The John Lennon Education Tour Bus

Next Destination: Warped Tour 2010

Detroit, MI

 

Press

Media Coverage

Lennon bus gets kids into music

Jennifer Brett - The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

If the late John Lennon were here today, his widow Yoko Ono says, he’d love nothing more than to create music with young people.

His legacy rolls into town this week, to give kids that chance.

Since 1998, the nonprofit John Lennon Educational Tour Bus has provided free programs to hundreds of schools, festivals and community groups. Kids who participate get to play music, write their own songs, groove through recording sessions and ultimately produce a video. At the end of the day, the budding stars go home with a DVD of their work.

“This type of mobile, technologically advanced, educational tool will allow the state to more effectively expand the interest of students in grades 6 to 12, in careers relating to recording and audio engineering,” said Asante Bradford, digital entertainment liaison for the film, music and digital entertainment office at Georgia’s Department of Economic Development, in a statement.

The bus will be open for business from 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. today at the Villages of Carver YMCA, 1600 Pryor Road; from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. May 22 at Lakewood Stadium, 70 Claire Drive; and from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. May 23 at Sam Ash Music Store, 2999 Cobb Parkway.

The program is geared toward school-age through college-age students. For more info, see http://www.lennonbus.org.

Original story appeared at:  http://www.ajc.com/living/content/printedition/2009/05/20/lennon0520.html

“This is precisely the kind of project John Lennon would have loved.”

- Yoko Ono Lennon

The Headlines

  • Warped Tour

    The Bus is on the Vans Warped Tour this summer! We're producing new songs and videos with the awesome bands on the tour and working with non-profits like Feed Our Children Now. Each morning before the gates open we pick one group of lucky attendees to jump the line and get personally escorted into the show so get there early and look for us! Subscribe to our Youtube channel to catch the latest videos and our Facebook page for a peek backstage with your favorite bands.

  • Gibson Foundation’s “Night Out for Nashville”

    The Bus visited the Hard Rock Café in Nashville for public tours and silent auction of an Epiphone guitar signed by the Black Eyed Peas to raise money for flood victims in the Nashville area. Donation boxes made from Gibson guitar cases were placed at Nashville businesses and venues. To find out how you can help, visit www.gibsonfoundation.org

  • The 70th Celebration

    This year will be John's 70th birthday. The celebration will be a worldwide event. Very soon we will announce how you can be a part of it. Keep checking back here for info. Imagine Peace!

Video aboard the Bus

The increasing accessibility of digital technology has led to an amazing expansion of opportunity in the art of digital storytelling. The John Lennon Educational Tour Bus has been at the forefront of this new media explosion, having produced daily video projects with students since January of 2001. The Lennon Bus puts state-of-the-art digital video equipment into the hands of workshop participants and teaches the entire digital workflow from story-boarding to DVD burning. Students leave the experience having shot, chopped, scored, and (most importantly) finished an entire digital video production. Using the latest cameras and professional hardware/software solutions including Apple's Final Cut Studio and Bogen Imaging's complete line of grip equipment, tripods, filters, and accessories, participants are exposed to the exciting world of digital videography and learn hot techniques of the trade. The accessibility of professional-quality technology is making it possible for millions of new voices to be heard and the John Lennon Bus is putting these tools into the hands of tomorrow's great digital producers.