Here at ADOtowers we have many a talented musician in our midst. Steve is a keen bass player with his band, The Christophers. Alex is a talented drummer with his band, The Mystery Creatures, Scott loves to strum an acoustic guitar and the rest of the team have been known to form a bit of a choir when the right tune comes on in the studio. With this great love for all things melodic, it was hardly surprising that a musical charity came to our attention.
We Need Strings is a rather brilliant concept set up by Janek Gwizdala, a US based Bass player and record producer who has played with industry greats such as Mike Stern, John Mayer, Pat Metheny, Jojo Mayer and Randy Brecker to name but a few. His music has allowed him to travel the globe. It was during these travels that he recognised a very real need from his fellow musicians who are living in impoverished areas.
“There are so many people around the world in countries like Cuba, Zimbabwe, Ghana, and many more that just don’t have access to strings. A new set can sometimes cost an entire month’s salary, and musicians have been tying knots in broken strings just to continue playing music.
As someone who changes their strings every three days I might be on the crazy end of the strings changing spectrum, but no matter how often you change them, we’d love to take your used strings and send them to people in need around the world.”
Janek is asking musicians around the world to send in their used strings in order to help 1000s of aspiring musicians who aren’t fortunate enough to have a plentiful supply. This is a cause we just couldn’t resist getting involved with! With this in mind, ADOtowers has now become the UK’s central donations centre.
A few weeks ago, we set up a Facebook page and Steve began to spread the word via his Instagram and Twitter feeds. We have been astounded by the results!
Boxes and parcels have been flooding in from all over the place and the studio has become full to brimming with strings, plectrums and various paraphernalia.
The geeky, design loving side of us has been admiring some of the cool packaging. These are a few of our favourites…
We will continue to collect and send the strings out across the world. Just doing our bit for our fellow music lovers.
“It’s not just bass strings! We’ll take guitar, bass, violin, nylon, steel… both used and new, you name it. If it fits on a stringed instrument, we can recycle it and change musicians lives all around the world.”
– janekgwizdala.com
If you would like to know more about this project, donate your own strings or you would simply like to get involved, then feel free to get in touch with us at weneedstrings@adomedia.co.uk – we’ll keep you updated with our progress.
