Students across the OCDSB are sharing their voices through songwriting workshops, videos, and album releases in collaboration with Juno-nominated folk singer Craig Cardiff and the team of artists, producers, and animators at SongCollab.Studio.
Working with the OCDSB Innovation and Adolescent Learning department, Craig and SongCollab.Studio have provided virtual songwriting and animation workshops for over 12,000 grade K-12 students across every OCDSB school since 2020. Those experiences have added up to an impressive 3,684 songs and 1,200+ video animations!
Additionally, the program has created opportunities for 106 students to participate in Co-op, SHSM, and paid work opportunities in the fields of arts, music, and animation, with 184 academic credits granted.
For musical experiences, the creative process begins with virtual class workshops, where Craig and the team use the software SoundTrap to guide students in experiments with rhythms, instrumentation, lyric-writing, and singing. These workshops are an opportunity for students to express themselves and explore issues that are important to them and their community.
OCDSB Co-Op and SHSM (Specialist High Skills Major) students lend their music production, mixing, and album art design skills to help bring the recordings to life. The albums are published on streaming platforms, and schools often celebrate by holding an album release party to share their songs with their school community. In the 2021-22 school year alone, students have collaborated on over 2,900 compositions!
Here are just a few of the musical highlights. You can dive into the full discography on Spotify, Apple Music or Amazon Music!