Mark Shepard’s DrumSongStory

All innovation and technological advancement ultimately comes from the same creative drive that fuels the arts. Currently our education system in the US is so far behind the technological curve that it is daunting. One way we can make a difference in our children’s lives is to expose them to as much artistic innovation as possible. Not to create artists necessarily…but to create the kind of thinking that leads to innovation and excellence in all areas of our lives.

Thoughts? Comments? Please Reply below!

Get Block Booking Discounts even for just a single school!

For those of you in the CT area, I will be coming to Connecticut on the following dates in 2010 and am offering you my block booking discounts. You’ll save your school about $500 over my regular fees. I’ll cluster my dates to save on gas and other travel expenses so we both win!

Available dates are:

• March 23-25
• April 15
• May 26-28
• June 1-3
• December 7, 9, 10

Any questions please give me a call or drop me an e-mail at mark [at] markshepard.com

All the best!

Mark

p.s. other dates are available as well but may not qualify for special block booking discounts. call me for more info. 888-598-7709

A non-religious celebration of the time of year between Thanksgiving and New Year’s with Drums, Songs & Stories. With multicultural respect for Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and the Solstice, the dominant theme is about gratitude and giving, daring to live your dreams, as well as anticipating and celebrating the return of the light…

Like all my Drum SongStory programs it works just as well for adults as it does for children. And is ideally suited to mixed audiences of all ages.

With The exception of The Silkie and Children of the Drum I have not yet recorded most of these pieces. Hopefully that will change soon!

Story Songs:

• Children of the Drum – Original
• Season of Light – Original
• The Silkie – Ireland
• Borning Day – Caribbean Lullaby
• Christmas Dinner – Paul Noel Stookey
• Falling Snow – Original

Stories:

• Zlatah The Goat – a Hanukkah story by Isaac Beshivis Singer
• What I Never Got For Christmas – an original story by Mark Shepard
• The Real Drummer Boy: Or A Strange Thing Happened on My Way Home One Night – an Original Story by Mark Shepard
• The Wee Red Cap – Scotland
• Billy Nell Kewley and The Strange Gentleman – Isle of Man

Instruments:

• Irish Bodhran
• Wooden Low Whistle
• Dejembe
• Guitar
• SFX instruments:
• Thunder Tubes,
• Ocean drum
• Wind tubes
• Wrench Chimes
• and more…

To book this program now call 1-888-598-7709 or e-mail mark[at]markshepard.com

See what other DrumSongStory Programs are available for:

• Schools, Family Concerts
• Colleges, Universities
• Corporations, Non Profits, Conferences

UCCCA stands for Upper Catskill Community Council of the Arts and I’ll be performing DrumSongStory for their “Family Fun Day” on Saturday, November 21st, 2009 at 2:00 PM. at Wilber Mansion, 11 Ford AVe, Oneonta, NY 13820 Admission is FREE! For more info call UCCCA: 607-432-2070

Check out the full flyer below.

Couldn’t let Halloween go by without some kind of story…haven’t recorded some of my favorite scary stories but this one will work. Don’t really think of it as scary but it does involve shape shifters and a skeleton woman. Ultimately it’s really about healing and transformation… have a listen now or download it to your mp3 player for later. It’s from my Breathing Underwater CD / Program

Leave me a comment below!
Happy Halloween!

An inspirational program designed to celebrate creative, innovative thinking, build strong self esteem and install confidence. Thirsty For The Sky is just the thing for your organization’s next conference, retreat, symposium, festival, orientation, celebration, graduation…any culminating or initiating event.

This Program works well for high school, college and adult audiences. Most of these songs carry positive NLP language patterns so the constructive thoughts get stuck in your head more effectively than affirmations.

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Here are the songs from the CD:
(I haven’t yet recorded the spoken word/storytelling part of the program. In addition I’ve written dozens of additional songs that support this theme since recording this)

Overtone Overture: Overtone Singing, African style yodeling, throat whistling and the “wooo” sound accompanied by a huge frame drum.

