporate your faith into your music and create modern, anthemic, feel good bangers. And actually, our podcast theme song came with the band, a song I've listened to all week. Honestly, it's so good. And it's so short that I want to keep listening to it over and over and over again. So whatever you're doing, it's working. And obviously the young people love it. So let's just start off like let's go around.
Ami
I love that term teaching artists I appreciate that's a that's a cool way…
Ashraf Hasham
Yes, that's your first time hearing that term?
Ami
We are teaching artists it's cool. Yeah. And, and the Cousins in the Classroom thing you talked about too, which is, we could talk about as well. I mean, it's I liked that I liked I loved also.
Duvid
I loved big bangers.
Ashraf Hasham
You all make the bangers, it's true. I mean, like, especially the songs you made with young people for me sounded like, Whoa, this is like highly produced. It has that sort of like, the stomp clap situation, which is just like so. I mean, I'm at the beach right now. So like I already have the mindset for some stomp clap fingers. But yeah, I think it's it's it's quite amazing how young people feel like they themselves can produce such bangers on their own, especially with y'all there too. Tell us about yourselves, maybe how arts education played a role in your lives growing up, and anything else you want to share with our audience. Who wants to go first?
Dov
I'll start. Well, first of all, thanks for having us. We've loved you know, working with you guys too, with Creative Generation, and Jeff, and so we're excited to be on here with you. So yeah, so the three of us have been friends and fans of each other's music for a long time. We’ve crossed paths through different bands that we were in. And then we found ourselves all living like five minutes away from each other in LA. And then we quickly start… we, I think our first session together, we came up with one of our first songs called ‘on my way’ and that really, you know, title and everything spoke for itself and we felt like there was this chemistry and so we've been working together every day since. And so we yeah, like you said, I mean we do, we have a lot of different avenues I guess for our creative endeavors. We have you know, our band, regular just albums that we put out on Spotify. So I think you were talking about our song ‘lights on’ which we love. That's the intro, thank you. And, and then we do some songwriting for, with other artists. And then through that we started this whole Cousins in the Classroom songwriting workshop which is now in the last year really taken off just because it's, you know, by nature, it's virtual, we do it on zoom with all these groups, so we can get in, get into that. But I'm trying to think, I mean, I think the first experience I had was I specifically remember my first grade teacher, always having a guitar every morning. And that like, right away, that kind of had a big influence on me without me realizing it at the time. But you know, it's something, something as simple as that, just realizing that music, you know, as you can appreciate music on its own, and it can be a vehicle to, you know, to teach to bring you to other places. So I think like, really early on, it was cool for me to see that music in the classroom is, you know, it works on both sides from the teacher and the students naturally.
Ami
And it's interesting to speak to how the Cousins in the Classroom workshop itself evolved. I mean, we were doing, and that was Cousin Dov speaking, and I'm Cousin Ami, for those who were watching, as we introduced ourselves as we refer to ourselves as cousins. And when we do our workshop and our songwriting sessions, it's Cousin Dov, Cousin Ami, Cousin Duvid. But the workshop itself evolved out of us doing, you know, the typical, you know, band life sort of thing, we were on the road touring in different cities. And like Dov said, we are involved in a lot of different avenues. And we've composed for film and television and theme songs for different shows, and work with networks that have, you know, put us in positions where we have to force ourselves to be creative under certain constraints with certain direction, and almost, you know, deal with creative projects as assignments to us. That really helped us form a certain craft and sensibility of how to write music in that way. So we wanted to take that and share it with students, and we found ourselves at a gig in New Orleans playing for a local community. And they asked us if we would do a songwriting session with their local schools and community centers. And we did that and we kind of for the first time, put together a workshop and worked with students, we just saw how inspired they were, and how stimulated they were by this. And it was very new, they never saw it, seen writing a song from scratch, in one hour, with a little bit of direction, we were able to write and record a good amount of a song in just over an hour. And out of that, we said, well, we really have to, this was maybe two years ago, but this has real promise. And we're gonna keep doing this. So we started doing more in person as we would tour in different cities, and work with various groups in schools. And then once the pandemic came, we had to adjust everything to go fully virtual. And we're really proud of the fact that we've adapted the whole thing into this fully immersive virtual experience of writing a song from scratch in just over an hour with students all around the world. And it's been amazing and inspiring.
Ashraf Hasham
Wow, all around the world, you say so because of zoom, you've been able to get out there outside of just LA classrooms or on the road where you are and go into international spaces.
That's exciting.
Ami
Exactly.
Ashraf Hasham
Duvid. Tell us about yourself, Duvid, please tell me how to pronounce your name.
Duvid
All right. Well, it's confusing. It's pronounced a lot of different ways. I grew up in Israel, and was named after my grandfather, who grew up in Poland, and then moved states. So it's sort of anything that has to do with David, dahveed, duhveed.
Ashraf Hasham
Any emphasis wherever.
