Dakota 38 on Minnesota Public Radio

Listen here to a story that Minnesota Public Radio aired on December 23rd, 2010.

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2010/12/22/dakota-conflict/

Honoring a great friend. Don Williams 1979-2010.

Don passed away this past weekend in Australia from a traffic accident on the eve his 31st Birthday. He will be missed by many. While on a run yesterday I had an idea to honor Don through the above video. -Silas

WE MADE IT!

A letter from our Smooth Feather brother Adam Mastrelli,

“Si, Amazing! So just to review what happened. 30 days ago we put a project online in the hopes of sharing it and raising $20,000. 182 different backers came together and it happened. Thanks for helping me to continue to see what's possible.”

First off, to the 182 people who contributed, we’re all so humbled & honored to have you a part of the “Dakota 38” family.

In the midst of the final hours of the kickstarter campaign on November 18th, I was working with both Jay McKay and Jay Parrotta on the latest soundtrack for Dakota 38. Working with these two musicians has led to some of the most inspiring times of my life on planet earth :) And because of all the amazing generosity through the kickstarter campaign we've been able to take the score to the next level. For instance, a few weeks back we purchased some instrument samples for the music editing program we use called Logic Pro. The samples (Symphobia & True Strike) are actual recordings of string instruments and orchestral drums which Logic then triggers through the keyboard. Essentially you get an orchestral sound without getting 75 musicians in the room. And this software is normally out of our budget yet with the support over the past 30 days we’ve been able to order that software and as a result taken the soundtrack to a whole new level.

Yesterday I spent a couple hours putting together some videos from those recording sessions.

Also we did an interview with Jay Parrotta who just recently signed on to Co-Compose “Dakota 38” with Jay McKay. How Parrotta got involved is an amazing story which he talks about in the second video below.

“Dakota 38” tells the story of the original ride from Crow Creek, SD to Mankato Minnesota in 2008. Since then, the ride continues to happen annually. Tomorrow, December 10^th, the riders will be gathering once again to embark on the 330 mile ceremony. Our thoughts and prayers are with this year’s riders. For more information about this year’s ride you can visit the following websites,

http://dakota-38.ning.com/

http://dakota382008.com/dakota38.htm

"DAKOTA 38" on kickstarter homepage

"Dakota 38" is currently featured on the homepage of kickstarter.com. I just got an email from indiewire.com who wants to do a story about the film as well. Exciting momentum is building. Thanks again to all those who have helped out so far. Talk soon, -Silas

Just came across this video

Thought i'd share this video that was recently passed on to me. Very powerful.

"Dakota 38" on Kickstarter.com

Hello,

A couple months back my buddy Seth Herman sent me an email regarding a friend of his who was putting together a film about street musicians in NYC. He told me to watch a trailer at a website called kickstarter.com. I checked it out, and loved the movie idea as well as the concept behind kickstarter. I ended up deciding to "back the project" with a donation. I liked the all or nothing approach of kickstarter as well, if the project reaches it's funding goal it's funded, otherwise it isn't.

After backing the project through kickstarter i found myself much more invested in the outcome of the film and felt great about my contribution to making this vision a stronger reality.

Over the past few years I've had some mixed feelings surrounding fundraising. And in fact, for a couple years one of Smooth Feather's main principles was that we didn't fundraise. Yet all of sudden, I was taking part in fundraising for a film and the energy surrounding it was great. Often times one is exposed to fundraising which has a desperate tone to it, a tone which can make you feel guilty, i.e. "for the price of your coffee you SHOULD be helping save the wild penguins of the north." And don't get me wrong, I love penguins and I imagine the organization is doing great work, yet often times this forced approach feels out of alignment. The kickstarter model felt different, if you're inspired to get involved you're welcome to and if not that's great too.

