Let's do our part to forever preserve this work of art

Diana and I worked with a member of the LA Greencorps to produce a song that would raise awareness about the environment and how it is every person's job to take care of it. Although there were difficulties meeting as a group, we did decide together how we wanted to approach the issue.

-We wanted to write something that people could connect with on a personal level.
-We wanted to present a good reason as to why everyone should help out.
-And finally, we wanted to present a solution to the problem that was small and manageable so that it was something any person could easily do.

So to connect with people on a personal level, we decided to talk about New Orleans in our song. The idea of a song or anything you write is to grab the listener/ reader's attention, right? So we planned on starting our song with something about New Orleans, and hinting at reasons why New Orleanians love their city so much. In the final song we made a reference to the ways that other people in the country think that everyone in this city is too crazy and does nothing but party, and how we don't let any of the negative comments stop us from being who we are. We wanted to be sure to remind the listeners that they loved this city, and WHY they loved this city.

So with the sentimental "We Love New Orleans" aspect of the song, we expanded by saying how it is our job to take care of the city. We wanted to emphasize that our city isn't going to be here forever, and that every individual is responsible for doing anything they can to preserve this historic beauty. Several times in the song is the line "This is YOUR city, so do YOUR part..." We wanted to make a point of stressing that this is OUR city, and so therefore we must not expect everyone else to take care of it for us.

We presented the problem of too many greenhouse gases as our environmental issue. We again, gave people a reason to care about the problem by saying how the problem would effect New Orleans by taking away from the city's beauty and polluting our air.

Last but not least, the solution. Providing a solution to the problem is what would make our song a magnetic song according to Denisoff. As a group we wanted to not only state the problem, but also inform people of something they can do to help make sure the city stays around for a very, very long time. The idea of greenhouse gases and pollution is huge, and we wanted to approach it in a way that wasn't overwhelming. So, to do this, we wanted to present simple solutions to the problem that any individual would easily be capable of doing. In the end, that solution was to install energy efficient light bulbs in your community. We added facts/statistics in the song to give people the sense that we were a reliable "source," and that maybe what we were suggesting wasn't such a bad idea.

In the end, the final product was definitely, as would be expected, nothing like what we had originally planned. But, we feel that we did succeed in meeting our main goals for our song: Present the problem, recruit individuals by reinforcing their value structures, and present a solution to the problem that is easily manageable by any person.