Duvid
As long as you pay me it's all good. Yeah, so yeah, it's been inspiring working with people all over the world. Obviously, you know, having grown up in another country that always, you know, reaching out across borders, never feels too strange. And, and, yeah, music education. You know, I grew up in a place that was the sort of a hippie commune where almost everyone played an instrument. And it was a part of everyday life, music seeped into everything, spirituality, day to day life, people, that was their job, all of us, you know, growing up played instruments. So, to me, and I feel like with Distant Cousins, our approaches, like music seeps into everything. There's, there's no divide, you know, our families… we feel like family, we feel like a band, we feel like it's our work, we feel like it's our mission, like it's our spirit. So we just try to apply it to as many different things that we can do and love and music makes sense to us in every avenue.
Ashraf Hasham
That's beautiful. And the idea of creative constraints, creating magic and creating opportunity for you to actually make something bigger than you would have had if you had all the room and time in the world, right?. All of the resources in the world is something that I certainly relate to as well. I think many of us can. We need a little bit of borders, well maybe not borders, but certainly some parameters, you know? We need some, some, some ways for us to be able to unlock that creativity because you need struggle and you need some sort of like something that's not happening so you can work around it. For me, creativity is all about workarounds. To do that in a graceful way, it's a beautiful thing.
Ami
When you're trying to create something out of nothing that you need, potentially can be anything, then it's completely daunting and overwhelming if you don't start picking certain anchor points to direct you. So having constraints does that, it puts you in a, in a position where I can write a song about anything, okay? But what if it's going to be about this, that's going to be served for this like, then your brain can all of a sudden start to stabilize itself into something. So you have some sort of mission.
Dov
We hear that over and over again, also, with all these songwriting workshops we've done, that's actually totally taken off during this COVID lockdown. Actually, we were doing a couple of these workshops here and there, but it really wasn't a big focus. It was sort of something we could do. But once COVID started, it was like, oh, what can we do? We can't leave, we can't go on tour. So what can we and we started doing it and it's amazing. We keep hearing the same stories from everyone we work with as well about all these incredible things that have come out of these limitations and these constraints we've been under. So it all again, it all sort of melts together into this beautiful, creative endeavor that we're on.
Ashraf Hasham
And the flexibility that you have to like really makes those shifts and changes as though it's water, you know, just moving across living life and trying to do what makes sense economically, financially. And of course, what feels good. And that's something that I appreciate about you all is that not only is the work you do in classrooms, just in general positive and inspiring, and comes from a place of abundance and love. It also, a lot of your songs, just in general, are just positive, full of love and abundance. And so is that true? Is that just me? Am I just listening to the right songs? Or do you kind of just like to move towards that end of things? And maybe you could tell us about specifically "Lights On" the theme song for this podcast as an example.
Ami
Duvid, I feel like you got it. I remember when we came in, I think I remember coming into the studio one day and you're like: “Yeah, I got this idea. What do you think of this?” And you had that first “truth is like a line, you don't need to defend it.” Like, yep, that's gold!
Duvid
Yeah. So I mean, to address the first part of the question. That's a complicated question. You know, and it's interesting, again, we've these workshops that we've been doing, and again, like, I keep coming back to it, because it's taught me so much about our own process. And, and what you know, what we've come to, I think our biggest lesson from doing these workshops is the most important ingredient… Well, in creativity, the first part is just doing it, you know, which is what we just talked about the constraints in just beginning to be creative. The second part in, in creativity is honesty. You know, if you don't feel it, nobody else can feel it. The more you feel it, the more somebody else can feel it. The, almost the more personal it is, the more universal something is right? So, honesty is really what we try for it. And we're dads…
Ami
Uh oh secret's out!
Duvid
You know, we grew up playing live music, we like a room full of people that feel good, you know, obviously, transported to me is the highest level of creativity. So sometimes it comes out positive. We always remind ourselves that it doesn't have to be positive. I don't like art that feels like it's being forced to be positive or forced to be anything. I'd like, you know, I think we'd like art that feels real and honest. And if it's positive, then wonderful. And yeah, that specific song you're talking about is about exactly that, about just being honest. Letting your real self shine through. That first quote, you know, I saw it somewhere and I you know, it's like.
Ami
We didn't even write it, that's what he's saying.
Ashraf Hasham
Shotout to the street artists of Los Angeles just givin us all this.
Duvid
Like that. I wish I could say where I saw it, but I saw that “truth is like a lion” and something like “it doesn't have to be defended,” you know, meaning like, truth is so powerful, you don't have to worry about like, you know, making sure, you don't have to prove it, it's obvious, you know?
Ami
Which I’m not sure if it's true, but it's a good line.
Duvid
Unfortunately, these days it's getting less and less.
