About joyfilled music
Joyfilled music is run by Nancy Bradshaw. The creative
collaboration for the CD itself was a project of Nancy and two other
talented and devoted parents: Michael Creber, and Beverley Elliot.
As parents who adore our own children, we want to express our love and
be of service to all children. We feel we have been guided on this
project to bring loving, joyfilled music to children everywhere.
As in any inspired collaboration, we each bring different talents to this project:
Michael Creber
is a Grammy-nominated, Juno Award-winning composer, musician and
producer who has performed and recorded extensively with world-renowned
family entertainer Raffi. Michael has appeared in
concert with Raffi throughout North America - highlights include a
performance for US President Bill Clinton's first inauguration, a week
of sold-out concerts at Gershwin Theatre in New York City , and a
special performance for Mikhail Gorbachev. Michael co-produced and
co-wrote Raffi's most recent CD Let's Play , as well the 1994 CD Bananaphone (which won a Juno Award and was nominated for a Grammy) and 1995's Raffi Radio .
In addition to his work with Raffi, Michael toured with the Irish Rovers for five years (including 36 TV specials), and was also one of k.d. lang 's “Reclines,” playing all over North America and Europe . Michael has also worked with many other amazing artists including the Rankin Sisters, Norman Foote, Charlotte Diamond, David Foster, and Cyndi Lauper.
Michael is the adoring father of two children: Andrew, who just graduated from high school and is also a musician, and four-year-old Michelle, who often popped into our recording sessions to get hugs from her dad or show him things that he absolutely had to see right now. Michelle is also a budding musician and an enthusiastic student at Creber Music Academy, where Michael and his wife Monique Tougas Creber teach piano/keyboard and vocal performance to students ages 3 to adult. Specializing in a wide variety of contemporary musical styles such as pop, folk, jazz, blues, country and gospel, Creber Music Academy employs a supportive, performance-based approach that fosters a love of music and encourages hands-on learning.
Michael is joined on Dream Child by the radiant singer, songwriter and professional film and TV actress Beverley Elliott.
Beverley is the voice you hear on the CD. She has been entertaining audiences with her own brand of earthy
country folk music for over 15 years.Her gorgeous song “Are You
Listening,” from her CD Yellow Dress (1997), won 1st
prize in the BC division of the Songwriters Association of Canada's
writing competition. She is a regular performer at Vancouver's
“Just Singing Around” songwriter's showcase, as well as at
various other festivals, benefits, charity events and churches. She is
also a fun and enthusiastic children's entertainer.
Beverley makes her living in film and television, and has just finished working on the Stephen King mini-series, Kingdom Hospital . Other film and TV credits include Clint Eastwoods's Unforgiven, The Addams Family, The Outer Limits, The X-File, Da Vinci's Inquest, Cold Squad, Dead Man's Gun and Bye Bye Blues. Beverley was also a series regular on Hope Island and Bordertown.
Beverley's biggest creative project, however, is her five-year-old daughter Sally, and they enjoy a warm, playful, loving relationship filled with joy and song.
Michael and Beverley were initially brought together for the Dream Child project by Nancy Bradshaw,
the leader of this journey to bring more love and light to children
everywhere. Nancy is an Ethics in Action Award winner, who was
also named by the Vancouver Sun as one of 25 top “new wave”
leaders for her role in creating leading edge socially and
environmentally innovative businesses such as the retail store HOPE Unlimited and Spark Strategies Consulting.
She recently led a consulting project for the Dalai Lama Centre in
Vancouver. She was also recognized for her pivotal role in
setting up two pioneering non-profit organizations, Canadian Business for Social Responsibility (founder and past President) and Dress for Success Vancouver (one of the three founding board members).
Nancy is very interested in helping people to live a life filled with purpose and joy. To this end, she has studied in many different areas. In addition to her practical background in visioning and implementation planning, she is a certified Neuro-Linguistic Practitioner (NLP) and is trained in self hypnosis. She is also deeply spiritual person. Nancy has taken many training days at PD Seminars (a registered post-secondary learning program that is highly effective in guiding personal growth) and is now teaching a program there for women on 'Radiant Relationships.' She has also taken the Adler STEP parenting program, and reads widely on the subject of child development.
Nancy is proactive about her impact: she eats almost exclusively vegetarian, screens her purchases to support only good working conditions locally or abroad, and tries to minimize her waste through buying recycled and recycling.
