RECYCLED MINDS, SOULS, & NOTIONS

A Paraguayan garbage collector and a recycler joined forces to recycle lives in one of the poorest communities in the world. Over 2,500 families live on top of a landfill in the Cateura slum in Asunción, the capital of Paraguay.

Photo: Courtesy of Philanthropy Times. Cateura Landfill.

The people pick through the 1,500 tons of solid waste that is dumped there each day, desperately trying to find something -- anything -- that they can recycle and sell for a paltry guaraní. It is their only source of income.

 

To add to their suffering, the town gets flooded with contaminated water, leaching from the garbage, whenever it rains. It is an environmental and human health hazard that has gone unchecked for many generations.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

There has never been anything to give anyone in Cateura hope for a better life until now. Now, they’ve got music to lift them higher. Now they have an orchestra.

 

It began with a spark. Nicolás "Cola" Gómez was collecting garbage one day when he picked up a piece of trash that looked like a violin. He showed it to Favio Chávez, a local guitar-playing environmental engineer who had recently started a little music school for the local kids.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic. Nicolás "Cola" Gómez crafting recycled instruments.

Gómez and Chávez began to fashion violins, cellos, flutes, guitars, trumpets, and drums out of old oil barrels, water pipes, packing crates, bottle caps, keys, spoons, and whatever odds and ends they could salvage from the dump.

 

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic. Recycled violins.

 

Chávez, who has played guitar since he was a kid himself, began to teach the children to play, and together, they formed Los Reciclados (recycled) Orchestra.

Photo: Courtesy of Intelliblog. The Landfill Harmonic Orchestra.

The orchestra consists of about 20 kids, from age 11 to 19. They play mostly classical music, some more-contemporary Latin music, and even a few orchestral versions of Beatles songs.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

As the children of Cateura learned and practiced their “new” instruments,  they began to learn a whole new set of life skills. They began to expand their minds and feed their souls.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

Filmmakers, Alejandra Amarilla Nash and Juliana Penaranda-Loftus, had set out to make a documentary about the underserved children of Paraguay, when they discovered the Recycled Orchestra in 2009.

 

They were so inspired, they made the Recycled Orchestra the subject of their film. Now called Landfill Harmonic, it is slated for release in 2014.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

The film has also become a movement with a grand mission: To inspire and demonstrate to people all over the world that creative and simple solutions, such as recycling, can bring powerful social transformation to the poorest communities.

 

Video: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

 

The trailer for Landfill Harmonic quickly went viral after it was posted online, with 2 million views on Vimeo, and nearly 1 million views on YouTube.

 

The orchestra has given the kids and their families reason to shine. And it has given them the means to begin to upcycle their reality.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

The orchestra began to receive invitations to tour around the world. So far, they have already traveled to Brazil and Colombia. They will be performing in Japan, India, Europe, and the United States later this year.

 

Money left over from the orchestra's performances goes into a fund that provides small no-interest loans to the families to improve their homes.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

One of the Orchestra's flute players now plays for Paraguay's national orchestra. The Miami Symphony Orchestra has offered scholarships for a few students, with invitations to join their youth symphony.

Photo: Jorge Adorno.

The world's largest Musical Instruments Museum, MIM, in Scottsdale, AZ., is setting up a permanent exhibition with a collection of recycled musical instruments.

Photo: Courtesy of Landfill Harmonic.

The Recycled Orchestra has just received a major grant from the Bertha Foundation which will help support the film, the orchestra’s world tour, and the community’s climb towards a better quality of life.

 

Kenya, Mexico, and Haiti, have expressed interest in launching similar projects in their countries.

 

Read more about Beauty Recycled, as it relates to Arts/Design, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact in our posts throughout this week, including The Most Beautiful Redux, Mind Blowing Recyclers, Ancient Recycled Flavors Now, Art Recycles Now, and Beautiful Recycled Vacations.

 

Get busy and enter the BN Competitions, Our theme this week is Recycled Beauty. Send in your images and ideas. Deadline is 11.24.13.

 

Photo: Courtesy of InterActiveMediaSW.

 

Also, check out our special competition: The Most Beautiful Sound in the World! We are thrilled about this effort, together with SoundCloud and The Sound Agency. And we can’t wait to hear what you’ve got!