Ami
But what's interesting about this band in particular is like that question in particular and others like it, you'll get three different answers from the three of us about how we view these things like philosophically, and I would say that having balance, it's really about honesty, and then also about balance like balance in the music itself as a final, like once as a final composition a piece of art like, and balance amongst the three of us over how we're approaching it. Sometimes I get a little too much in my head, I'm very technical, I think about like intention of a song sometimes too much as opposed to, at the risk of losing in touch, losing touch with like, my gut instinct of how something you know, feels, it's just my nature, I overthink about everything, well, how's this gonna end.I think for Duvid and Ami, they're more a little bit in touch with that sort of gut instinct of reacting in the moment. And I personally always I'm on the mission to always demystify everything that's going on musically, so I can kind of figure it out and solve that. And that's fun for me. But at the same time, it's good to have the three of us so we can balance each other out. And if you look at some of the lyrics, even on the song ‘lights on,’ the music is so you know, pumping with energy and power and positivity that you can allow for lines that feel darker, you won't even interpret them that way. And it doesn't feel too sugar coated. So I find that sometimes, you know, love is just a word when there's nobody listening. There's like, there's ideas that find their way in that I think, in conjunction with being authentic and honest, is also balanced, you know? And I think having that good flavor profile, and everything that you do is really important. And it takes collaboration, oftentimes to be able to do that.
Ashraf Hasham
Beautiful. Dov, you want to add anything?
Dov
Yeah, I agree. I mean, you also mentioned something about, you know, faith finding its way into our music, and it's, I’m just thinking of, you know, it's very similar. It's like, it's not something that we necessarily sit down and say, Oh, you know, let's try to incorporate that. But it's like, what Duvid was saying before how it's just a part of us, and it seeps its way in. It's just, it feels very authentic. I mean, again, all three of us are, you know, maybe different levels and at different places, you know, within our Judaism, but we are, we do all have that in common. And so that comes up in our discussions as friends. And so it finds its way into our music. I mean, me personally, I enjoy sometimes masking some of that, you know, it can come from a real place, and then, you know, you do something to the lyric, where not everyone who hears that would necessarily know that that's what it's about, but we know where that comes from. But yeah, but the bottom line is, is that, you know, the three of us tried whatever song whether it's our own song, or we talked about this too, in our workshop, how, even you know, we'll get songwriting briefs, like missions sent to us from networks to write for a kid show about you know, a little a goldfish or whatever, whatever it is, the point is, we always try to, you know, remove the, that mission a little bit and just talk about how can we make this, you know, a real authentic song for ourselves so that it comes off that way too, in the end.
Ashraf Hasham
That's beautiful. Yeah.
Ami
And Duvid said it too before, when he said, it starts with doing it, the more you do it and embark on the craft of creating and writing songs, you sharpen your sensibilities and identity, and solidify your identity as artists. And then the stuff that you come out with, even as it's starting out kind of tells you what it needs, you're discovering the song in real time, too. So if you start with a nugget of an idea, that's just a groove, or a lyric or a melody, it starts to tell you what will work for it. And you're kind of having that relationship with the song as you create it in real time. And you don't have to go in with as much overt intention to say, well, we need to write a positive song. We're like, if you put a baseline then and it feels good, it's telling you how it feels like, and you're reacting and responding to it. So the other stuff that comes in just starts to either, you know, accentuate or compliment or balance it out. And that's, that just comes with time and putting your more hours into the process.
Ashraf Hasham
And like you said, it's honesty, right? Like, it just comes because that's the truth of the thing. I so relate to that. In fact, just yesterday, I was taking a walk. I'm staying on Venice Beach this week, and it's just beautiful. Lovely. I mean, it's been cloudy the last couple days, but today is beautiful, lovely. And I saw this young person wearing a Lakers jersey and had a soccer ball and was finessing the soccer ball so that it would go into a basketball hoop like just doing the thing where it went behind his back, and then he was kicking it up to the hoop. And he was trying this, I swear I saw I'm doing this like 56 times or something. And none of it worked out, right? They got pretty close sometimes but the idea of just like persistence, being seen doing it, and also like he has his camera down there like recording his every move. So there's an intention around it, where it's like maybe there's a viral thing coming from this, but really it's all about trying doing it and like seeing where that takes you. And then I started reflecting on it, writing down in my notebook what I was seeing and connected it to my life. And you're right, it just kind of came out like I don't. I didn't think about the whole idea of this person, and really Venice Beach exists to be seen and to see and be seen and like this whole idea sort of came to me. And you're right, it kind of just comes with the themes, they might not be super apparent in the front. But as you start getting into it, they'll reveal themselves and he talks about trust, right? Like you're trusting yourself, trusting the collaborators, trusting the music, and you're trusting the art form to do what best.
Ami
They might disagree with me. But I would say like, you get that honesty by practicing being dishonest.
Ashraf Hasham
Mmmm… Whoa!
Ami
How do you do that if you're just starting out and just doing… it's like you're copying influences, you're taking, you're taking in all of these things. And don't interpret that really as dishonesty in the wrong way. Take it as like finding yourself just like developing a sense of self or personality like, you first have your parents as a reference, and your friends and you're absorbing other things. And eventually, you can only ever be yourself. So don't be afraid of that. And taking all these things in and maybe trying with intention. And eventually, over time, as you put in your hours of work into it, you'll arrive at something and not have to be thinking about it
Ashraf Hasham
Does that show up in the classroom? Like, is that part of you know, do you have to sort of say it? I mean, finding your voice is such a big part of this. Talk to me about that.
