Main Theme from the new documentary, "A Hope for Hartly"
Garden State Film Festival Winner, Best Melodic Theme
Director: David Kuznicki
Writers: David Kuznicki, Matthew Russell
Music by Brian Katona
http://www.gsff.org/festival-info/added-competitions/movie-music-competition/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4715890/?ref_=nm_flmg_com_2
https://www.facebook.com/HopeForHartly

A Hope for Hartly

GSFF Awards Info

A Hope for Hartly (Garden State Film Festival Winner-Best Melodic Theme)

The Covid19 pandemic has taught me that we've been worshipping the wrong heroes. I have 5 family healthcare workers, and countless friends and family who are frontline workers of the Covid19 Pandemic. I’m inspired by all of them, but a comment from my aunt is what gave me the idea to write this song. She’s been a nurse for 30 years, and I’ve never heard her complain once. She told me that the Covid ICU was like a war zone and she felt like a veteran returning from the Vietnam War because people could not understand what healthcare workers were going through. It was then that I realized they were like superheroes - superheroes in disguise. The song was written in the next 24 hours.

Superheroes In Disguise

Kathleen Elle is an award-winning singer-songwriter from New Jersey. Her original music has won awards and been recognized by Seventeen Magazine, Abercrombie & Fitch, Campus MovieFest, Lincoln Center, and the National YoungArts Foundation. Elle's style and songwriting has been compared to artists like Joni Mitchell, Colbie Caillat, and John Mayer for her smooth vocals and grooving melodies.

Elle unexpectedly discovered her talent for writing music after taking a music writing course on a whim in high school. One of the first songs she wrote was an anti-bullying song “Don’t Let Them In." Its message is to be true to yourself, don’t change for bullies, find those who accept you, and don’t let bullies’ hate into your heart. Kathleen recorded the song, put it up on youtube, and soon received messages from people all around the world about how the song empowered them to face their bullies. The most impactful comment was from a 15 year old girl in the Philippines who said she found the song while contemplating suicide for the second time due to chronic bullying, and that the song saved her life! Elle knew then that writing and performing music was going to be her career. 

Kathleen went on to attain a degree in Music Composition from Rutgers Mason Gross School of the Arts, which helped her to not only write all the songs on her new album, but also to arrange and self produce it.

“Brainwaves” is a collection of personal experiences as well as observances of friend’s relationships. The album covers multiple song styles, from indie-pop singer-songwriter to dance funk to country, showing Elle’s versatility as a songwriter and artist. Elle provides all vocals, and plays guitar and keyboard, but also employed the help of talented musicians from Rutgers Mason Gross. 

“Brainwaves” is a 100% NJ project, recorded at Jankland Studios in Wall, NJ. It was engineered, mixed, and mastered by owner Steve Jankowski, a classically trained trumpeter currently touring with Hall of Fame Songwriter Nile Rogers, & CHIC band, formerly with Chicago, Blood Sweat & Tears and more. Kathleen is honored that Jankowski also plays horns on the album.

Superheroes In Disguise

Kathleen Elle

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