This page contains a brief overview on the album A COMPILATION OF 11 ALASKAN BANDS: Tell the Children the Truth. Learn more about the artist and explore the track lists and website. If you find any information that needs to be corrected, please let us know.

 
Current Total of $$ from CD Sales to the Children's Trust
as of 7/19/06 = $4,000.00

Tell the Children the Truth is the name of an exciting and brilliant new compilation CD of Alaskan musicians and songwriters.

The CD contains 17 songs and is a showcase for 11 Alaskan bands, including GaNgLy MoOsE, Melissa Mitchell, No Time Flatt and the University of Alaska Fairbanks Steel Drum Band. The musical styles on this CD include rock'n'roll, bluegrass, acoustic jazz, female vocalists, old timey, steel drum music and more!! The artwork for this CD is also a showcase for longtime Fairbanks artist, Jamie Smith.

Tell the Children the Truth is a benefit CD for the Alaska Children's Trust. All proceeds from the sale of this CD are donated to the Friends of the Alaska Children's Trust. The Alaska Children’s Trust awards grants to community-based programs and projects across Alaska that aid in the prevention of child abuse and neglect. See www.friendsofact.org for more information about the Children’s Trust.

Tell the Children the Truth was produced by and is being distributed by me, Kliff Hopson. I also play drums/percussion in all the bands.

The following is what I have to say about the title:

I only have one bumper sticker on my truck. It is a Bob Marley quote from a powerful song, and it is the title of this CD. Several years ago I was stopped on an Alaskan highway at a construction zone. The truck behind me pulled up beside me on the median, which I thought was a pretty strange thing for it to do. The driver rolled down her window, smiled at me and asked what my bumper sticker meant. At the time, I don’t think I had a good answer to that question. But the experience has led me to think about what a good answer would be. I have had a notion in the back of my head that it is a very hard question to answer. Truth can be such an elusive and subtle thing, often overlooked when most obvious and then sometimes impossible to locate. But, in my life, I have found that there is one unequivocal truth that rides high and mighty on the sea of knowledge and ideas. This truth of which I speak is that love is the key to a happy life. If we give love freely, it comes back to us in spades. If we fill our lives with Big Love, we are rewarded with a sense of inner peace and fulfillment that can’t be bought, stolen or conquered.

Furthermore, I would add that music is the language of love, and that a life filled with love and music is the most joyous experience possible for a human being.

Fourteen years of playing music in Alaska has put me in a unique position to bring together this host of amazingly talented musicians and song writers to make a love-filled recording for the children of Alaska. Some of the groups aren’t together any more. Some have morphed. But all of the musicians are still performing in Alaska and I would encourage the world to check them out.

And this is a list of the programs that received grants from the Alaska Children's Trust in 2006:

Alaska Children’s Trust 2006 Grantees

Juneau Family Birth Center
Juneau Award: $37,500
This project will provide the Strength in Families Program that supports families, infants and children in the earliest, most crucial stages of development and beyond through supporting parent-infant bonding.

Safe and Fear Free Environment
Dillingham, Bristol Bay Award: $37,500
The proposed project will develop and implement prevention initiatives within established inter-agency and community groups; design age and culturally appropriate prevention activities and develop capacity and skill building training for caregivers, human service providers and others.

Standing Together Against Rape
Anchorage Award: $37,500
This project will focus on educational presentations on sexual abuse with students, the professional and general public adult populations in Anchorage.

Togiak Traditional Council
Togiak Award: $37,228
This project will increase availability of secondary prevention services and parenting education to first time parents, young and single parents; provide support for at-risk parents; and coordinate community programs to increase the skills and resources of at-risk parents.

Child Care Connection, Inc.
Southcentral Alaska Award: $37,500
This project will provide three different models of parenting education including one in Spanish for the Anchorage area. Models include the Zero To Three; Parent to Parent by the Casey Family Programs and the Incredible Years.

SeaView Community Services
Southcentral Alaska Award: $34,098
This project will provide primary prevention through positive influence with parents and children through weekly playgroups where parents have the chance to meet and discuss concerns and issues that relate to raising young children, birth to age 5.

Resource Center for Parents and Children
Fairbanks Award: $37,500
This project will target new parents or at-risk parents of newborns through a parent and family education program called, Cuddle Cure.

Southcentral Foundation
Anchorage Award: $37,500
This project will assist in providing effective training on child abuse prevention at the Arrigah House in Anchorage.

Track List:
1. Little Children
2. Train 45 / Doin' My Time
3. When the Sun Comes
4. Ptarmigan in the Tundra
5. Country Ham
6. Sarah
7. Don't Grow Up Like John
8. Undecided
9. Big Eyed Cat
10. Matlacha
11. 1000 Miles
12. Dark Eyes
13. Rebecca's Waltz
14. Miss Mary
15. Klinch Mountain Backstep
16. Love You More
17. The Middle of the Night

Other Genres:

• JAZZ: Jazz Vocals
• ROCK: Jam-band
• TYPE: COMPILATIONS