Dov
Yeah, it definitely finds its way in. And we do talk about at the beginning, how a big part of this journey that we all go on together is really about trusting each other, right? I mean, at the beginning, we talked about when the three of us were trying to figure out what exactly we really want to come out of it. This idea of creative collaboration, or you know, collaborative creativity, however you want to switch it, but I think a lot of times people think they have to go off, you know, into their little studio and have the magic and try to be creative on their own. And one of the big things we talk about is trusting each other and working off of each other, I guess it comes up more in comedy, the concept of “yes and” right? Like you just improv, someone says something and instead of trying to knock it down with something better, you say yes, and you build off of that. And that's, you know, it's very natural for us now, but we do try to remind people to do that. And so we see in real time, as people are coming up with lyric ideas in the song, someone will mention something and instead of someone else saying something else as a way of shooting it down, you know, it's like, “Oh, that's cool. What if we do that?” and so it all kind of builds off of each other. So yeah, so I think we do stress to everybody that the collaboration has to come from a place of trusting and vulnerability, you have to trust people in order to share any idea. Even among the three of us, and we've worked together and been friends and everything, and still, I'll speak for myself, I mean, when I share the nugget of a new idea, it's still a little scary, I don't know if it's gonna get shot down. But we do have this, you know, foundation of trust among us that, hopefully, people in our workshop who work with us, they can sense it from ourselves and feel comfortable in the safe space.
Ashraf Hasham
Yes, the idea of vulnerability is so important, and brings us back to the theme of this podcast change, right? Like, you have to admit that there's something that needs to be changed or can be changed, or it's flexible, or is malleable or maybe isn't doing so well to be able to get to a place where you're able to really feel that. Hmm, let's move in a different direction. Or let's all go together in this space. And getting by is a big part of that too. So talk to me about the classroom work, like y'all obviously doing this songwriting piece and bringing people together and trust and collaboration. And that's definitely a ton of a ton of content already. But you're also doing this music, business, DIY sort of work. And I'm super stoked about that. Because, you know, before, one of my many, many lives that I had lived was executive director of a small nonprofit arts organization called the VERA project. It's a music venue in Seattle. It's also like a youth DIY space. Young people run the delights, the sound, they do the security, they stamp the tickets, they do concessions, they do hospitality for the artists, they go out to Safeway and grab some hummus and all that. And they're doing all of this on their own with adult partners sort of there with them. And a lot of what we teach and a lot of what we ask our artists to come in and sort of mentor is this music business piece like the whole like DIY. Like you can do it, it might take you a few tries, and it might take you some failure. But if you're trying to, if you're just trying to try, we're here for you. tTell me more about the workshops that y'all offer on music business, and you're leveraging all of the success you've had in terms of composition for film and TV, and also those 50k monthly streams on Spotify can't be too bad either for your legitimate reputation. So yeah, talk to me about all that. That's exciting.
Duvid
So we don't really do workshops on the music business. That's not something we've ventured into yet. There's a lot of other people doing that and we feel, certainly felt like some of our friends do that. Yeah, we feel like they're doing a good job of that. Not that you know if we have any advice for anyone or can get advice from anybody else, we're always open and listening and trying to help anyone we can. But in terms of the DI D I always get this confused with my Israeli-ness and my ADD, I always say DUI, and that's not what it is.
Ashraf Hasham
DIY, do it yourself.
Duvid
In terms of doing it yourself, for me personally, I felt like I had been doing it, I had a little experience doing it the like the other way, sort of like when you get signed to a label, and you make a record for a bunch of money, and it was all piles of fun, and you know, learned a lot from it. But when you're like me, the three of us where you've decided that this is your life, music, you have the family, you have to make a living, a lot of things become very practical, and it's like, Okay, if I get a, you know, $100,000 from a record company, and I spend it all on making a record, like, how am I feeding the family? And it was like, wait, we can do, there’s so much we could do on our own, we want to do this, we love doing it, we can, and we want to do it, you know. We hear how things should sound, we, we, you know, we've got a lot figured out. So let's just see. And, you know, it's… I don't want to say it's thinking small because, you know, thinking small can be the biggest thinking in the world. But it's sort of thinking simply, it's like, what do we want to do? Let's do it. Let's do what we can, the best we can, and hope that it connects. And also a huge plus is that it's the three of us. And this is a piece of advice I've given to people about who asked me about collaborating. And I say, you know, that often people look for people who are exactly like themselves to collaborate. “Oh, we love the same music, like let's be a club or a game.” And there's certainly value in that. But I find a lot of value in working with people who are good at what you're not good at. And being self aware enough to know that about yourself and find other people who you both can deeply connect with, but also have strengths that you don't. The fact that it's the three of us, we couldn't, I feel like I couldn’t be doing this alone. There's so much that each one of us deals with that makes this work. And that's a huge part of the whole do it yourself thing is that it's not yourself, that's it's do it yourselves.
Dov
Do it yourselves. There's an S at the end.
