Part I - You MIGHT be an Environmentalist...

Holiday Wreath made from discarded sheet music.

Part I --You MIGHT be an Environmentalist….

..if you insist on your coffee being organic, shade grown (to protect the songbird habitat) and labeled “fair trade”.

..if you tote your rotten apple core 74 miles home to put it in your compost pile rather than pitch it in a trash can.

..if you limp when you walk because you recently darned the holes in your socks, and it is a new skill, so they are lumpy!

..if the only cleaning supplies in your house are salt, baking soda, vinegar, lemon juice and borax.

..if you haven’t used a chemical on your lawn since you read the ingredients and knew the dandelions and butterflies wouldn’t like it.

..if every time you see a child having an asthma attack and silently cuss out makers, sellers and drivers of SUV’s.

..if you only want to go to the food store when you have four items left in your refrigerator and none of them are tofu or fresh fruit.

..if you count down the days to Household Hazardous Waste Day to dispose of your used batteries, paints, solvents, household chemicals and computers and parts.

..if you think that Julia “Butterfly” Hill should have been Time Magazine’s Person of the Year for the two years she tree-sat in Luna.

..if you always cheer for the Indians in the old westerns—and you still regularly want to defend native peoples.

..if you watched 3 people on your block die of the same rare disease and begin to study eco justice issues.

..if you use leftover water in glasses from meals to water your houseplants instead of dumping in down the drain.

..if you can describe the difference in mission of Sierra Club, Nature Conservancy, Environmental Defense Fund and Audubon Society.

..if you struggle with the issue of living sustainably in a consumer world.

..if you’ve held a child in your arms as you read about degraded air and water quality and whispered, “How can we do this to you?”

..if your favorite “good clothes” came off the Final Clearance rack at Goodwill.

..if you’ve ever asked a loved one to save their bath water so you can use it next, knowing aquatic life downstream need the next tub full more than you do.

..if you’ve read about sustainability successes Kerala, Curitiba, and Gaviotos and thought: "Why can't we do this in more communities?"

..if your jewelry collection is made mostly from rocks, string and dried mushrooms.   

..if you shopped your entire Christmas list while only buying things from groups that are committed to Earth restoration.

..if your friends can recite by heart your speech about the dangers of pesticides to children.

..if you’ve ever saved all your dryer lint to stuff a pillow.

..if you hang wet clothes all over the house, rather than use the dryer, because besides saving power it humidifies your dry winter house.

..if you’ve ever called the hotel desk and asked them to leave the same sheets on the bed  for the 4 days you’ll be in the room.

..if you’ve ever stood in your backyard in the rain in your skivvies laughing at how good it felt.

..if you wretch every time you hear the word disposable.

..if you compost because you know that  “a rind is a terrible thing to waste.”

Where Did This Come From? Link to song

Where did that come from? 
Where has it been? In what other forms?

I love to play “Where does this come from?”, picking any item in a room and tracing the path of a book or chair, iPad, or cookie all the way back to it’s basic components.  A tree in Asia, sugar grown in Florida? Rare Earth element from Africa for an electronic component?  What kind of energy transported it to each step of its making? How many times did it need to be handled. What was the cost in air and water quality? 

This is a wonderful car game for families. It helps us see in our possessions just how interconnected we are on this planet.
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First Law of Ecology: You can’t do just ONE thing. Everything is connected.


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My love of planet Earth comes from such a deep spiritual place, that it has no words. When I play “Where does this come from?”  it inevitably goes back to the beginning of the Universe.

Surely along the way of Where Did This Come From, you will find a song to sing about a place or resource, so Sing Out!


Songs connect the whole world in weaving wonderful way!

My work has taken me from schools in the Hawaiian Islands to cathedrals and concert halls throughout North America. Nature centers and converted barns have been favorite places to sing and share the joy of wonders of Earth.  Whether at a University or a House Concert hosted in someone’s home, there is no sweeter music to me than when people join in and sing along.  Pete Seeger used to say that “Singing together strengthens the bonds of community.”  I think we can sense that power when we join together in song.

If You Need a Chair— Act Locally for stronger communities

IF YOU NEED A CHAIR BY JOYCE ROUSE 

Happy Chairmaker by Todd Price ©2013 Original oil painting. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

This song is on my CD  “A Sense of Place” by Earth Mama. One of the main themes of the album is to honor whatever place you chose to live in. I love our local farmers market and meeting the people who grow our food.  As we discover more local products, I have greater respect for the artisans, growers, crafters, and creators of useful items we have right here in my community. And probably in yours! I wanted this song to have a global musical feel and honor many cultures, with humor, fun rhymes and places to sing along with “la la la” syllables.  I hope people will get up and dance around and sing harmony when they hear this song. And perhaps inspire people to make stronger communities by shopping for locally made goods. Maybe it will even promote supporting local music...  La La La La LA!

For music and lyrics click here: If You Need a Chair

This was first posted on the Children's music network blog in september 2015. reposted here with their permission

The Blue Ridge Parkway-A Ribbon of Stone

Come Drive this Ribbon of Beauty

One day as I drove a section the Blue Ridge Parkway, I noted migrating birds and imagined what the Parkway must look like to them, flying high above our terrain. I could picture the curving, undulating road from the sky like a ribbon on patchwork squares of farms and fields, woods and fenced off pasture land. Perhaps it looked like a long narrow rumpled quilt with creases of peak and valley.

Out of this image began music and lyrics fleshing out the many facets of the importance of the Parkway to our nation.  Many years ago, for the 50th anniversary of the Blue Ridge Parkway, I had written and recorded a ballad of the history of the parkway. Now, the deeper cultural and ecological, natural history and artistic aspects called to me to paint a song richer in metaphor, melodically Appalachian and recorded with organic traditional instruments.

 The cultural history of this region is rich with stories of the early settlers, some played out by re-enactors of their brave and rough lives at designated stops on the Parkway.  The music, the handmade, homemade life that became the folk art of this region sprang up along the early trails of America’s First People and wildlife. And from above, to the raptors and songbirds, it might all look like a ribbon stitched on to a verdant quilt—a glimpse of heaven far below.


 A Ribbon of Stone

One of thousands of great views along the Blue Ridge Parkway, American's Favorite Drive.

Here's another song you may enjoy as you drive the Blue Ridge Parkway: Virginia Beauty


   Artist’s Statement:  Joyce Johnson Rouse