Making music pop in Monroe
Published 6:38 pm Tuesday, November 16, 2010
MONROE — Teens in this city want to rock.
Winning a contest for a $250,000 grant will help the music start, according to Hannah Lunstrum, the teen program director at the Monroe Sky Valley YMCA.
“I feel like there’s not a lot of stuff for teens to do if they don’t play football or if they’re not really involved in school,” Lunstrum said. “Every once in awhile, an open mic night will open up in a coffee shop but it doesn’t last long.”
Teens can travel outside of the city to attend concerts and musical events, Lunstrum added, but she would like to see a teen music drop-in center get started closer to home.
That’s why she and others worked on a proposal for a free music center for teens and submitted the idea for a national music programming grant through the Pepsi Refresh Project. Winners will be announced Dec. 1 in grant categories worth $5,000, $25,000, $50,000 and $250,000. Two winners in the $250,000 category and up to 10 in the other three categories will be chosen by people casting their votes online or by texting.
Pepsi started accepting and letting people vote on ideas in the Pepsi Refresh Project earlier this year. Every month, Pepsi awards grants for the winning ideas. This round of voting began Nov. 1 and will run until Nov. 30. People can vote once a day for the teen music center online at www.refresheverything.com/letteensrock or by texting 104057 to 73774.
Lunstrum said if their proposal wins, the Monroe Sky Valley YMCA and the nonprofit, One A-Chord Academy of Music, will work together to provide music opportunities for teens. The Teen Center at the YMCA will be the site of the music center where teens can attend concerts and learn about music. One A-Chord would be able to expand to accommodate more students and help teens learn to sing, dance or play a musical instrument.
One A-Chord Academy of Music is a music school for middle and high school students. It is directed by Scott Shrock twice a week at the Monroe Community Chapel.
“I know in Monroe music is a pretty big deal,” Shrock said. “I think (a music center) would just open up more opportunities for kids to want to come to the Y and hang out. We would spend so many hours at the Y helping with kids and introducing them to music.”
His students and teens at the YMCA helped to make a music video during the summer for the contest. The video features Zach Day, a senior at Sultan High School, who sings a rap written by Lunstrum and Shrock about the teen music center. The video was filmed and edited by Megan Sanford.
Teens at the YMCA are also letting people know they need their vote. Monroe High School students Amelia Haskins and Travis Salmi regularly organize and host concerts at the YMCA Teen Center. The grant money would help buy sound equipment and help make more concerts possible, said Haskins, 17.
“We’ve done various concerts at Y for charity and that evolved into an idea to host concerts to have something to do in the community,” she said. “We really wanted to start doing this as a regular thing.”
Her 1995 Subaru Legacy with red flames painted on the sides attracts attention, Haskins said. She’s hoping people will read the painted information she added on to the car’s windows for texting a vote.
Salmi, 17, said he regularly reminds his friends on Facebook to vote. He and others supporting the project spray painted lime green T-shirts with “Text 104057 to 73774.”
For Salmi, music is an important part of his life.
“(Music) is really the only way to convey an emotion or feeling,” he said.
Amy Daybert: 425-339-3491; adaybert@heraldnet.com.
Grant ideas
There are 1,127 ideas in the running this month for a Pepsi Refresh Project grant. Here are some more ideas in Snohomish and Island counties at www.refresheverything.com.
$5,000
•Create a Kids Book Club to empower children, by Lynn Fischer of Marysville
$50,000
• Build a safe playground and learning garden at Cedar Way Elementary in Mountlake Terrace.
• Support 4,000 kids’ organizations with interactive books, by Candace Schecter of Mommy’s Heartbeat in Coupeville
• Provide bicycles along with racks, fenders, lights, odometers, locks and helmets to create 50 green bicycle commuters in Marysville, by Julie Tinsley
Help Teens Rock
For more information or to vote for a teen music center at the Monroe Sky Valley YMCA visit www.facebook.com/ymonroeteens or www.ymca-snoco.org/teens/monroe.