Duvid
There's a big s. And if you look closely, in almost anyone who's doing anything successfully in any way, there might be a face at the front of it, but there's always a group of very hard working, creative and talented people behind that person. So that's our biggest weapon. And our I don't know if it's a secret, it's the three of us. And it's more than even the three of us. We have other people who help us do things. And we're very grateful for and we feel like they are part of our family as well. So that to me, that's the big secret.
Dov
Yeah, I would just add one thing also, I mean, yeah, it's true. We don't, you know, formerly have a part of the workshop, yet, about just the business part. But we do, you know, we invite everybody on our workshop, students especially, to be in touch with us, we give them our email. And we've had some nice, you know, interactions with students from all over who send us a song idea that they're working on. And they have specific questions about how to break into, you know, music licensing a lot of our songs they get used after the fact, in a TV show or so they're always interested in that.
Duvid
Yeah, I'm sorry, I don't mean to cut you off Dov. But yeah, I didn't mean to say that we don't do that at all. I just get nervous sometimes with all these people, these, some of these self help music, business gurus.
Ashraf Hasham
That's not your vibe. It doesn't seem like your vibe anyway.
Duvid
Sometimes I think there's a lot of people doing great work. But some of it makes me a little suspicious, you know, anything like self business, anyway.
Ami
But as part of the, part of the educational, the teaching artists educational piece of it, it's a very valuable thing. And it's, it always sparks curiosity, because part of our workshop presentation is about how our songs get used in film and TV. And we've based a lot of our presentation off of the same kind of briefs that we get in the industry of writing custom songs for specific projects. It's a good way for people to get into the creative space and feel safe doing it. When there's a particular mission involved, it helps us, instead of saying we're just gonna write a song about anything like we give certain directions and a certain framework that help people and all that's based on our experience in the industry. And it does spark curiosity in different elements. Some people are interested in the production, the songwriting, and then the business side of things. So we're definitely open to that, expanding into that part to help give at least some sort of guidance for people who are curious as they, you know, decide what they want to do, how the landscape works. And fortunately, as everybody was saying, to your point and to your question, the state of the industry now is the best it's ever been for independent creatives, musician artists, because from the get go, everything that needs to be done from recording, writing, recording, distributing and cultivating fans that can all be done yourselves independently, if you're willing to put in the time and the work in creating the music and the content and all the things that can support it and put it out into the world. So it's all there in front of us. And thankfully, the gatekeepers really have been scattered and are not as powerful as they once were in determining who gets to hear what; it's just a matter of who's really working the hardest.
Ashraf Hasham
And you get to leverage each other's strengths in doing that, right? And maybe one person's story can speak to the sort of licensing element, one person speaks to the sort of parameters that studios give you and all that kind of stuff. I mean, you're really exposing young people to careers they didn't know about, right? I mean, that's part of I think, what where you're getting some of that interest, it's like that sexiness, you know, because we see all of the things we see, you know, the credits after movies and TV shows, and I'm like one of those people, you've given them a taste of what that actually could look like, right. And that's really powerful, really powerful.
Ami
Look, at where we're all sitting right here in our home studios, where all the music that's been heard out in the real world is being created. So, you know, that's the new, that's the new normal, and it's a good thing.
Dov
And it's also, I mean, we tell them as well, and ourselves is just to be open, because people have this idea that you have, you're going into it, you're gonna be you know, the old school model of like, I'm, if I'm getting into music, then I'm gonna be on stage for stadiums. And that's the only way that I can be successful. And, you know, you can go into it for that reason, and then just be open to shifting along the way, like Duvid was saying, like, a lot of times, it's just a practical consideration. But, you know, we didn't necessarily set out to be doing the songwriting workshops, as often as we're doing, and we're loving them. And we, you know, we really are, but that wouldn't have happened, if we were just, you know, only focused on the one thing that we thought we wanted to do, you know. And a lot of like, just debunking those myths as it comes up a lot with students through the Cousins in the Classroom workshop, because, you know, I think they, a lot of time, kids have this idea, and this perception that you have to get discovered, and you have to find this manager, who or whoever that person is, that's gonna make you, right? And obviously, only you can make yourself and you put in the time and you put in the work, and you work on your craft. And like Ami said, like, you know, it's all at our fingertips right now, whether it's social media, through TikTok, I mean, we don't have to get into it. But even Ami has, like a huge personal TiKTok following like, because he does it every day. And so, you know, it's just a good lesson for students and for all of us to remind ourselves, so
Ashraf Hasham
That's awesome. Yeah, the idea of keeping it simple, and using that simplicity, to create profundity, you know, like, make a profound, because in simplicity, whether that's consistency on the TiKTok end, or whether that's, that's the type of work that y'all do together and leveraging each other's strengths is, I think, is this such a long time learned lesson, and you have to kind of see it happen, you have to do it yourself to be able to really learn it.
