The Mission to Youth and New Life Band (NLB), is on a limited tour of the United States trying to raise awareness and funds for their mission and the school they are building in a rural part of Tanzania. Seeing this talented group of self-taught musicians and composers on television or live in concert is great, but neither of these ways is the same as meeting with them personally.

I was very fortunate to be able to spend a bit of time with their founder, Fortunatus Mabondo [Ondo], a few weeks ago, as we attempted to put together a video that described the situation Tanzanian’s face and what the NLB are doing to improve things. They provided the raw footage and the background music. Unfortunately, the video doesn’t capture all of the challenges they face; like a power grid that only allows for electricity every other day.

And these challenges make for a different kind of life; a life that harkens back to what it was like in America before we had a constant assault of media. Ondo made the observation that Americans do not seem to have the attention span of the Tanzanians (could this be because of the 16,000+ images per days that our kids purportedly see). Hence, we created this American-sized, sound bite video to communicate what they are trying to accomplish. It’s not quite the same as being there, but hopefully it provides a flavor for these truly original and unique content creators.

http://www.newlifeband.net

for their latest tour information.