Nancy and her husband Robert Brown (a “green building” developer) have an adorable 3½-year-old daughter, Faith, who brings Nancy many of her greatest joys. Nancy became a mom in her late 30s, and it was Faith who taught her to slow down and cherish the flowers in life. Indeed, motherhood has opened so many new doors in all aspects of her life - including leading her to create these two magically channelled CDs. This has given her the opportunity to work with talented musicians like Michael and Beverley, as well as with her brilliant marketing partners at Raised Eyebrow.
Our Extended Team
Although we have listed official roles for each of us, Dream Child was indeed a true collaboration. Each time we wrote or recorded music for the CD, we gave thanks and prayed for guidance on how to best support children, and we are so grateful for the guidance our process brought us. We have also been wonderfully encouraged by the feedback we have received from children, their parents, energy workers, family therapists, spiritual leaders and healers along the way.
This CD has been made so much richer by everyone who contributed to its creation.
In particular, these include Marilyn Norry , a good friend of Beverley's, who generously gave her time and ideas to each draft of our stories. Diane Lund from Creative Wonders offered to design a beautiful cover for the CD, and in the process not only helped us with the visual look of the project, but also helped us find the words to describe what we were trying to achieve. Not only is Diane incredibly talented, she is also open to listening to the guidance she receives during her own creative process, which greatly enhanced Dream Child 's visual feel.
We are also very grateful to our website and e-marketing partners at Raised Eyebrow, who offered to get involved after they read our original scripts, and found themselves wishing they had had a CD like Dream Child when they were kids. We are absolutely delighted to have them on board, because not only are they brilliant at what they do, they also share our passion for making a positive contribution to the world. They have done amazing websites for organizations like EcoTrust, Bombs Away and Lunapads.
The Process of Creating the CD: In Nancy 's Words
As a new mom who adores having her own sleep and relaxation time, I found myself looking for sleep techniques that would help my child relax. I was also looking for music and stories that would support me in creating strong, positive belief systems for my child. There did not seem to be very much out there. In fact, I was surprised at the number of nursery rhymes and songs that had negative messages, like Rock a Bye Baby or The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe. Like many of you, I believe it is time to bring more loving ideas to our children, and clearly there is a need for songs and stories that can help us do this.
In making Dream Child , therefore, I wanted to produce something that would relieve tension in our bodies and help us to sleep. I wanted to provide music, lyrics and stories that would encourage children to face the challenges in life with a more optimistic, resourceful attitude. Ideally, it would also support children in connecting with their own inner divine guidance.
When I first heard Beverley Elliot sing, I was moved to tears by the radiance of her voice and beauty of her presence. Thought I did not know her at the time, I approached her with the idea for this children's CD, which had been percolating in my own mind. To my delight, Beverley enthusiastically jumped at the opportunity to join the project. It was she who then suggested that we contact Michael Creber and ask him to partner with us. She said that she wanted "to start at the top and call the best children's music producer around." Given Michael's wealth of experience in creating children's music (among other things, Michael has co-written and co-produced Raffi's last three albums), we were both over the moon when he too agreed to join our collaboration.
Over the course of creating Dream Child , we have each grown to love the songs and the stories it contains. As I sing the songs with my three-year-old daughter and do movements to the words, I have come full circle back to where the project started and why I was inspired to create the CD in the first place. It warms my heart to hear Faith sing such loving lyrics as “Thank You Sunshine” and “I Love You when you are happy/sad/angry/glad” – and we have great conversations about the topics in the songs and stories afterwards.
Michael, Beverly and I care deeply about children and for the planet they will inherit. One of our ways of demonstrating this care is to donate 10% our profits to cover the cost of providing these CDs to children who may not have easy access to them. We believe that assisting children in need is part of our purpose in making this music, and we are excited about encouraging their connections to spirit.
We also printed our CD cover on recycled paper. These days that may not sound too impressive, but we were surprised to learn that many people are moving back to using virgin paper. So, while the choice to use recycled paper did increase our costs in producing this children's CD (a cost we did not pass on in the price of the CD itself), we felt we had to do so. We would like to thank David from spindigitalmedia.com, who has taken on our printing, using vegetable based inks, and was able to help us keep the cost as low as possible (For the record: printing on recycled paper still costs us 300% more than using traditional non-recycled processes. Without David's generosity, it would have cost us 540% more).
We would like to encourage you to make similar choices in your own buying habits – by choosing recycled toilet paper, greeting cards and office paper, and by asking your favourite artists to use recycled paper for their CD covers. It's so easy to make choices that will support our beautiful old growth forests and allow them to continue to sustain clean air and life for us and our children. The more we all make those choices the more economically viable they will become.