Ami
The consistency is the secret sauce to everything. Duvid practices. I mean, I'm bad at this, but you'll find David has like 15/20 minute regimens of practicing guitar every single day. Even as a professional musician, there's a lot you know, and I'm trying to apply it to other instruments and stuff. But it's just the consistency, it's like fitness, you can't just like get in shape once and meet and then say I'm done. If you want to be successful, it's it's all about consistency.
Ashraf Hasham
And knowing when to ask for help, or knowing where your strengths are, right, and knowing where your weaknesses are. And hopefully that also you can be vulnerable about it. You can bring it out into the world and actually, that provides the strength instead of the weakness, right? Like actually, it becomes the opposite of what you thought it'd be. That's beautiful.
Jeff M. Poulin
Wow, Ashraf that was such an amazing part one of a conversation. I really can't actually wait for part two. But you know, I, I am so struck by the power of this trio of musicians and how they just work together and really complement each other. I mean, how was that when you were speaking with them, and how they kind of jived as musicians but also educators and just people.
Ashraf Hasham
It was so beautiful to be able to like actually see grown men who are probably had recess, you know, folks who were like vulnerable with each other who were like passing the mic in a way that allowed everybody to speak equitably, and everybody's voice get heard. You don't really see that in like male culture, you know, like, I think about this a lot how like, I'm very picky with my male friends. Because I want, I want to be surrounded by people who share my values, of course. And these people obviously share values right? And yet, you know there's parts of each other that don't fit and yet they still work together, right? Like and we'll hear some of that next week. I think there's a little bit to have the idea of, they really occupy the space of art reflecting life in the sort of Oscar Wilde sense. So they actually are living their music in a way that I just, I still can't stop thinking about, you know, like, we talked a little bit in this last interview, as you just heard about, like, it doesn't always have to be positive, but like, it ends up being sometimes pretty, pretty inspirational, regardless of positive or negative or anything in between. And I think they give out that vibe, certainly, I also, I'm excited to talk about how they work more with young people and how specifically their faith plays into it. So that's something I'm really excited about for next week.
Jeff M. Poulin
Definitely. You know, that's a really interesting point that you bring up. One other thing that stuck out to that conversation was their realization that, you know, they work with their friends, and yeah, okay, right. There's so much in like corporate culture and other types of, of environments, I know, that are certainly prevalent in my work here in Washington DC… that, you know, we shouldn't be friends with the people that we work with, then that there's a big distinction between our personal relationships, and professional relationships. But this idea that when we come together, if those relationships are driven by the values that we share, like you were just talking about, then it all sort of becomes this amalgamation and, and what comes out of it is really, really powerful. Not only relationships, but like powerful outputs, at risk of sounding a little bit too, I don't know, neoliberal in my approach here, but like, the idea that when we come together with like minded people that have a common goal, like these three band members, what we can create is absolutely astounding. And that's something I feel like we also do here with this podcast, you know, we're all friends and colleagues and are able to do some pretty cool stuff.
Ashraf Hasham
Yeah, I mean, these guys like took their, and you will hear about this next week, too, but they took this Cousins in the Classroom, like not just in schools, but they took it to like the army. And like, that's a conversation we didn't really get into. But like I expected to follow up with that when I, when I hang out with them next. Because I'm sure they'll be up in Seattle, I'm sure they'll be doing some gigs. And I'm sure we'll get some treats and catch back up. So thank you so much, Jeff, for introducing me to these folks. Like, I'm so glad they did the theme music to our podcast. I mean, it's a banger, like I keep talking about that song “lights on.” If you haven't heard it yet, in its entirety, do. It's only like two and a half minutes. But it's one of those that you want to repeat over and over and over again.
Jeff M. Poulin
I totally agree. And we'll definitely drop that link in the show notes for this. You know, in their creation of their music, they also talked about this approach of taking their vulnerability and using those improv skills to like, yes, and you mentioned that at the start of our conversation today. But they, they sort of used the approach you talked about in your previous work of DIY, you know, to, to make the best out of all the strengths that they bring together. And I know that you know, in your work with the city, you're able to bring people from lots of different areas, whether it be other government agencies, or people that are expert evaluators, or that there's young people who are living the programs, all to the same table. So I wonder, you know, what are your thoughts on this idea of sort of the democratic or, or distributed leadership models right in, in artistic creation, but also in like, the management and organizational side of things?