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Thirsty For The Sky: Title song expresses the longing many of us feel for being unlimited and empowered rather than victims of our own self talk.

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Victory Song: This song is full of “Why” questions that Noah St. John calls “Afformations” because they are questions they are more powerful than affirmations. The questioning process engages your Unconscious Mind to filter for the presupposed answers. Having a rough day? play this song quietly in the background. You will be delighted with the shift to a more positive state by the end of the day.

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Arise, Arise: A song about rising up to new levels in response to challenges.

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Coming Home: A drum song about personal healing.

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Spirit In A Body: We are spirits with bodies not bodies with spirits. Big difference!

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Children of the Drum: the story of my African drumming teacher, Kevin aka Kazi Oliver and I met, connected and influenced each other even though we came from widely different backgrounds and cultures.

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Be Patient With Your Drumming: Based on a saying by the Shona people of Zimbabwe

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Beautiful Person: a quieter, more meditative version of this song. The original version is from my Visions & Voces CD. Slightly altered the lyrics after learning about NLP language patterns.

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Field of Dreams: This really happened.

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Why Is It Possible?: Using NLP presuppositions as well as the powerful effect of asking questions has on the unconscious mind, this chant is designed to run in the background of your day alerting your “Reticular Activating System” to “filter” for possibilities. To learn more about this process check out http://ModernJedi.com

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Better Than Expected: One of the concepts I live my life by: Why does it work out better than you can possibly imagine? In NLP reframing we take anything that seems bad and find a way to turn it around. It’s technically called “reframing”. Hopefully I’ve managed a bit of humor to get the message across. BTW that’s Joe Mennonna playing a real Tuba in the back ground.

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Best Day of Your Life: Inspired by my reading of Carlos Castaneda books. A warrior lives as if each day, each moment is his last. Turns out to be really good way to have an incredible life.

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Ancient of Days: A spiritual but not religious song.

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Fly, Fly, Fly: A lot of sky and flying themes fill my music. someday I will take those hang gliding lessons or get my pilot’s license!

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Back To College Programs

Back To K-12 School Assemblies

Back To Corporate/Non-Profit Programs

Mark Shepard’s DrumSongStory Concerts For Colleges are fully customizable and adaptable for any theme you may be working with. DrumSongStory is ideal for:

• Campus Coffeehouse/Concert Stage – When you need something different to uplift the spirits and attract an audience with plenty of humor as well as thought provoking and mesmerizing content that goes beyond mere entertainment.

• Festivals, Special Events, Multi-Generational Concerts - Ideal for special events where the audience might include younger siblings, parents or grandparents or folks from the larger community beyond campus.

Below are a few samples of Mark Shepard’s DrumSongStory selections appropriate for College audiences:

Narcissism: A humorous look at what we all know is true… (accompanied by Irish Bodhran)

Hippie Girls: Another humorous song (accompanied by guitar)

Rain On A Tin Roof: A Joyful Love Song

Raven Stops The Rain: A Creation Story From Siberia. this is one of the many stories I tell where I hadn out dozens of sound effects instruments for the audience to play. (Studio Version)

These are just a small sampling of songs and stories available for any given performance. I draw on over 400 songs written over a lifetime and countless folktales and original stories to mix and match for a unique concert experience your audience will remember for years.

check out these other programs:

• The Drum of The Elephant King: My most interactive program
• Thirsty For The Sky: Drums, Songs & Stories About Daring to Live Your Dreams
• All My DrumSongStory College Programs

For booking Call 888-598-7709 or e-mail me at Mark [at] MarkShepard.com

Hey everybody!

In case you are just dying to know how make the cool and groovy (and downright spooky) wooooo sound on my drums, watch this short video:

Thanks for watching! got any questions or comments? Leave ‘em below.

