Ode to San Francisco

San Francisco, CA, June 8, 2015 (Newswire.com) - ODE TO SAN FRANCISCO

San Francisco, June 2015.  The average one-bedroom apartment rents for  $3,120.  The minimum wage is $12.25.  If a person works 40 hours per week, he/she cannot afford to rent a one-bedroom apartment. If that individual hooked up with another full-time worker, together they could rent a one-bedroom, but would have no money for food, utilities, transportation, insurance, medical bills, education, or entertainment.  The norm of teachers, fire crew, and plumbers in San Francisco is a salary range of $30,000 to $60,000.  Only those at the higher end of that range could afford to rent a one-bedroom apartment.  Unless one is a lottery winner or recipient of a major inheritance, no one in the middle class can purchase a home in San Francisco; the current average home price is $1.22 million. All around the City long-term residents, small businesses, independent bookstores, music clubs, and artists are being evicted and displaced at an alarming rate to make room for the needs of the exploding technology industry.

Ms. Loomis created the lyrics, music, and arrangement of “Ode to San Francisco” as a poignant tribute to the City.  She chose to create her piece around Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” both because of its familiarity and its sense of irony.  The CD has been distributed to radio stations and online via social networks.  Additionally, the video is playing on Wendy Loomis’ YouTube channel.

Wendy Loomis is a San Francisco-based composer who has won the ASCAP award for composition 4 times, released 12 CDs, and has performed with various ensembles nationally and internationally.  She has received numerous nominations for her songs from the Hollywood Music and Media Awards, the Los Angeles Music Awards, and the Unisong International Song competition in the genres of jazz, world, new age, and contemporary classical.  Her most recent CD “Mystic Places” (for ensemble Phoenix Rising with flutist Monica Williams) is in the top 20 on the Zone Reporter charts for new age and is in high rotation on Sirius, Comcast, Music Channel, Pandora, and Rhapsody.

In December 2013 Wendy performed one of her piano compositions in Havana, Cuba as part of the American Composers Salon at the Unión Nacional de Escritores y Artistas.  In February 2014, Wendy was in Columbus, Ohio delivering a pre-concert talk at Capital University where one of her chamber music compositions was performed.   She also has had numerous commissioned works performed by the Flock of Flutes ensemble in Northern California.

Wendy has had her compositions included in several independent films including Lillie Paquette’s “We Are Egypt: The Story Behind the Revolution” and Victoria Giordana’s “Virgin of the Candles” which had its premiere at the Latino International Film Festival in Hollywood in 2010.

Mixed into “Ode to San Francisco” is a poem called “Haves & Have Nots” written by poet/spoken word artist Royal Kent.  “The Haves have the Have Nots doing everything but what they ought. So they can have all while all others have naught!"  Ms. Loomis and Royal Kent have maintained a long-term business and creative partnership in San Francisco.  Their ensemble COPUS has performed throughout the Bay Area and in Los Angeles, Nashville, Atlanta, Boston, and Western Massachusetts.  Currently, they are working on their next full-length CD entitled “Aspects” that will be released on September 11th.  Their monthly “Poets & Composers Salon” house concert series brings together independent singer/songwriters, storytellers, poets, composers, and audiences eager to feel a sense of community in such an unstable time.

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