After a long winter of the gloomy blues—uber-enhanced by a rainy and cold spring season—I spotted a rufous-feathered eastern towhee while I was out walking in the woods. As it perched on the branch of a beech sapling between me and the rays of the rising sun, the bird made me feel as though I’d found a plump, red flower with a song.

There were no other humans near the New World sparrow’s thicket.

All the socks in the laundry pile matched up

and the Fairfield Inn, Long Island City, Queens said they had a room for $119.00.

It was Friday.

I’d clicked play for a video posted on my son’s Facebook: The Ramone’s Do You Wanna Dance. In the video, the crowd gets crazy happy about music. On my son’s Facebook, he asks do you do you do you do you wanna dance and alerts the Facebook community that he and his bandmates—all members of New York City’s Teeth People—have a show coming up later in the evening at a club called Piano’s

in the Lower East Side

in never the same old, same old New York City

if you wanna dance.

My son included a tantalizing promise with his FB post: Freedom, the band’s percussionist, would be singing a lead.

I figured if the day’s luck held, my husband and I could make it to NYC in time for the show at 10pm. (Three-and-a-half hour drive to the center of the universe, if the stars are aligned and there aren’t any fires to put out on the home front.)

We hit the road in time to ride the brakes over roads crammed with vehicles moving at the speed of frozen molasses melting uphill.

Finally made it to the hotel.

Parked the car FOR FREE.

Changed into black duds, put on some boots, dotted my eyes with mascara.

Fetched the hotel’s courtesy van to the subway. Climbed the stairs to the subway platform and—as if on cue—along came a 7 train. We rumbled from Queens into Grand Central. Flew through the closing doors of a 6 train. At Bleeker, an F train was just waiting to take us to Delancey and Essex

where real music lives

in real time

in a cozy conglomerate of valiant clubs featuring now bands playing new music upon stages managed by sound-and-light technicians as passionate about their artful work as the boys and girls in the bands are about their artful work.

ARTFUL WORK IS THE ONLY CURE.

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Long about midway through Teeth People’s set, every member of the band took a turn on another instrument.  The bass player got rid of his bass guitar and moved to center stage to sing a lead. The lead singer/guitar player moved to play the bass. The percussionist moved to take a seat at the drum kit. And the drummer (my son!) strapped on a guitar near a microphone where a new percussion ensemble of drums and a garbage can lid awaited his crazy-happy-about-music act of playing guitar and percussion while throwing in a little bit of singing.

During this brief shuffle, the percussionist—aka Freedom—made an announcement. He asked the crowd to check out: STAYIN FIT IS LIT—a video created by his junior-high students in Queens, New York.  The video was inspired by—and generated in support of—Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move health and fitness campaign.

If you are a parent, an educator, and/or a great American, Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move website is LOADED with useful information about how to make America great again.

FYI and BTW: Stayin fit is totally lit if you ever want to be an artist at work in a rock band. Because after the long hours of your day job—and the volunteer work you can’t walk away from—you’ll be doing an enormous amount of heavy lifting and extra laps for several more hours every single day: hauling gear to and from gigs, rehearsing, promoting your art, performing your art, producing your music, pounding the pavement for gigs, and muscling your brain to stay on so you can study music, learn music, and create music. Then there’s all the jumping, swaying, banging on drums, and training the vocal chords to sing, sing, sing.

True to their FB post, Teeth People surprised the crowd at the end of their performance when Freedom leaped onto center stage to sing lead for one more tune: A cover of the Ramone’s, (you guessed it), Do You Wanna Dance. It was a unexpected moment of surprise in Teeth People history to hear Freedom singing while the band performed a cover tune—something they rarely do.

When the lights came up and it was time for the band to haul their act onward, one more unexpected and generous moment by an Artist of New York surprised everyone when the sound and light technician, (one of the best in NYC), locked into STAYIN FIT IS LIT on the Internet and played it loud, filling a bar in the Lower East Side with the groove of the next generation. It was so WOW to realize the sound guy had paid attention to Freedom’s announcement! I ❤ New York!

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HERE IT IS: Freedom’s and New York City’s young Artists of New York at work. Don’t miss the spinning roundhouse kick to the bag of junk food. Original music by 8th grader Kazi Hoque for Arts and Literacy Middle School’s “Let’s Move” competition. YES—your clicks  and the clicks you encourage kids to make on this video help promote it! How often does a video worth encouraging young kids to watch come along? Freedom, (the junior high teacher you wish you could have had), is coaching the gym rats at 1:21 and asking What you eatin right now? at 2:16:

 

If you watch the video on youtube, you can click “Show more” beneath it to access the lyrics. Print them. Hand them out to a classroom of kids. Play the video. The kids will wanna wanna wanna dance! Share the video!

I was so impressed by Freedom’s community of students and teachers—and envious too. How I longed for programs like this one in the suburban after-school programs where I raised my kids.  When I explored the websites associated with Freedom’s “day job” communities, I discovered great inspirations and hopes for America—through music, dance, drama, painting, etc.

—And then—my heart skipped a beat when I found my son, unexpectedly, in one of the videos. He was working with his bandmate, Freedom, teaching kids how important it is to bang on garbage can lids:

 

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Artists of New York multi-tasking. Eating, working, talking, hover boarding.

And stayin fit riding Citibikes over the Williamsburg Bridge from Brooklyn to Manhattan to more artful work.

New Teeth People EP “Talk” coming out May 6th:

http://teethpeople.bandcamp.com

It never stops when you’re an Artist of New York.

ARTFUL WORK IS THE ONLY CURE.

Let’s Move!