To get my entire DrumSongStory Live! CD instantly register as a fan in the top right corner! ==>

I Hate To Be Told What To Do All The Time | Song #237 | 6/12/1995

Refrain:
I hate to be told what to do all the time
I hate to be told what to do
I hate to be told what to do all the time
And something tells me you hate it too…

“Do This! Do That! Don’t step on the cat!
Leave your little brother alone
How many times do I have to tell you
To be quiet when I’m on the phone?”

Refrain:

“Do your homework. Clean up the yard.
Turn the Television off.
Don’t leave your clothes on the living room floor
And cover your mouth when you cough”

Refrain:

“Take a bath, wash your hair, change your underwear
Fix your collar, tie your shoes
Don’t leave your roller blades on the stairs
And you better change that attitude…”

Refrain:

Now listen to your folks when they talk about work
And how the boss can sometimes act like a jerk
And you know what it all boils down to?
Is that parents hate to be told what to do!

Refrain:

Commentary:

This was one of the first songs I wrote totally accompanied by drum. It was originally inspired by an overheard conversation I walked by in New York City around Christmas Time. A very annoyed parent was lecturing a young child and kind of coming down really heavily on this little kid. “Don’t do this, don’t do that” It was a whole list of things the kid had done wrong. Sheesh! It occurred to me that as an adult I certainly don’t like to be told what to do and memories of my dad talking about his boss’s latest demands triggered this idea that there is a chain of being bossed around that starts pretty young. It would be cool to hear elementary aged kids singing this and shaking their fingers like little annoyed adults…I would love to teach the NLP feedback sandwich to every parent, teacher, and boss in the country…

• Slice of bread #1: Tell them something specifically positive
• Between the slices: Give constructive feedback on what they could do better in the future
• Slice of Bread #2: Tell them something generally positive.

Let me know what you think! Leave a comment below.

Just got great news! The awesome version of Letters To Daddy, (the kids musical that I wrote the songs for) has been invited to be performed at the New York Musical Theater Festival a.k.a. NYMF

The project originated with Bill Rodman requesting me to write songs for his god daughter, Rilee O’Neill. Along the way, Jill Jayson, an awar winning playwright and director from Westport CT adapted it for elementary age children. Her version, called “Letters To Daddy, Jr.” has been invited to NYMF.

In case you don’t know what NYMF is, it is considered the “Sundance Festival” of Musical Theater. Many of the recent TONY award winners have premiered at NYMF. So it’s kind of a BIG deal. No. It is VERY DEFINITELY A BIG DEAL.

As it turns out, I will be part of the show, accompanying on guitar. I’m excited!

Here’s an article from Broadway World with all the details:

LETTERS TO DADDY JR. To Get Special Presentation at Manhattan Movement and Arts Center

Get Tickets To Letters To Daddy, Jr. (a NYMF Special Event)
Seating is Limited so get your tickets Now!

Sunday, October 04 at 1:00 & 4:00 PM

at Manhattan Movement & Arts Center
248 West 60th Street
New York, NY 10023
The theater is located between Amsterdam and West End Avenues.
Take the 1, A, B, C & D to 59th Street/ Columbus Circle.

In case you can’t make it into NYC on October 4th for the NYMF performances of Letters To Daddy, Jr., There will also be a Westport CT performance on Saturday Oct 3, at 1 pm & 7 pm

Seabury Center
45 Church Lane, Westport, CT

all tickets to the Westport shows are $15
Call 203 341-9659 for reservations (seating is extremely limited so reserve ASAP!)

Reactions from Kids, Parents, PTA Volunteers and Administrators at Church Street School, White Plains, NYto Mark Shepard’s DrumSongStory Family Concert.

Featured Theme for Multicultural Family Night Program: “Beyond The Borders – Drums, Songs & Stories Celebrating Cultural Collaboration”

Learn more about my programs suitable for: K-12 Assemblies & Family Concerts Concerts

Teacher Reactions from Halliwell Memorial and Smithfield Schools, Smithfield, RI, after Mark Shepard’s DrumSongStory performances Winter of 2009