While Coast resident Gordon Walker was learning guitar from music teacher Ken McBride, his attention was caught by another of McBride's projects. Walker began to sit in on some fun singing sessions in a program McBride was leading with the special needs folks at the Sunshine Coast Association for Community Living (SCACL) in Sechelt.
Walker noticed that with McBride's musical attentions, some of the SCACL day program participants who had never sung before were now singing openly and enjoying it.
As a contribution to the community, Walker decided to sponsor the group toward making a CD, The Sun is Here, of their original tunes. He wanted to dedicate the CD to another of his causes.
"I've watched the Olym-pics year after year, and every year they blow the flame out before the Para-lympic Games," Walker said. "I believe we should show respect for the Paralympics and not extinguish the flame until the last Paralympian has left the field."
A Vancouver 2010 media liaison confirms this practice and says that the flame from Athens is extinguished after the Olympic Games. But she said the Paralympics are their own event, and they will also mount a torch relay. The 2010 website said the Paralympic torch relay is a relatively new idea that first took place in 1988: "Unlike the Olympic flame, the Paralympic flame has no ancestral home. Each Paralympic organizing committee has the freedom to choose a lighting method and ceremony that is significant to the host country."
That's not good enough for Walker. With the goal of raising public awareness of this omission, the participants of the SCACL's music program and their executive director Glenn McClughan released a CD in November under the group name Friends of the Flame. It opens with McClughan reading the dedication, and then the novice songsters chime in with their own compositions. The core group of about 15 all take part, sometimes increasing to about 30 singers of all ages. McBride, who has led this program for over two years and who also plays at the Bethel Baptist Church, tells how keen the group is.
"It gives me so much pleasure to get them started in music," he said. "After the session, everyone has a smile on their face."
McBride played guitar and recorded the songs on site; he recognizes it is not Grammy Award winning material, but he is thrilled with the result.
"I'd ask 'what do you want to sing about today'?" he explains. "Then the group would suggest the ideas. Sometimes nothing happened. Sometimes we recorded songs."
The themes are as varied as the participants. The title song, The Sun is Here, is performed by the whole group. Someone giggles throughout this recording and the good humour is guaranteed to lighten the listener's day. One woman sings about riding on the bus on her way to the day program. Another sings a good rocking number about his dog. One man focuses on the important things of life: "My house, mom and dad, drink Coke, sing sunshine."
The songs are individual, drawn from their hearts and souls, but the result is very much a collaboration, so much so that no song writing credits are given or any one person singled out for attention.
The CD is not for commercial sale but can be bought by donation by calling 604-885-7455. McClughan said donations will probably be pumped back into the music program. The purpose of the CD was not to make money but rather to make the symbolic gesture and to further the Association's aims, those of advancing citizenship for all people.
