Album Notes

Planting Gardens is the latest album by singer songwriter and activist Joe Reilly. The result of a three-year process of songwriting, musical collaborations, and spiritual activism, this album offers listeners a hopeful vision of peace, non-violence, and love within the context of community building. In times when positive messages are difficult to find in the media, Reilly waters seeds of compassion and understanding with poetic lyrics, beautiful melodies, and soulful rhythms. Planting Gardens gives us a tour of Joe’s experiences and reflections of life in Detroit and Chicago and of the earth and waters in between. "City oh city I sing to your soul. Let the babies and seedlings be free and grow. Before you replace them with buildings and roads. Remember the sunlight and flowers who grow." ~Follow the Sun Cultivating soils of our consciousness with messages of environmental justice and stewardship, Joe’s songs appeal to all who seek a deeper connection with themselves, with each other, and with the earth. "Maybe I should be a little more like the river, flowing slowly, into the sea." ~The River Throughout his travels of natural, urban, and spiritual worlds, Joe never loses sight of his origins. "Michigan is the state where the lakes are great and the water is fresh so you can hydrate." ~The Michigan Song Backed by his Chicago-based band The Faith Project, Reilly recorded the album with Kalamazoo engineers Ian Gorman and John Campos at the Leaven Center, a retreat and study center nurturing the relationship between spirituality and social justice in Lyons, Michigan. The spiritual activism supported by the Leaven Center as well as the beauty and serenity of its land provided the perfect conditions for the germination of this creative project. A ten-minute enhanced video portion of the album documents this creative process and includes interviews and scenes of the Leaven Center recording sessions. The Faith Project consists of jazz drummer Jon Faro, soul gospel bassist Alejandro Cornejo, Haitian Master Percussionist Camelo Romelus and special guest vocalist, Chicago’s Native soul diva Michaela Marchi. Their multicultural musical chemistry transcends barriers of race, class, and religion to create a solid foundation of world rhythm behind Joe’s powerful voice. This effect is accentuated by several special guests to the album such as Native American Music Award winners Keith Secola (Akina Music) and Annie Humphrey (Makoche Records), folk singer Sue Demel (Sons of the Never Wrong, Gadfly Records), and members of the Long Hairz Collective. Complementing the music are three excerpts from a talk by Vietnamese Zen Master, author, and teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, given during a retreat for entertainers at the Deer Park Monastery in California. On the song Detroit Summer, inspired by Joe’s involvement with the grassroots movement in the Motor City founded by Grace Lee Boggs, Reilly and The Faith Project are joined by Detroit’s own St. Leo Choir. Background Joe Reilly has been a singer, songwriter, and guitarist for over twelve years and has had extensive performance and touring experience, bringing messages of hope and peace in his songs to audiences in the Midwest and across the United States. Both of his parents are singers and guitarists and Joe grew up listening to their classical and liturgical music in his home and church, learning that music can be prayerful, healing, and celebratory. With their help he began to teach himself to play guitar and sing. In addition to self-instruction he has also studied voice and guitar privately and at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago. Joe is Italian, Irish, and Native American (Cherokee). His background in the study and performance of many different musical styles, including Native American music, folk, blues, jazz, liturgical, and classical, as well as his academic studies of environmental justice and racism and spiritual roots in Catholi