Ashraf Hasham
Oh, my gosh, it's so hard. It's like the hardest thing. And it takes like really sophisticated folks who know each other deeply. Well, to do it, right? Like I almost think about, like I said earlier army, right? Like you need people who've gone through some form of let's just say a trauma, right? Like, I don't know, if it's like it doesn't I don't think trauma has to be a thing that that necessarily is the worst thing in the world, it could just be a challenging situation that you got through, right? Like, I wonder if it is part of that, right? That you have to go through to really be in a space where you can trust each other and know a little bit about, or at least like know that you're not coming into it with ill intent. You're only coming into it with best vibes for everybody. And I guess the word, I guess for me, the word consensus comes up a lot in these type of conversations. And I realized that a lot of people may not be using it correctly. And so one of the things I'm kind of a stickler about is like when we talk about consensus, we should talk about what consensus is: which is, you talk about every option, everybody has a chance to input and it's not loading... what you do is you talk about two things, and the conversation leads in a certain direction and we just confirm that we're going in that direction, right? Knowing that not everybody's gonna be all about that direction. But knowing that nobody, that everybody is not going to be not about that direction, right? Like, it's a little bit of operating in the gray, but a little bit operationalized is kind of like what I consider consensus to be. And sometimes it can be a lot more strong and a lot more decided, I guess, uh, but a lot of times it continues to be a little gray for at least a couple of people in the group if it's a larger group. And so the idea of consensus, I always come back to and I have a sense that distant cousins does a pretty good job at consensus, you know, in terms, I mean, it's a small group, obviously. But, you know, if you have a group of people, including young people, and folks who have a little more power in the room, too, it's going to be, you're going to see different agendas pop up, and to be able to control those and to be able to hone those in towards the greater good, or perhaps the goal that this group wants to get to, is an art as much as it is a skill.
Jeff M. Poulin
I totally agree. And that's something that we see a lot in our work at Creative Generation, is we work with all sorts of different groups. And one of the big findings from a study that we conducted last year was that there's a new model of leadership that's moving away from this idea of one person at the top, and then a few people that oversee different organizational perspectives, like a CEO and the COO and the CFO and whatever. And then other people that oversee small dominions, right? But that's sort of moving away. And what we're seeing is this idea, what do we call it, distributed collective leadership, so that there's a circle of people that operate on consensus, that all have different areas of expertise. So if your project has to do with research, and communications, and programming, your three leaders have expertise in research and communications and programming. Moving away from this idea that there's one person who has all the knowledge, and must lead to a group of people that are assembled based on their strengths to lead a project in a certain way. And, you know, there's a few things that we've learned about that, though, is that one, it does redistribute power so that these age old institutions or very privileged, often, white male, cis, European educated leaders, are able to, naturally they're in an environment that encourages the sharing of power with other people, whether that be smaller community based organizations, or up and coming emerging, you know, professionals that have real lived experience that is valuable in that in that project. And, but that idea is grounded in the fact that one, there's a willingness to sort of “Yes, and” as was described in the interview, but also there's a willingness to take a little bit of extra time. So I really appreciated when, when Distant Cousins, they were talking about, and I forget which which one of the big cousins was talking, but they said something to the effect of, well, sometimes the song just happens, like someone's saying a line and they were like, cool, this is a song that we have now. And other times, like they really work through many iterations of it to get it right. And that is something that is really important, particularly when you're working with young people, because those young people can be absolutely filled with brilliance, and like, hit it immediately, or can go through many, many iterations, because they're learning and growing and changing and challenging norms and disrupting the status quo. And as adults in the room, I think our own awareness of those types of dynamics is absolutely essential, particularly for those of us that are bringing together these sectors of like arts and culture and education and social change.
Ashraf Hasham
Yeah, like you're what you're describing is like, the feeling, right? The feeling of trust, the feeling of comfort, and the feeling of vulnerability and being cool with that. And it takes I mean, not just young people, but takes older people a long time to feel that way. I'm certainly for young people, too. But you know, the key there is like modeling it, right? Like having somebody actually be like, “Yeah, actually, we are going to go this direction. And it was that random. And but it does feel right. So let's just go there.” Part of it is that constraints that we've talked about right? It’s like, we only have an hour. So this is a really good idea. We're going to go with it. But having somebody I think, pull that trigger, like push that button, like make that, start that first leg of that walk is going to be such a key moments of distributed collective leadership. I love that. And you're so right. I mean, they say that 85% of the jobs in 2030 don't exist yet. And what does that mean? That means that these, these distributed collective leadership models, perhaps one of these 85% of jobs that don't exist yet, is a little bit of like operationalizing how we work next, you know, like in the future of work, what does that actually mean? And oh, gosh, that gets me so excited about like, the idea as they're being operationalized, the idea that there are people who are good at some stuff and people who just whose job it is to trust the people around them. That's just so crazy. I can't even put into words how crazy that is.
Jeff M. Poulin
But it's possible, like, the thing that's really exciting to me is the possibility, and all of these possible futures that we're talking about. As long as we are determined to not allow these like gatekeepers to get in the way, right? You know, one of the things that you all talked about that resonated with me, I haven't been able to stop thinking about it, is this idea of how these guys who are, you know, professional musicians are building capabilities in young people to be musicians themselves, and to be viewed as you know, potential professional musicians. Maybe they'll write this one song, maybe they'll write songs for the rest of their lives, but that they have that knowledge base, and that they're sort of eliminating those gatekeepers, because they're professionally producing it, they are utilizing social media, they're bringing these these kids to go sing at a clippers game, you know? Which is so cool! Because, you know, at the end of the day, right, there are so many gatekeepers, and if we just use the example of the music business, for this conversation, that can stop creativity or can stop the creation of musicbecause of one reason or another… That if we sort of just remove those or for folks in positions, like you and I, if we can just like not allow those to exist… Imagine the types of creativity that can come out. Imagine the future innovations for the arts and culture space, for the education space, for the I don't know, legal space, the aeronautics space, whatever, right? There's so many possibilities that when we disjoint those gatekeepers from existing, we can really see the next generation invent those jobs for the future and flourish in those communities.