And so when I found kickstarter, it felt like a great way for people to take a powerful role in helping to finish "Dakota 38". Currently we're working on recording an original soundtrack for the film, as well as sound effects, visual effects and also looking to finance a debut road trip tour of "Dakota 38" in our Smooth Feather Winnebago. Despite the fact that everyone is donating their time, there are numerous costs associated with bringing the pieces together which totals around $20,000.

So we've got 30 days and $20,000, lets see what happens. Right now it's at $360, Peter, Tirza, Sean, Adam, Ainsley, Josie, Caroline and Valentina, you guys rock :)

Let the games begin,

Silas

Hello from D.C.

It’s good to be writing on these postings once again. When looking at the last post of June 2009 I realized how much I’ve been in an editing cave for the past year. Most of the time was spent up in Maine editing “Dakota 38” at my buddy J Golub’s house. J, you’re the man once again. At night I’d head back down Porterfield Rd. where I grew up and climb the mountain behind my folks house to spend nights in the yurt. If you don’t know what a yurt is, they’re very rad Mongolian structures that were used for nomadic travel. At any rate, it was great to do the core of the editing for “Dakota 38” completely immersed in the rhythms of Nature. Owls would often swoop down on my hike up at night, I encountered a Big Buck in the trail one night; all I could see was his eyes because my head lamp was dying……it’s pretty intense to see eyes that are 5 feet off the ground in the dark :) He eventually started snorting so I knew who he was.

I spent this past summer in Maine and then about a month ago I decided to move down to D.C. and finish working on everything with “Dakota 38” from here. Love is what often pulls a man in the directions he travels, and Ms. Caroline Jova is the reason for me moving to the mother ship of Washington D.C. A couple weeks back I was grabbing a table for our new house and driving by all of the monuments including the Lincoln memorial, it seems quite fitting to be finishing “Dakota 38” from the city where many of these decisions and policies where headquartered from. It’s also been a huge part of my own journey of reconciliation, healing and forgiveness towards Lincoln and everyone involved on both sides.

This morning I got an email from someone who’d watched the trailer and they were very angry about many things. I think anger is an important step in the process of reconciliation; it needs to be honored and then processed in order to move towards a deeper healing. I look back at myself and many of the riders on the ride and we were pissed off many times for different reasons, yet with Jim’s Leadership he always pulled us back with that unconditional love, coming up to us and muttering in a low tone, “I love you buddy”.

Even last week I was talking to Jim on the phone about how messed up it was that our nations capital had a football team called the “Red Skins”….I mean if I were to call Jim, Andy, Sarah or J.B. a Red Skin that would be deeply offensive. The teams mascot is a Native Chief with a feather headdress and everyone was walking through the streets of D.C. with that logo proudly displayed. And so I was venting this to Jim over the phone and he honored my feelings, yet I could tell that he wasn’t putting any of his energy into the subject. Those things are difficult to change, I think is what he may have said something to the effect of. And so as I continue to learn from Jim, I keep coming back to the power of love and forgiveness. That’s what makes this film so powerful and I’m honored to continue growing from it everyday.

There have been many exciting developments with “Dakota 38” over the past week. I’ve been trying to make what we’re doing with the film more transparent to the general public because we do need help in certain areas in order to finish the film. Those can be found on the community page of the site if you're interested. I was starting to feel overwhelmed with all of the things that needed to be done and the people closest to me kept saying, “Silas, you need some help” :) And so I’ve started making these needs more transparent.

For example, there is a website called kickstarter.com which has got me thinking about alternative ways to finance the final stages of post production for Dakota 38 , i.e. the score, sound effects, travel, etc. It’s an amazing way for many people to finance the film with 10 bucks and become part of the process. I actually backed a cool documentary about street musicians in NYC and the light bulb went off when I realized how good it felt to be part of that film and as a result how invested I became in its future.

So I’m excited to welcome more people into the family that is Smooth Feather and “Dakota 38”. I’ll be doing my best to keep folks up to speed with the developments with everything. Thanks also for all of the emails of support.

Alright, if I'm going to be more consistent with these postings I’ve got to pace myself. :) Talk soon,
Silas