Ashraf Hasham
So real. And we don't need … the idea that we gain the skills and we gain the confidence we gain the connections and networks that actually, the gatekeepers have made themselves irrelevant. And also obtrusive, likeare actually making it harder. Keeping it simple and profound, is something. Or keeping it simple, there's profundity in that simpleness, is something I really got out of the conversation with Distant Cousins, you know? Do it the best we can keep it simple, leverage each other's strengths, ask for help when you need it, which is key, you know, something I have to remind myself to do all the time. And in terms of what you said about gatekeepers, I watched this terrible, well it wasn’t terrible, it was a great little Vice documentary on YouTube, as my algorithm is known to tell me to watch. And one of them was around the Shaggy song “It wasn't me,” which is about cheating, and all that kind of stuff, and how that song was never going to make it out to the album. But there was an A&R person in the room, while the band went out to get a soda from across the street, who heard the song that was on the tape, wasn't supposed to hear it. And when he did was like, “Oh, my gosh, this slaps, we got to get this on the album. I don't care what the content of the song is. This needs to be heard.” And so that made it onto the album, album still wasn't doing well. Then this DJ in Hawaii, random DJ in Hawaii who was just trying to get a better song than the next DJ in Hawaii, found the song on Napster. It hadn't even gone to the station yet, right? Like the physical CD wasn't even getting distributed to the station in Hawaii. But he found this on Napster, this whole album, he played it on the radio, the call box light it up. People are like, “What's song is this brother?” olks were like… this is like when the song blew up, but then it became you know, everywhere in every radio station. And then we have this amazing song about cheating. And the good and the bad around it, right? Like we just have a song about real talk, which really happens. We're naming it, we're naming real life as it happens. We're putting a beautiful beat to it, a funky floral beat to it. And it actually turns out to be 10 million records sold in like less than a year, right? Like it's you guys can trust the process, trust the vibe, trust the feeling, and also just be real about naming it, right? Like it's uncomfortable to talk about cheating. Yes. And also it's a thing that will not stop happening. So if we at least put some narrative to it, show that I'm gonna tell her I'm sorry. That's a lie from the song. Like, if we put that narrative to it then I think we put power to it too, right? Like that's just something I've learned by working with young people.
Jeff M. Poulin
I love that story, first of all. And in the vein of naming things, I did not think it was possible to use the word profundity, and then quote, Shaggy's "It Wasn't Me" in the same anecdote. But you have done that here on the Why Change? podcast. And I really do appreciate that. But unfortunately, that does bring our time to an end today. Ashraf, I look forward to the continuation of your interview with Distant Cousins, which will be coming up in just a little bit of time. But to leave our listeners on a note - what is happening next in your world? What should we be thinking about as we move into the future of our work as the listeners of the Why Change podcast?
Ashraf Hasham
Lately for me, I've been reading a lot of grant applications. I'm on a grant panel this week. And it's become really clear that, for me, always, in these grant applications, always when people represent themselves in the written form, which of course is a tool of white supremacy culture that we need to figure out how to find alternatives to folks are always there's a strength space and a deficit base thing that becomes really obvious really quick, like… I think for me, what's sticking out to me this week, as I'm going into next week thinking about is, how can I encourage folks to think about their strengths and not think about them as deficits right? Like, or the idea of like, we're in this community doing this work, not because young people need it, but because we want them to thrive or because they have these brilliancesthat we just need to figure out how to, with them, expose those and make them become powerful. And in fact, make them become powerful for not just themselves, but their communities, their families, their friends, their schools, everywhere else, right? So it's not for them, it's with them, right? And so that's kind of where I'm at this week.
Jeff M. Poulin
That's such a wonderful note to land this episode on, simply because it's certainly our outlook with this podcast. It is definitely the ethos of the work of distant cousins as they make music, and they partner with young people to make music together. And the work that you're doing, which is really kind of a sweet note. So we'll end it there. Thanks so much for this episode, and for tuning in to the Why Change podcast. We will see you next time.
Ashraf Hasham
See you next week.
Jeff M. Poulin
I hope you enjoyed today's episode of Why Change the podcast for Creative Generation. If you would like to support this podcast aimed at amplifying the voices of creative changemakers around the world, please consider donating through the link located in the episodes show notes. These show notes contain all sources discussed in the episode. Be sure to follow, like, subscribe, and share the why change podcast to make sure you and your networks get episodes delivered directly to you and that you don't miss any stories of creative work happening around the world. If you haven't already, be sure to follow us on social media, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn. Also, we'd love to hear from you. You can write to us at info at Creative-generation.org We would love to hear your ideas, the topics you want to learn about and why change matters to you. Our show was produced and edited by Daniel Stanley. Our music is by Distant Cousins. A special thanks to our contributors, co hosts and the team at Creative Generation for their support.